Today was another day with no fixed agenda so we started out the day guzzling coffee and Irish Cream before settling down for a nap. When we both decided we might actually want to do something we selected a trip to New Bedford (which the locals call newBEDfud in their charming, heavily-accented speech) where we wanted to check out the Whaling Museum.
After about a 15 minute drive on mysteriously rough back roads, we arrived in newBEDfud and the Garmin took us right to the museum. We were fortunate enough to find a metered parking spot across the street from the museum and stuffed 2 hours worth of quarters into the little bandit and entered the beautiful building housing this facility. After parting with $14 a head, we wandered into the museum where we got to see all kinds of neat whaling memorabilia. They have all kinds of whaling equipment, good interpretive exhibits, scrimshaw, artwork, re-created whaling ships, stuff made from whale bones and baleen, a nice 2nd floor viewing platform overlooking newBEDfud and all kinds of other things made from whale and seal parts. They also have some skinny little boats that men actually went out and killed whales from which is a testament to these folks’ bravery because the boats look like they would capsize in a calm lake. They must have had enormous cajones to go out into the sea, particularly those parts of the sea where whales exist, in these tiny, narrow, flat rowboats with some harpoons and a big store of rope.
We learned that New Bedford is the largest seafood production port in the world and the view from the second floor viewing platform gives you a good impression as to why. The port is filled with thousands of fishing vessels of all sizes and types. New Bedford is also a pretty little town with magnificent buildings, even in the grimy slums down near the waterfront factories. The streets are made from little rectangular stones laid side-by-side so they are bumpy and most of the streets we went on are one way, possibly due to their narrow width. Nevertheless, this was a neat place to visit and I would go back again as long as I wasn’t required to drive on the challenging Massachusetts roads.