Vacation #3: Hansen Family Reunion

Part 1 of many posts, I'm sure :)

After we drove home from Utah, we had a couple of days to do laundry and repack. For our next vacation, we were going to Castine, Maine to rent a beach house for my family's reunion. We left Oregon on July 29th and flew a red eye to Boston, MA. Since flying across the country with 6 people isn't exactly cheap, we used Garrett's saved up mileage and flew for free--hence the red eye flight and the flying into Boston instead of Maine. We got there early and had a few days to catch up on some sleep and sightsee in Boston before we were supposed to meet everyone in Maine on August 1st.

Bella at the airport

The redeye flight went as well as I expected. The first half went pretty well and the last few hours were never-ending! We didn't have a ticketed seat for Bella, so she was on my lap the whole time but she ended up sleeping for the first 2-3 hours. Paige slept pretty much the whole time; Lydia slept on and off, but wasn't too cranky and Maggie watched a movie for the first hour and a half, slept a couple of hours, but then was awake and cranky for the rest of the flight. I dozed when I could, but didn't get much sleep. When we got to Boston, it was 6 am (3 am Portland time). We called to see if we could check into our hotel early because usually they don't let you check in until the afternoon, but luckily they let us. So we ate a quick breakfast at the hotel and then bribed the girls with swimming after lunch if they took a nap. Miraculously, everyone was able to nap for a good 3 hours. So we went swimming, ate lunch/dinner at the Rainforest Cafe (pretty cool place: a first time for us), then went to see Ice Age 3. Then it was back to the hotel to get a good nights sleep!

July 31

We decided for one of our sightseeing days (we'd have a few more days in Boston after our Maine vacation) that we would drive to Salem, Massachussettes to check out the town of the famous Salem Witch Trials. I thought this was a neat little town and I learned a lot. My kids were scared of the whole idea of witches and didn't want to go anywhere. We finally did convince them to go to one museum with us and they closed their eyes and plugged their eyes pretty much the whole time. Such funny girls! The museum we went to see was called the "Salem Witch Museum".
This is from their website:
"She afflicts me! She comes to me at night and torments me! She's a witch!"
Words such as these struck terror into the hearts of Salem townspeople in the early spring of 1692 as hysterical young girls called out names. By summer, 180 people had been accused and imprisoned - defenseless against accusations of witchcraft in a society driven by superstition and fear. The court, formed to try the victims, acted quickly. Bridget Bishop was tried on June 2 and hanged on June 10 thereby setting the precedent for a summer of executions. In total, nineteen men and women were hung to death. In addition, one man was crushed to death; seven others died in prison and the lives of many were irrevocably changed.
The Salem Witch Museum brings you there, back to Salem 1692. Visitors are given a dramatic history lesson using stage sets with life-size figures, lighting and a narration - an overview of the Witch Trials of 1692.
I quite enjoyed being there and learning more about something that I didn't know much about. We mostly walked around the town and went into some shops, looking for a souvenier T-shirt for me. We were meeting my parents in Portland, Maine that night so we left and drove a few hours to meet them. We ate dinner at I-HOP and went back to our hotels for bed.

August 1
My sister Tiffany and her family and my brother Tad and his family were getting in this morning and so we all met at our hotel. It was so great to see everyone! I hadn't seen my brother and his family in over two years--and I had never met their little girl Mailei either. We were meeting my other sisters Charee and Megan and their families at the house later that evening. After everyone finally got there, we went out to lunch at Chili's.

Micah, Grant, Tiffany, Paige and Bella

Brooks, Hayden, Micah (blondie in front), Grant, Tiffany and Paige

This was everyone...it's hard to see everyone in the back, I know.

After lunch, we drove up to Castine (90 minutes from Bar Harbor) which was supposed to be a three-four hour drive. It took us five because we took a scenic route along the coast and we hit quite a bit of traffic. It was a pretty drive, though and we got to see lots of cute little towns. When we arrived at the house, my sister Charee had been there for awhile and my other sister Megan was just getting there. It was fun to see them again, too.

We stayed at a really old (100+ years) place in Castine called Northrop Cottage. It was huge! It had 10 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, 4 porches, 3 full floors and more than 7,000 square feet of living space. It fit all 26 of us quite comfortably and it was quite a maze. The place could have used a little fixing up, and some new furniture, but it was a really neat house.

Northrop Cottage

We all got there in the evening and realized that there was no food in the house at all. So my dad and a few of my brothers-in-law went out to find some dinner. But since Castine is so small there really aren't a lot of options, food wise. So they stopped in at a bar and ordered some pizzas. Trying to feed 26 hungry people...there's entertainment! It reminded me of Home Alone, except with not so many pizzas! :) These are pictures of everyone waiting for food...

Bella

Tiffany, mom, Garrett and Paige
Mom, Bella, Garrett, Paige, Megan
Charee, Mailei, Solviej and Tad

Tad, Micah, Grant, Rachel, Emily and Hayden

More to come from our adventures in Maine....