Miles travelled
229
Where we stayed
Doubletree Hilton, Hyannis, MA. We stayed here two nights, as we couldn’t get anywhere decent further up Cape Cod, but it turned out to be a bit of a disaster. We didn’t sleep at all – the walls were so thin that we could hear everything going on outside (the air conditioning generator and pool room) and next door. It didn’t help that our neighbours decided to have a shower at 5am.
Where we ate
Lunch was a very tired and almost tearful donut at Dunkin Donuts somewhere on the way back from Race Point. We desperately needed caffeine and sugar, and this was the only thing we could find.
Dinner was much cheerier – The Black Cat Tavern, Hyannis as recommended by the front desk staff at the hotel. I had fish and chips was was really tasty (if not quite pricy) and Husband had pistachio crusted salmon.
Photos
Day Nine
When we went to bed at Foxwoods the previous night, we were quite worried that because we were so close to the lift lobby, we wouldn’t get any sleep. Thankfully, we were very wrong, and we ended up having one of the best sleeps so far! I made a promise that I wouldn’t gamble this morning so our walk to breakfast was slot machine free. I was still in a grump over losing last night, so I probably wouldn’t have done anyway. We walked back towards the Great Cedar hotel to go to Panera Bread for breakfast. I don’t ever remember seeing Panera on my previous west coast trips, they were everywhere in New England. I’m sad I didn’t visit earlier though, as I got very quickly addicted to their cinnamon rolls. We sat and watched buzzards flying overhead as we ate our breakfast, and observed that we were completely surrounded by old people (not the image I’m sure Foxwoods want to promote!) before packing up and shipping out.
This is where we made a mistake with our planning. We were driving over to Hyannis in Cape Cod where we’d spend two nights, and we knew we wanted to do both Martha’s Vineyard and the tip of Cape Cod, so we decided to leave Martha’s Vineyard for the Saturday and drive up Cape Cod today. What we hadn’t factored in was that we’d do a 2 hour drive to Hyannis, then an hour and a half to Race Point, an hour and a half back, and by then we’d be so tired we wanted to cry.
Anyway, all this was to come – what a wonderful surprise we had in store for us.
We drove the first part without a problem – 2 hours into Hyannis, but before we checked in to the hotel we made a stop at the Cape Cod Potato Chip factory. We originally joked about going to visit, but after buying some amazing waffle chips from Hannaford’s yesterday morning, we couldn’t say no. It was a great little tour – essentially a series of windows into the production line where you could see potatoes going in and chips coming out. It was really fun to watch, and completely free! At the end of the tour, they had a shop where you could take two free bags of chips. We chatted to the guy in the shop for ages – he was really lovely and we ended up buying some more chips, a bag clip, a t-shirt, and a tote bag. I miss Cape Cod chips already 😦
We dumped out bags at the hotel, had another great chat with the front desk staff, and drove up to Race Point beach. I don’t regret doing it at all, but it was so incredibly windy that I don’t think we appreciated the beach as well as we could have done. It was stunning, and I can just imagine how packed it is in the summer. We walked about 500 metres down the beach, before we couldn’t stand the wind and retreated back to the car. Our ears and jaws were in so much pain! As we stood on the beach (before we were overcome with excruciating ear pain) we both said how weird it was that this morning, we were walking through a darkened casino and now we were on a beautiful sandy beach. Quite surreal!
On the way back down the Cape, we came very close to witnessing a massive car accident, and there was a car a little way in front of us weaving all over the road, almost slamming into any car that went near it. When we eventually overtook it, we found out why – the woman was texting and not even looking at the road! It was terrifying how little care she was taking! We drove passed her as quickly as we could. We also experienced our first school bus stop – we were on the other side of the road but we still had to stop when the bus lights started flashing. We’d read about this law before we went over and thought people surely wouldn’t abide by the law, but they did! It was very surprising.
Now feeling so very very tired, we stopped at a Dunkin Donuts to have some coffee and it took so long to actually get served that we almost collapsed with relief when we finally had coffee in our hands. We got back to the hotel for our usual afternoon chill out, before getting changed for dinner. We walked to Main Street Hyannis and then to the Harbor – it took about 15 minutes and it was a fairly easy walk. We went to the Black Cat Tavern to have a fishy dinner which was very tasty. The restaurant was really busy and lively, and it was a fun place to eat – a great recommendation. We walked back to the hotel, taking a different route so we could see the other part of the main town, and settled in for sleep.
untold blisses 