Wandering on a Rainy Afternoon...

Shortly after our visit to Mystic Seaport in Mystic Connecticut, we still had plenty of time for further exploration… I’d done a little research ‘just in case’ and I’d noted that Watch Hill Rhode Island was just on the other side of the Connecticut state line and that it was listed everywhere as a scenic small town.

So, off we went! 

Watch Hill is a little isolated…several miles south off Interstate I-95.  It’s situated at the tip of a peninsula, (the most southwester point in Rhode Island), just across Little Narragansett Bay from Connecticut.  From here, boaters have easy access to Block Island Sound and Long Island Sound.

Our first impression was disappointment… This new looking ‘touristy’ shopping area is right off the main street of Watch Hill and adjacent to Watch Hill Cove.  The weather didn’t help our exploration much as it ranged from drizzle to rain while we were in town.  Despite the weather, the ‘downtown’ area was very busy and parking was at a premium.

As per Wikipedia, Watch Hill is an affluent coastal village in the Town of Westerly Rhode Island.  It gained prominence in the late 1800s and early 1900s as an exclusive summer resort.  Wealthy families built huge Victorian ‘cottages’ along the peninsula. 

This was the view along one end of the main street in the business center/shopping area in Watch Hill.  It’s uninspiring… Apparently Watch Hill’s waterfront was once lined with huge Victorian hotels.  Unfortunately, fire and hurricanes destroyed almost all of them in the 1900s.  

Despite the destruction of most of the hotels, the town still has a 629 acre historic district that is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places.  If the weather had been better and if my better half hadn’t had another idea, we probably would have explored the side streets and checked out the old homes in the village.

Note:

·         Notable current and former residents of Watch Hill include: Taylor Swift, Conan O’Brien, Andrew Mellon, Henry Ford and Clark Gable.

We decided that we’d find somewhere to have a light lunch and take a break before exploring further.  The St. Clair Annex Ice Cream and Sandwich Shop seemed to be a popular place so we decided to give it a try…

The menu was listed on a board on one wall.  Soups, hot dogs, burgers, grinders, other sandwiches, salads, etc. are offered. 

St. Clair Annex is a very casual place… Customers stand in line to place their orders and you are called when the order is ready.  Service at the counter was gruff and not terribly helpful.

We had Grey Sail Brewery Draft Flagship Ales ($5.50 each) to drink and we tried their Clam Chowder. ($5.95 cup/$7.25 bowl) We thought that the beer was very nice but that the chowder was just OK…

For a sandwich, we ordered an Italian Grinder. ($9.75) It was quite disappointing…

After our lunch, Laurie did a bit of shopping and I wandered around the waterfront taking pictures in the rain.

This is the Watch Hill Yacht Club.  This 2-story, gable-roof, shingle and stucco structure was built in 1939 on pilings in the harbor. (Watch Hill Cove) The Yacht Club was founded in 1913 but the original building was destroyed in the Great Hurricane of 1938.   The Club currently has over 400 Senior and Junior members.

Watch Hill Cove is fairly large, with the entrance channel at mid-point being 5.8 feet deep.  The cove/harbor itself is up to 9.4 feet deep.  It’s a great anchorage for small boats and mid-size yachts.  The cove is very well protected.  I’m sure that it’s quite beautiful on nice sunny days…

To view a map of Watch Hill and Watch Hill Cove, go to https://www.bing.com/search?q=watch+hill+cove+westerly+ri&qs=AS&pq=watch+hill+cove&sk=AS1&sc=2-15&cvid=1924E3EFC5B44FCFB2E19E561D5BD75A&FORM=QBRE&sp=2.

Overlooking Watch Hill Cove, this is Watch Hill Inn, originally called the Narragansett House.  Narragansett House was established in 1845.  It was one of 7 luxury hotels along the water’s edge in Watch Hill at the beginning of the 1900s.  The Great Hurricane of 1938, with its devastating winds and flooding, destroyed all but 2 of the hotels, Ocean House and Watch Hill Inn.  With new owners in 1985, this hotel was renamed Watch Hill Inn.  It has been carefully renovated over the years. 

I like boats…and I particularly like antique boats!  I was very pleased to spot Aphrodite moored in the harbor.  This ‘commuter’ yacht was built in 1937 by the Purdy Boat Company.  The original owner was John Hay Whitney, wealthy Wall Street financier, U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom, publisher of the New York Herald Tribune and President of the Museum of the Modern Art…not to mention the fact that he was a member of the wealthy and famous Whitney family. (See the following for more information about the family: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitney_family)

Each morning ‘Jock’ Whitney would commute on this beautiful 74 foot long ‘commuter yacht from his home on Long Island to his office via New York’s East River to his Wall Street office.  It was a 45 minute ride in each direction.

 

Over the years, guests on the Aphrodite included Fred Astaire, Sir Laurence Olivier, Spencer Tracy, Shirley Temple, Katherine Hepburn, Henry Ford II and Nelson Rockefeller.  During WWII, she was commissioned in the Coast Guard as CGR-557 and she spent much time ferrying dignitaries along the Atlantic coast and transporting President Roosevelt to and from his home in Hyde Park on the Hudson River. 

In 2005, after 33,000 man hours of effort, Aphrodite has been totally restored.  The reborn “Aphrodite” can be seen in action in the following video: https://usharbors.com/video-gallery/aboard-classic-1937-commuter-yacht-aphrodite.  

There was another antique yacht in Watch Hill Cove.  The Miss Asia, built in 1923, is a 1923 62 foot long Consolidated Speedway Luxury Commuter yacht. 

Back in 1924, Motor Boating Magazine stated that “these sleek and sexy power boats, capable of speeds up to 40 miles per hour, were popular with tycoons for zipping back and forth between their country estates and business offices in waterfront cities such as Chicago, Detroit and New York.”

Miss Asia was built for Lawrence Fisher of Fisher Body Works in Detroit Michigan.  She had several owners over the years.  In the 1950s she was purchased by John Jacob Astor VI, son of the famous tycoon who went down with the Titanic.  In the late 1980s, another owner, who was based out of Edgartown Massachusetts, hosted Diana, Princess of Wales aboard the Miss Asia.  In recent years she was purchased by Earl McMillen III, owner of McMillen Yachts and she was completely restored. 

We still had some time left and we could have explored Watch Hill a bit more…but that critical rule “Happy Wife, Happy Life” came into focus.  I decided that I could earn some valuable “points” by acceding to Laurie’s desire to check out our old house in Attleboro Massachusetts. 

So off we went…I-95 through Providence Rhode Island and on into Massachusetts exiting onto MA Hwy. 123 into Attleboro.  The photo above is a side view of our old home.  Laurie had no trouble finding our former abode even though we lived there for only about 7 months before my career careened back to Chicago Illinois. 

This front view is what our old Attleboro home looks like today… It hasn’t changed much and whoever lives there now has done a great job of maintaining the house.  It was probably the best constructed house we’ve ever lived in.  It had been built by a home builder for his daughter…hence extra care in its construction!  When we lived here, I was working for Stop and Shop Grocery Stores and its Bradlee’s Discount Store chain.

So, after a quick look around our old neighborhood, we headed south toward Newport Rhode Island and then turning east on RI Hwy. 138 with the rainfall coming down in increasing amounts.  After crossing the two impressive bridges that cross Narraganset Bay via Conanicut Island, we found our way back to I-95 and headed back to New London Connecticut.

Then we had to find a place for our evening meal…but that’s another story.

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave