Virtual Travel – Connecticut

Our virtual travel tour takes us back to east to Connecticut. The oldest map in the collection is from 1964. The cover is a nondescript view of an early Interstate with the State Police posed in the median strip with minimal traffic.

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In Connecticut the traffic has changed but the roads are the same.

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The flip side has a collection of tourist attractions of the state.

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For 1965 a colonial church is featured. The European history of Connecticut started in 1636 as a Puritan settlement known as the Connecticut Colony. In the famous Charter Oak incident this group refused to surrender local authority to the Dominion of New England, one of the first acts of self government in the country.

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Connecticut Yankees have a history of having great ingenuity. There is no better example of this than Mystic Seaport.

The Mystic Seaport is the largest maritime museum in the United States, with a large collection of ships and buildings in a complete town.

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The transportation modes of Connecticut is featured on 1972. Located between New York and Boston, Connecticut has always been a commuter state with a large rail network for getting into the larger cities surrounding it.

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New England is known for it’s impressive fall foliage. While most visitors head to Vermont and New Hampshire, Connecticut offers some scenic fall countryside views. as shown on this 1983 map

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Connecticut’s one major airport, located between Hartford and Springfield, Massachusetts is on the cover of the 1987 map.

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The next in the series from 1989 is a scene from the Long Island Sound.

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The Long Island Sound separates Connecticut from Long Island. There are a number of ferries that cross the water thus bypassing the need of going through New York City.

We once took the New London – Orient Point ferry providing great views leaving New London and crossing the Sound.

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Since the late 1990s the maps have featured non identified scenes.

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We leave Connecticut with a postcard view of a small coastal town.

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New London, CT – May 2018 – Crossing the Long Island Sound

If you are in New England and you want to go to Long Island you can either make the drive to New York City and backtrack back out the island, or you can take a cross sound ferry.

We made a choice to take the ferry from New London, Connecticut to Orient Point, New York. With a full day in Boston, we showed up in New London in the early evening and spent the night before taking the 1st ferry of the morning.

We spent our evening in New London having dinner (an interesting experience at Tony D’s Italian restaurant) and walked the downtown area, where it was apparent the architectural firm that designed the library was the same one who had designed the Waterworks in Boston, as the buildings had a strong resemblance.

 

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The schooner Amistad is docked in the harbor.

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While along the harbor front is a row of American flags.

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A fountain celebrates the whaling history of the city.

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The New London Union Rail Station was designed by Henry Hobson Richardson in the late 1800s.

 

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A centerpiece for the town is a schoolhouse that Nathan Hale taught at before the Revolutionary War.

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The next morning we caught the ferry out of town. It offered a nice overview as we left.

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Including the impressive interstate bridge over the Thames River.

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Past the lighthouse and into the Long Island Sound.

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We were on the slow ferry since we had the car with us. Soon the passenger only Sea Jet ferry caught us and passed us in their 40 minute crossing, whereas ours took 80 minutes. But soon we were on Long Island and continued our trip.

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