The Breakers in Newport

Happy Tuesday Readers! I hope your week is going well so far and you did not have too horrible a case of "the Mondays" yesterday. 

The rest of our vacation was very nice and very relaxing.  We spent some time in Cape Cod playing putt putt golf with my dad, we relaxed and were lazy for an entire day, then we made our way out to Newport, Rhode Island to visit the mansions out there.

I had never heard about the Newport Mansions until my dad mentioned them right before we came out for our visit and when I asked around, everyone was excited that we were thinking about making a trip out there to visit them.  If you are like me and had never heard of them, check out this website: http://www.newportmansions.org/.  

All together, there are 10 places that you can visit out in Newport.  Because we were limited on time, we were only able to visit on place but I honestly think it was the best place to pay a visit to.

^This is The Breakers.  The Breakers was previously owned by the Vanderbilt family before it was turned into a museum for the public to visit.  The house is 163,000 sq ft, has 70 rooms and 20 bathrooms.  

During the tour, you are not allowed to take any pictures of the inside of the house, so I can only share pictures of the outside of the house and the grounds with you.  The structure really is impressive though.

After our tour of the mansion, we made our way into the town and grabbed lunch at a local pub - I had the burger while the guys had clam chowder and sandwiches.

Overall, the weather was perfect and it was so nice to be right near the ocean hearing the waves and smelling the salty air.

How many of you are Downton Abbey fans like I am? Well, the Vanderbilts had servants much like Mr. Carson and the gang.  During our tour, I was really hoping to get to see the servants quarters to see how accurate Downton Abbey is, but The Breakers tour does not include the servants quarters. *sigh* But, after some inquisition, I was able to find out that another one of the mansions, The Elms, does a servants quarters tour.  Had we had enough time, I would have really liked to make my way there to do that particular tour.  Oh well, maybe next time! 

Question of the Day: What is your favorite historical building?