The Distracted Wanderer

Located just shy of the Massachusetts border, the northernmost section of Connecticut's Air Line State Park Trail  can be found near the intersections of East Thompson Road and New Road in the Quiet Corner section of the state. The 50-mile linear former rail bed passes through eleven towns in eastern Connecticut - East Hampton, Colchester, Hebron, Columbia, Lebanon, Windham, Chaplin, Hampton, Pomfret, Putnam, and Thompson - and is divided into sections designated South (22 miles: East Hampton to Windham), North (21 miles: Windham to Putnam), and the Thompson addition (6.6 miles: Thompson to the Massachusetts state line.) The popular greenway that is now used by hikers, bikers, and horseback riders was once upon a time the site of the Boston and New York Air-Line Railroad (later the New York and New England Railroad (NY&NE) carrying passengers on what was then the most direct route from Boston to New York or vice versa. The rail line opened in 1873 and underwent various owner...

I should probably warn you that this post is actually going to end up being at least two posts (nope, it ended up being three!) as I took so many photos in spite of the lousy weather that descended upon us that there's no way that I could put them all into one post - not without creating the Mother of All Blog Posts at any rate! After leaving the beauty of Jackson and the Christmas Farm Inn and Spa behind, my mother, Jamie, and I backtracked south a little bit to North Conway which is known as "the birthplace of American skiing." North Conway is the largest village within the town of Conway and it became a major tourist area after people had a glimpse at some of the White Mountain Art that over 400 painters popularized in the 19th century. Once the Portsmouth, Great Falls & Conway Railroad extended service to North Conway in 1872, the place really became all the rage and that's when all of the grand hotels that used to exist in the area were built. Most of ...