Licensed! And Vacation!

So soon for another post, considering it had been months since my previous one :) Austin and I spent the end of this week in Mystic, CT, at a Bed and Breakfast called Whaler's Inn, enjoying a short, but much needed vacation! Like the previous post said, this semester has been crazy busy, so it was nice to get away. We left MA Wed. night and made it to Mystic in just under two hours.
Outside our B&B, The Whaler's Inn.

Thursday morning, Austin drove to Cromwell, CT, where he was interviewed by a panel of other ECC pastors, and was officially given "two thumbs up" for continuing the ordination process! I am so proud of him, and as of Thursday, he is officially a licensed pastor for the Evangelical Covenant Church (www.covchurch.org). Basically, he can now "marry and bury" people, and perform other pastoral duties.

After his interview, we enjoyed lunch at Mystic Pizza, made famous by the Julia Roberts movie. The pizza was YUMMY! We then headed to the the Mystic Seaport, a large museum about the town of Mystic, the whaling and boating industry, and other sea-like things. It was really neat, but my favorite part was being able to board the Charles Morgan, the last wooden whaling ship that still exists. It was built in 1841, and they are now undergoing the process of restoring it. We got to walk around the deck, and the upper two levels, seeing how the whalers lived while they were out on the ocean. It was really cool to see, but sad to hear about all the whales that were killed.




The Mystic Pizza sign... I really wanted to get a t-shirt with the slogan, but Austin wouldn't let me :)



This is a view from the inside of the Morgan, overlooking the Mystic River
This is the Morgan, the ship they are restoring. I tried to make Austin look like he was holding the boat up, but it didn't work so well :)

Wed. night we went out for a fancy dinner (no pictures). REALLY good if you ever get a chance to to the Daniel Packer Inn (http://www.danielpacker.com)

Thursday morning we woke up early to head off to Groton and New London, which are nearby. We really wanted to visit those towns, because it is the place that Austin's grandparents, Jim and Eleanor Calhoun, met each other almost 70 years ago! At that time, Austin's granddad was stationed at the Groton Naval Base, and his grandmother was attending school at Connecticut College. They are literally were right across the Thames River from each other.

In Groton, we drove around the outside of the base, then checked out the US Navy Submarine Museum, which was pretty neat. We got to board the USS Nautilus, which was the first nuclear powered submarine. As with the Morgan, we got to go inside the sub, and it was really neat to see how the soldiers lived. From the outside, the sub looks huge, but it was very tight quarters inside! We then headed over the river to Connecticut College, to take some pictures for Austin's grandmother! It was a beautiful campus!
In front of the USS Nautilus.


The entrance to the US Naval Submarine base, where Austin's granddad was briefly stationed


The entrance to Connecticut College, where Austin's grandmother attended.

After grabbing lunch in New London, we headed back out to check out two local vineyards on the CT Wine Trail. While they were both nice, and Jonathan Edwards (http://www.jedwardswinery.com) was beautiful, we really liked Stonington Vineyard http://www.stoningtonvineyards.com) and got to take a very cool tour of how they make the wine. I think in the future we're going to try to check out more vineyards on the Connecticut Wine Trail!