The Brigand's New England Tennis Trip 2003

After a jaunt to Ireland and then a relaxing Caribbean cruise, where would my adventures take me next? This time I decided to stay in the States... My dad is always saying how there's so much to see in this country, why would I want to visit elsewhere? It sounded like a good idea, so I set my mind to figure out where to go and what to do with a week's time in the summer. After some research, I found out that Nike runs tennis camps for adults all over the United States. The most widely praised one is held in Amherst, Massachusetts. So I figured, why not design this trip around my favorite activity? A week in New England in July would HAVE to be nicer than in Texas!

~~ Saturday, July 12 ~~

Somewhere over America...
I love taking pictures from the window of a jet flying high over the clouds!
I had to fly from DFW to O'Hare in Chicago and then into Boston Logan.

When I got to Boston, I had to pick up my rental car and head west immediately. I had reserved a room for the night in Greenfield, Mass., a town not too far north of Amherst. I had just barely estimated the traveling time correctly, as I pulled in about 10 minutes before the time I had told the owner I'd be there - 8 pm. After a long day flying and driving, I packed it in and got some rest for the long next day.

This is the Candlelight Motel, where I stayed in Greenfield, with my rental car in front. It certainly was a pleasant change in surroundings and temperature compared to where I had left earlier in the day!

Sunday morning I had some time to go driving around and just check stuff out. Tennis camp didn't begin until like 2 pm, so I made the most of my free time.

I had read in one of the travel brochures for the area that there was some tower that afforded a marvelous view of the surrounding area. At breakfast I asked my waitress if she was familiar with it, and she pointed me toward what she thought I was talking about. Turned out it was some shopping center with an aluminum tower about 20 feet tall. Yeah, I'm sure it is more memorable to most people. But as you know, I'm not most people. So I drove around peering at street signs, connected the right back roads, and made it up the side of the smallish mountain to the place I was looking for, Poet's Seat tower.

This cool place was fairly old, and had been used by some poet to get inspiration for his work. I'm sure it did the trick, because after climbing the freaky staircase to the top, the views of the surrounding area were fantastic.

This picture was taken looking west over Greenfield town. Look how they have CLAY courts in the town! Awesome!

This picture looks east over what I believe is the Connecticut River. I love all the trees and hills. It was about 9 in the morning and no one was around. Very quiet and peaceful.

Here's the requisite picture of me in front of the background of some distant place. This time it's Greenfield, Massachusetts, whoopee! :-)

Don't ask what the graffiti on the wall says. I couldn't read it there and I certainly can't tell in this picture.

It seems I'm always "lucky" enough to come across some pot-related graffiti on vacation. (Remember the "reefer trailer" in Ireland? And, well, Jamaica the previous year... the whole country seemed pot-related.) This moron command was on one of the parking bumpers at the tower.