Perseverance in Connecticut

Day 36 - Friday, August 19, 2022

Worthington Vineyard and Winery, Somers, CT

At 61 degrees when we wake, we are pleased to say we slept without the air conditioner on last night.  Skies are overcast and the 68% precipitation predicted will cause folks in the drought plagued area to do their happy dance.  

Herb turns on the diesel heat and 110 heat for me early.  The light rain soon stops  and we now welcome the sunshine, which warms to 65 degrees.

Highway 1 is the road we take coming out of Duval's RV Park, and it is very, very busy with traffic speeding along at 70 mph.  Sweet Georgia Brown will stop at the stop sign before turning left toward our next destination, so Herb and Doug think the best thing to do is get out EARLY before traffic builds.  Doug jokes, "You picked a fine time to leave me, Lucille!"

Eight o'clock in the morning sounds like cruel and unusual punishment to me, as I like getting on the road around 10am.  However, I take a couple of photos around the RV park before shedding a tear to leave.  I think the puppy dog kicking over his watering can is cute, and I love the steps on decks built beside the RVs that stay parked here as vacation homes -- they look like drawer pulls.

7:45 am sees us leaving the exit to Duval's RV Park, and onto Hwy 1, also known as the Blue Star Memorial Highway, and we are fifteen minutes ahead of our schedule. Driving through Ogunquit and York for the last time (this year), I take a photo of some buildings that we have passed day after day when going to the beaches.

I love the name of the river Piscataqua, that separates the state of Maine from the state of New Hampshire, and wonder who named it and why.  There's so much history to be learned.  When we cross the river, we are welcomed by New Hampshire.

Soon the state of Massachusetts welcomes us as we pass the reddish-brown metal sculpture of a dog that was created in 2006 by local metal sculptor, Dale Rogers of Haverhill MA.  I wondered about the significance, and learned that Rogers had said, "When you create pieces that make people question why, it builds a long lasting impression."

The state of Connecticut welcomes us with lots of curvy roads, steep hills and warnings to slow down, slow down.

Worthington Vineyard and Winery is our destination today and in spite of the slow downs with construction and a one lane road, we arrive at 11:45 after only a four hour drive.  This is a Harvest Host member, which means they provide an area to park free with no hookups, and ask that we make a purchase at their facility.  

When we check in, our host tells us to park up the hill on the grass, and Herb finds a mostly level spot that Sweet Georgia Brown can become perfectly level on.  With no electricity furnished by Harvest Host, our generator provides power in the now 86 degree heat.

The wine tasting begins around 5:30 and we are curious to see what kind of wines they have.   We passed a vineyard on the way in and have a lot of questions about the operation.  Who could not love a grapevine, especially if it has grapes on it?   I see a blue grape, with a green and purple yet to ripen.

The tasting room has comfortable seating, sofas, tables and even a fireplace for those cool winter evenings.  We choose a table near a back door that leads onto a patio, then down the stairs to several sitting areas in the yard.

We are given a choice of purchasing a flight of different wines, but seeing that many are on the sweet side, we decide on just getting a bottle of the driest red they have.  We meet Michelle and Bill from Connecticut, who tell us they have moved to Florida but are back to take their daughter to a college in Maine.  They have just finished their flight.

We think our choice, named Perseverance, is quite nice.  "What's in a name?  A dry red wine by any other name would taste as dry."  (Slightly plagiarized from Shakespeare)

Willie of Sweet Georgia Brown,

   and of Walldog and Willie

   Friday, August 19, 2022