It's Always Fun for Everyone When Grandma/pa Comes (part 2)

MYSTIC SEAPORT
On Monday, we headed to Mystic Seaport. I'd been with the kids to the aquarium before but never the seaport. It was a really REALLY great day! Nice weather, pretty nice kids (hee hee), nice company, and nice place. We spent a full day and still didn't see it all.

Mary and Andrew knocked out of their whaling boat!


A much calmer boatride than the one above. Notice all the pretty sailboats in the background. For a mere $800, your teenager too can learn to sail at a 5 day sailing camp they offer. The kids even live aboard an old ship used just for that purpose. I wish I had a spare $800--it looked like fun.

I love this picture of Rita and Annie. We rode the water taxi from one side of the seaport to the other. The kids loved it.

I think Whit would have climbed over the edge if she could have. I wish that girl had a little more fear in her. :)

Evidence of our inability to take a good picture.

The seaport was set up as an old village and there were lots of buildings you could go in, lots of boats you could go on and look at. We had to pause outside the store that sold cigars in memory of good ole Durham tobacco. The Indian woman was holding a Durham tobacco box, so Matt posed with honor and respect. The kids couldn't figure out what he was doing.

One of the parts the kids liked the most was the "Children's Museum". They had so much fun dressing up like sailors, swabbing the decks, cooking meals at sea, 'fishing'.

Still wondering why my kids love pretend chores and hate real ones?!

Land ho! (or something)

They also loved the mini bunk beds for the sailors. I tried to make them take a real nap but no one was interested.

Throughout the day there were different demostrations put on. There was a fun play put on called "A Whaler's Tale" (I think). Mary and Andrew were picked from the crowd to be part of the show. Talk about being excited!

Here they are in costume. Andrew was a seasoned seaman and Mary was a greenhand.

Kind of looks like a pirate to me.

So excited!

There's Mary. They were probably on stage for 15 minutes.

Andrew had to laugh a lot with his part. He picked up on it pretty quickly.

They are on opposite ends doing some whaler's pledge or something.

Whit and Annie had to be distracted since they hadn't quite caught on that their siblings were on the road to stardome at that exact moment.

Between shots of Mary and Andrew in the play, I got this cute one of Matt and Whit looking at the water.

We looked at a few more ships, had a yummy lunch of fish and chips, got ice cream, and were utterly exhausted by the end of the day. The initial hope had been to head to the beach as well, but we're saving that for another day.

Here are a few more shots from the day.