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Peters 69th Birthday 06/16/18

For my 69th birthday, Sue orchestrated a wonderful day for me. It started with sausage, eggs, and home made croissants out on the screen porch. The day was supposed to be quite warm and sunny, and the morning was giving every indication that was in the works.

Later, she drove us up to Wolfeboro where we wandered around the dock area until 11:45 when we boarded the Millie B.

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Waiting by the dock for our boat trip.

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The Millie B ready for boarding! Beautiful, just beautiful.

The Millie B is a 28-foot, mahogany, triple cockpit “woodie” that is a replica a 1928 Hacker-Craft. The boat is operated by the N.H. Boat Museum, and provides 45 minute tours around Wolfeboro Bay on Lake Winnipesaukee.

As soon as we cleared the dock area, the driver threw the hammer down, and away we went, spray blasting over the bow. As you can see from the picture of me with my hair flying around, we were moving out, crashing though the 6 inch chop created by the brisk breeze blowing across the lake.

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Do I look like I'm having fun, or what!

Lake Winnipesaukee is so beautiful. It can be dangerous, though, as you have something like a 13 mile open fetch that can build up some very treacherous waves. Even today with just about a 15 mph breeze blowing, the chop was enough to be sure the boat was kept into the swells. Not that it would tip over, but it certainly wouldn't be pleasant for the passengers to be caught broadside in a series of them.

But the wind had begun to abate even as we approached the dock at the end of our short adventure. The docks were packed with boats; there wasn't a slip open that I could see. And people were everywhere. Sue and I walked up onto North Main Street, and visited a couple of the galleries until I spotted a hot dog cart.

Sue could see the glimmer in my eye, and got me a terrific dog loaded with sauerkraut and all the works piled on. Loved it! I shared only a bite with her as she hadn't seemed interested in a dog, but rather ice cream. I was wrong on that one, as I came to find out later....

We wandered around a couple more shops and then stopped in at our favorite bookstore, The Country Bookseller. We enjoyed browsing the aisles for just a little while, and were then off to get Sue her ice cream. That's where I found out she had wanted more of my hot dog. She told me she'd buy me my own cone but wouldn't share hers with me.

I was stuffed from breakfast and my dog, but, sure, why not? I asked for a kiddie cone thinking I'd get a small serving that I could put right down. But no. A kiddie cone here was more like an adult size. It had three huge scoops with fudge and vanilla dripping down the sides of the cone from the heat, and onto my hand.

I was stuffed by the time I finished that ice cream cone off. At first I felt guilty, but it was my birthday. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it.

Then Sue drove me over to the N.H. Boat Museum. We had been wanting to visit there since last year. Not sure why we didn't make it because it was so much fun.

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One of the classic boats at the NH Boat Museum that we saw.

Before leaving the museum, I bought a really nice short sleeve, light gray, knit shirt embroidered with "N.H. Boat Museum" on it. We didn't want to go back home through Wolfeboro because it was graduation, and we knew with that as well as this was the final weekend of Bike Week, the traffic could be awful. Who wants to fight traffic....

Sue knew how to keep going on the road we were on, and then take the back roads south. We were having so much fun exploring that we ended up taking some really rutted roads around Lake Wentworth, then through Milton, and then winding around down and through Farmington.

When we were about 20 minutes away from the Alton Circle Store, I called Jack's Pizza, and ordered a large Chicken, Broccoli, and Garlic. As soon as we got home, Sue opened the pizza and cut it up while I grabbed a beer from the fridge. As she made some kind of drink for herself, I set up the backgammon board on the screened porch. We toasted to a wonderful day, and had a nice party.

By the time we had finished eating and running a few sets of backgammon (a set is 3 games), we went inside and watched the really interesting 2017 movie The Post. But after that was over, we just crawled up to bed and went right to sleep. I can't believe how tired I was. I was just gone....

Sue gave me a wonderful birthday: her terrific ideas of neat stuff she knew I'd enjoy, and her time sharing it with me.

Here's the Yelp review that I wrote:

My wife got reservations for us on the Millie B for my birthday in June of 2018, and we then toured the NH Boat Museum.

The boat ride is really fun. And even though there was a fairly stiff breeze blowing up some chop, the Millie B just plowed through it all. Just be aware that getting wet is all part of the trip.... I want to do it again!

The NH Boat Museum is still housed in its location on Center Street, and you can see how great it will be when they move into their new spot in a couple of years - hopefully.

Be sure you watch the historic video before going through the museum itself so you get a better sense for the things that you'll see. This isn't a big museum, and if you don't appreciate the historical significance of these boats and life in the Lakes Region, then you probably won't enjoy the 5 minutes that you'll spend walking through the exhibit. My wife and I savored each boat and read all of the documentation, and really enjoyed it.




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