Tags
Connecticut, Local, Nautilus, photo, Rhode Island, Submarine, travel
Our time in the tiny state of Rhode Island was a mere 2 hours. We did not know what to see or do in Rhode Island. Aya was able to find out online that “the breakers” was a must see. We did not know what the breakers was. We showed up and it is a massive mansion.
Wikepedia describes it best:
The Breakers was built as the Newport summer home of Cornelius Vanderbilt III, a member of the wealthy United States Vanderbilt Family. It is built in an Italian Renaissance style. The 70-room mansion has a gross area of 125,339 square feet and 62,482 square feet of living area on five floors. The house was constructed between 1893 and 1895. The Ochre Point Avenue entrance is marked by sculpted iron gates and the 30-foot (9.1 m) high walkway gates are part of a 12-foot-high limestone and iron fence that borders the property on all but the ocean side. The footprint of the house covers approximately an acre of the 13-acre estate on the cliffs overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
We did not care to drop $20 each to look inside the building, the free views from outside were spectacular. We did stroll up and down the seawall in front of these buildings to see the views.
Right next door to the breakers, we found this private mansion. It was unbelievable, this is one persons house!
After our brief stop in Rhode Island, we moved further south into Connecticut. We did stop and purchase a Power Ball Lottery Ticket, but even if we win the $40 Million prize, I doubt we could purchase one of these homes with a measly 40 million. But we could get a kick ass RV with that kind of money and keep this travelling circus on the road.
On to Connecticut
We passed a road sign on the Interstate in Connecticut that said there was a Submarine Museum nearby.
A few old subs were on display outside.
When we were in Pearl Harbour, Hawaii we learned about one of these subs being found minutes before the main attack.
Inside the museum there was tons of information on Cold War sub operations. Hydrophones that are set up around North America to listen for enemy subs entering. Coverage of the 4 Soviet Subs that were detected around Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It was an extremely interesting read, but the main attraction here is the USS Nautilus- the worlds first Nuclear Powered Submarine.
The Nautilus was launced in 1954 and was the worlds first operational Nuclear powered Submarine. Nuclear subs are able to stay submerged far longer than traditional diesel electric subs.
Unfortunately only half of the vessel is open to tour, and this does not include the engine room or Nuclear stuff. So this was very similar to the USS Drum Submarine we saw in Alabama.
Due to RV park availability in New York City we have pushed back our NYC time a week. We are in upstate New York burning a week before the big apple.