We waited for Mom to finish her radiation this morning and then headed out to Newport. James has never seen any of the mansions and I wanted to see what they looked like "decked for Christmas." (Of course the irony is that all the Newport mansions were only "summer cottages" and in use for 10 weeks during the warm part of the year and none of them would have ever been used at Christmas. Nevertheless, it looked really nice.) It was another pretty blue-and-white day and I took advantage of the nice weather to take a different route, down 114 instead of 136. Dad didn't like going through the towns of Barrington, Warren, and Bristol, but the traffic wasn't bad and we had a chance to see the various areas decorated for the holidays.

If you're going to see one Newport mansion, the Breakers is the one to see. They include the kitchen and the butler's pantry as part of the tour, along with the main part of the house, so you get an idea how the entire home worked. This was the home of Cornelius Vanderbilt, grandson of the Cornelius Vanderbilt who made his fortune in New York steamboats and then railroads. The brother of the younger Cornelius, William, also had a home in Newport: Marble House on Bellevue Avenue (you see this most often in documentaries about Newport Society, chiefly due to the Marble House's ballroom, which is covered walls and ceiling in gold leaf).

Needless to say, the Breakers is a fabulous place and looks all the better decorated in Christmas Victorian style with roping, garlands, period toys (including dolls and a fab toy horse), and different styles of Christmas trees. The rooms are filled with authentic furniture in French and Italian styles, Tiffany glassware and china, marble walls (indeed, entire rooms) constructed in Italy, then disassembled, crated, and shipped to Rhode Island, then reassembled within the house. One room has designs painted on silver, another with then rare-aluminum plates (they cost more than platinum when the house was built). The ceilings of different rooms are inlaid with gold or painted by noted artists in themes like the Four Seasons. A theme of dolphins runs throughout the house, not just because the home was on the shore, but because the architect loved them.

We saw the morning and music rooms, the men's billiard room, the great hall, the upper and lower loggias, and the main bedrooms and baths, and of course the magnificent doorways, halls, and stairs. It's indescribable, really; no description will do, only a visit in person will do.

After a bite to eat, we had my favorite part of the afternoon. We'd headed out so late that it was approaching sunset when we reached Brenton Point. Mom was cold and said she'd stay in the car, but James and I took the cameras and walked along the sea wall. The ocean was a wonderful silvery blue-grey color, shading dark and light between the combers. The tide was coming in and the surf was wild and wonderful against the outjutting rocks of Brenton Point, and there were only a few people out watching the surf. This is the best time to come to the beach: it's pristine and still and open and free. We waited until the sun set and then walked back to the car; Mom had been unable to resist the beautiful sunset and had come out of the car to watch it. Before he died, she and my dad would always go outside to watch the sun setting over the field across the street from our house.

We found a station playing Christmas music and had that to "light our way home."

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. . . . . noted and logged by Linda at 11:15:00 PM

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