travel – Page 22 – Destination NOW

Global Volunteers, Cook Islands

Let me introduce you to Global Volunteer’s Vaca 139. Why “Vaca”? Because it is the Maori word for boat, and it serves as a reminder that we are all in the same boat–we’re in this together.

The 139 is self explanatory: we are the 139th group of Global Volunteers to serve in Rarotonga. Of Vaca 139’s ten volunteers, six have been here before, which speaks volumes about this assignment. Half of the group will be staying for two weeks. I am one of the five that opted for three weeks.

Standing: Dave, Larry, Willy Middle: James, Lynda, Shelley, Bud Front: Robyn, Patrick, Sally, Niki — Standing: Dave, Larry, Willy
Middle: James, the country manager, Lynda, Shelley, Bud
Front: Robyn, Patrick, Sally, Niki

So what were we going to do during our stay? Larry and Sally split their time between the prison and the high school. When she was not in jail, Sally was a one woman “beautifier”, sprucing up the exterior of Tereora College. She was leaving HER mark in flowers, while Larry, a former math teacher, gave his students practical skills, such as learning how to calculate nutritional values and convert celsius to fahrenheit.

Robyn and Dave worked in Titikavaka College. Bud, an Ob/Gyn, returned to the hospital to offer his assistance, and Lynda worked with the Ministry of Education, developing plans for special needs children.

Willy and Niki, Patrick and I were delighted to be assigned to an elementary school. Papa Patrick, an artist from Florida, very thoughtfully brought along a suitcase full of watercolors and paper. He spent the first two of the three weeks at the school, helping the children make cards; the last week he taught disabled adults at the Creative Center with Lynda.

Uncle Willy worked with the third graders during class time.

Can you see why it required more than one attempt to photograph THIS group?

Once the drums started beating (yes, that’s right–there are no bells, there are drums that mark the start and finish of school periods) he was out in the field, playing soccer with boys of ALL ages, regardless of the heat and humidity.

If you would like a more vivid drumming experience, Just click on this YouTube link.

Niki and I preferred more sedentary (and cooler) ways to interact with the children during “free” time. During the school day, she worked one on one with fourth and fifth graders.

My first week was spent helping out in the office. Their secretary had abruptly quit right before we arrived, leaving a mountain of unfinished paperwork. A basic principle of Global Volunteers is that you do whatever you are asked to do, so I got busy copying, doing excel spreadsheets, data entry, and report cards. James figured that my years in the insurance industry would mean I was good at office work. I didn’t bother to tell him that wasn’t quite what I did, and once I left the world of paid employment, I said goodbye to PCs to become an Apple devotee. I was shocked at how much windows and excel had changed in just a couple of years! Fortunately, speed was not important, and I was able to figure it out–although the copy machine WAS a bit of a struggle.

The best part of my assignment was I shared the principal’s office, so I got to know this warm, gracious, interesting woman. Because she had recently married, she generously shared her wedding photos and the stories about people in them, her extended family.

In the principal's office — Engia, the principal, and her new secretary

Of course, I was able to take several breaks during the day to play and read with the children, who LOVED to have their photos taken, AND to take photos. Here are a few schoolyard shots.

Stay tuned for the next post–the coronation!

Geologic Wonders

A photo just doesn’t do the Te Puia bubbling mud pools justice. I was mesmerized, watching them pop up and flatten down. If there were such things as witches’ cauldrons, I imagine they would look exactly like this.

But the real show was the Pohutu Geyser.

Hmmm, that wasn’t all that special…but wait…

It’s getting better…
Our guide, Albert, took this photo of Mike.

Mike’s quite a distance from the geyser, so it gives you an idea of the size of the water column. But there is more to come.
NOW you’re talking!

Speaking of Albert, here he is with our Maori guide.

While I was busy photographing Albert, Mike was surrounded by a crowd of Asian women. Just like in Thailand, but this time only one wanted to be photographed with him, so I wasn’t fast enough to capture the scene. Mike was only to happy to explain to me that his new friend told him he was very handsome…
But back to the tour. After viewing the geological wonders, we visited the woodworking school.

This one is my favorite.

Blowing Off Steam

I didn’t think that anything could come close to being as glorious as yesterday’s experience in the Waitomo Caves. I was wrong. The Waimangu Valley Geothermal Site was equally magnificent, but in a very different way. This valley is the only geothermal system on the planet that was created by a volcano–the Tarawera eruption of 1886.

The result was Lake Rotomohana. Our group was divided in two, with half cruising the lake first while the other half hiked, and then we switched. Our boat was the only one on the lake that morning, and with only 18 passengers, it was easy to get an unobstructed view of all the geothermal phenomenon. Before the volcano erupted, what is now Patiti Island was part of a small hill. It became a lava plug, cooled, and is now home to cormorants.
The steam vents fascinated me, so I kept snapping away.

The hike gave us the opportunity to get close to craters and geysers.
The lake water is acidic. It looks like it is boiling because of the gases (carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulphide) bubbling up to the surface.
Here is our smiling guide Chas, holding a silver fern, one of New Zealand’s symbols. Do you think he usually carries a Winnie the Pooh back pack in front? Something to look for in future installments.
More bubbles, then time to head back for lunch.

Pretty amazing, right?
Once again, our guides came up with a great lunch venue. The Princess Gate Hotel has it all: an owner that welcomed us with a brief history of the hotel, fantastic food, wonderful ambiance, and a location close to the most beautiful section of Rotorua.

After lunch, we had time to stroll through the gardens, and ogle the beautiful buildings.

Our Last Day in Amazing Auckland

Have you ever experienced an inspiring teacher? Been completely enthralled by a lecture? That is what our entire third day was like, being with the amazing Dr. John Walsby. He is truly a Walking Wikipedia — botany, geology, history, architecture, zoology, marine biology–you name it, he can speak at length about it. Although his extensive knowledge was impressive, what was most memorable was his delivery. He talks with his entire body. For example, he didn’t just say “boom” when describing a volcanic eruption — instead, his whole body exploded–with arms and legs flying in all directions. Dr. Walsby is a writer, an artist, a marine biologist, the author of 5 books, weekly contributor to Nature Watch, a newspaper column, and one of the most entertaining and memorable speakers I’ve ever encountered. So, what did we learn?

Although we tend to lump Australia and New Zealand together, that island just to the west of New Zealand is about 1,200 miles away.

New Zealand’s weather is influenced by its location midway between the equator and Antarctica. It gets warm air from Australia and cold air from Antarctica, which makes for plenty of rainfall. The North Island gets many brief showers, averaging about 4 feet per year. The joke is that Auckland gets all four seasons, frequently within the same day. Despite cloudy skies in many of the photos, the weather has been quite lovely!

Some of his more memorable analogies:
The earth is like an egg cooked in a microwave: a solid core surrounded by an ocean of magma with a cracked crust.
Volcanic activity is like tea being brewed on the top of Mount Everest or a bottle of champagne being uncorked, with the crust on top being the cork. Important fact–volcanoes don’t erupt in the same place twice. Once it goes dormant, it is done.
The formation of New Zealand was compared to a scab that formed on your knee (the knee being Australia) that gets “flicked off”.

Our first stop, Lake Pupuke, was created from a volcanic eruption. A mile across and a half a mile deep, it supplies fresh water for the nearby town of Devonport.

Here is Dr. Walsby, demonstrating what happens when a pukeko gets frightened. The pukeko flushes a white tail to warn his compatriots of impending danger. Had I been faster with my camera, I would have caught him flashing the white handkerchief tucked into the back of his pants.

And here is a REAL pukeko.

This beautiful flower is fertilized by birds, rather than insects. It’s “lady parts” are on the outside, rather than the inside of the flower to make it easier for the birds to do their important work. Can you see the long appendage?

Our next stop is Takapuna beach to see the fossilized trees. When the lava flowed from the volcano, the trees were snapped at the base, with a portion of the trunk remaining. It became encased in hot lava. The flows are clearly visible around what was once a tree trunk.

Dr. Walsby in action.

Our final stop was at North Head, a great spot for our group photo.

I’m not pressing my luck–I’m going for the upload! Thank you Queensland Airport!

Amazing Auckland, Day Two

One of the many reasons we thoroughly enjoy Road Scholar trips is their high quality lecturers. Wednesday morning, New Zealand journalist and author, Gordon McLaughlin, gave us a brief overview of this very young nation. Some interesting facts and figures:

New Zealand is the last land mass to be inhabited, settled by the Maori about 800 years ago. DNA analysis has proven that the Maori migrated from Taiwan, providing a perfect example of Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest. The long ocean voyage was an endurance test that only the strongest, biggest and fittest could pass.

In the 1840’s, the Maori were joined by settlers from the United Kingdom, with the those of European descent now making up the majority of the population. About 3.5 million live on the North Island, mainly in Auckland, with about 1 million inhabiting the South Island.

New Zealand was the first country to allow women to vote, in 1893; at one time the top three government positions were held by women.

In 1898, New Zealanders instituted an old age pension, with free health care since 1938. Seems Kiwi are not horrified by the thought of “socialized medicine”. And it doesn’t seem to have impacted their quality of care because their life expectancy exceeds that of US males by 3 years, and a year and a half for females.

Both countries have similar percentages of those over 65, and under 15. Education is free, including some university and trade schools. Pensioners also enjoy a variety of freebies, such as train and boat transportation, admission to museums, etc. So how do they pay for all of the free services?

The top tax rate is 35%, with a 15% GST (goods and services tax) built into their prices. So, when dining out, a menu item priced at $25 means that you actually PAY $25. Tax has been included and the wait staff has been paid a reasonable wage, so tipping is only for extraordinary service, and even then is about half of what is customary in the USA. I guess if you are not bristling with weaponry and fighting senseless wars, you have money for such things.

New Zealand is geologically young –a mere 12 million years old. If you have ever walked along the Trail of Time in the Grand Canyon’s South Rim, you may recall that equates to only 12 of the trail’s 2,000 footsteps. If you haven’t been there, each footstep represents a million years. Samples of rocks from that particular era exhibited along the trail–starting 2 billion years ago, which is the age of the oldest rocks in the canyon.

Years ago, there were no mammals on New Zealand, so the birds had no predators, which resulted in flightless birds, like the Kiwi.

Sitting atop two tectonic plates, New Zealand has an abundance of hot springs, geysers, and mud pools, all of which we will see when we visit Rotorua. But for our second day in Auckland, we are scheduled to sail in Waitemata Harbor.

View of Auckland from the water.

It looks like it is going to be a tight squeeze under the bridge. That’s our North island site coordinator, Albert.

Not to worry, there is an experienced skipper at the wheel.

Is that a concerned look on that passenger’s face?

This lovely young woman is a marine biologist.

Amazing Auckland, Road Scholar Day One

The Road Scholar portion of our journey began on Tuesday, October 29, with a walking tour of downtown Auckland. This city has lots of interesting architecture, much of it newly constructed, so that it is earthquake-proof.

The sky tower is visible from just about everywhere in Auckland, but during our stroll we managed to catch someone jumping from the tower. See that little black speck in the lower right hand corner? That’s him, and yes, it IS an approved activity. The Kiwi are very big on bungee jumping. And no, I had absolutely no desire to “give it a go”, as they say down here.

We ended our walk at the Art Museum, which has a wonderful gallery of Maori portraits. We weren’t allowed to take photos there, but this postcard gives you an idea of what a tattooed face looks like.

As one might expect, the facial swelling from face carving is fairly severe. the guide showed us a large funnel, which functioned as a feeding tube while the facial wounds healed.

I as quite captivated by the flower sculpture hanging from the ceiling in the entryway. The petals move!

Auckland has a number of incredibly beautiful parks. The museum is next to one–Albert Park has this interesting entryway, and we did a quick walk by after our excellent lunch at the museum cafe.

Our hotel has two things going for it: a great location near the harbor, and a spectacular view from the restaurant on the 13th floor.

I told told you you could see the sky tower from everywhere!

We had just enough time for a brief walk around the waterfront before joining our group for dinner. This picture is for our former host, Norman, to show him that we actually DID see some tall ships!

New Zealand is an amazing country with many things the USA could learn from, but their wifi isn’t one of them. It is very limited, and blogging is a challenge. So, uploads are being done on the fly, and proof reading is a luxury to be reserved for better connections and more time. Typos will become a regular feature!

Kiwi Hospitality

Lonely Planet has proclaimed that Auckland is one of the ten best places in the world to visit in 2014. Although I concur with their choice, I would have moved Auckland to the number one spot. But then, Mike and I had something Lonely Planet didn’t– New Zealand’s best tour guides, Norman and Davina, which definitely influenced my rating.

It’s hard to believe that we spent only four days with these very gracious hosts, because we saw and did so much. It was all wonderful: breathtaking scenery, with beautiful beaches, but what made it extra special was the time we spent with their wonderful family, which gave us the opportunity to experience Kiwi culture and daily life.

This post is my way of saying thank you to Davina and Norman for a fantastic visit. I can’t capture ALL of the high points of our time together–there were just too many, so I’m limiting myself to 10 memories. Here they are, not in any particular order.

1. One Tree Hill

The Auckland area has more than 50 extinct volcanoes. This is a relatively young crater, a mere 500 years old.

2. The “Bach”
According to Wikipedia, the term originated from “bachelor pad”, but it has now come to mean a New Zealand summer home for family vacations. We stayed at our hosts’ family bach.

New Zealanders welcome drop ins, (or at least Davina, Norman and their friends do. I really shouldn’t generalize that ALL New Zealanders are like them, because they are rather special). Anyway, we got to see yet another bach, in Whitianga, right on the beach, when we popped in to visit their friends.

3. Whangamata
No only did we visit this lovely seaside resort, we also leaner how to pronounce its name. The Maori way sounds like this: Fong-ahh-mat-AHHH.

I’ve never used a public toilet that had piped in music and recorded instructions for locking the door, including a warning that you had best be done within 10 minutes. I thought it might be a New Zealand thing, but no–so far, it has only been a Whangamata experience.

4. Farmers’ Markets
Had I known that I could get a haircut by the side of the road, I wouldn’t have been in such a rush to get a trim before we left.

Farmer's market,on the way to Whangamata — Farmer’s market,on the way to Whangamata

5. New Chums Beach
I don’t know if this is the most beautiful beach in New Zealand, because EVERY beach I’ve seen so far has been rather wonderful. I think we just TOLD ourselves that it was the most beautiful because we had to walk over rocks and through rain forest growth for about 30 minutes to get to it.

It DID have a rather nice swinging rope, though.

6. Saturday Night at “The Club”
In the USA, we don’t have anything quite like a New Zealand club. Take a casino, a restaurant, a pool hall, a sports bar, a cocktail lounge, a dance hall– mix it all together, but make it family friendly and voila, you’ve got yourself a New Zealand club. Best of all, members of one club can use any other club. Sounds good, doesn’t it?

7. Lost Spring Thermal Pools, Whitianga
No photos for this one. We sat in a natural hot spring surrounded by lush foliage and beautiful flowers. You’ll just have to take my word that it was quite glorious.

8. Waihi Picnic
We were only in Waihi a short time. Just long enough for us to have a great picnic lunch atop a hill, check out the gold mining operation, and for me to buy a Kiwi cap.

9. Karangahake Gorge
A bike path runs through this area. Biker chicks, take note!

New Zealand - Clean and green — New Zealand – Clean and green

10. Family, Friendship, Fun
Spending time with Norman and Davina’s family made our time before the start of our Road Scholar trip extra special.
I had a chance to see how “socialized medicine” works, when I accompanied Davina to Taylor’s visit to the dentist. The offices are located on school property, and there is no charge for the visit. Brig, clean offices, a short wait, at no cost. What’s not to like.

This is the "walking school bus" — This is the “walking school bus”

So what do you think…Auckland #1 spot?

Grander than Grand

Magnificent! Spectacular! Those adjectives are far more accurate descriptions of the natural wonder that we call The Grand Canyon. It is very difficult to capture in a photograph the enormity of this “hole in the ground”.

An early explorer, with the catchy name of James Christmas Ives, was unimpressed. He dubbed it a “profitless locality” and predicted “the Colorado River, along the greater portion of its lonely and majestic way, shall be forever unvisited and undisturbed.” Had cable news been around during his day, he might have had a brilliant career as a pundit. (I leave it to you to decide which station would hire him).

After meeting at the Scottsdale Cottonwoods Resort in Scottsdale, our group of 35 headed off to the Hualapai Lodge in Peach Springs via Sedona and Flagstaff. Our hotel is on the reservation, right by the railroad tracks. Somehow that image didn’t make it into the hotel’s decorative window.It occurred to me that the trains’ engineers might have been a little annoyed that they were working while others were sleeping. That’s the only explanation I can come up with for blasting the horn multiple times as they approached the town. And yes, there were many, many trains–about 1 every 15 minutes. Made me feel really sorry for the people who live in the Peach Springs.

The big attractions for the western Canyon were the helicopter rides down to the canyon’s bottom, river rafting to Lake Mead on the “snout rigs”, and the Sky Walk.

First the Sky Walk. It wasn’t quite what I had envisioned. We didn’t go out on it, but we saw it from the top of the canyon,

then later from our river raft. It’s that silver oval, jutting out from the top of the photo. What do you think? Worth an additional $70?

View of the Sky Walk from the Colorado River

We didn’t think so either.

Back to the western canyon–here’s the view from the rim–very subdued colors, with a sediment laden river (that very brown ribbon) winding along the bottom. The Colorado River is quite low because of 12 years worth of droughts and the additional water needs of the area’s growing population.
Mike and I were in the last group of chopper riders, so we had time to become “one” with the landscape and to take pictures of our new friends as they climbed aboard.

The flat Colorado Plateau gave no hint of what was close by

I was lucky enough to get a front seat.

Prior to this trip, we had toyed with the idea of rafting and camping through the canyon. Our ride on the snout rig absolutely settled that issue!

I’ll let you in on a little secret. Those rigs are not the most comfortable way to travel. And if you are seated in the front, you are guaranteed to get wet, even when there are no rapids. Guess what–the water is COLD.

Our land transportation, on the other hand, was luxurious. Good thing, because we traveled from one end of the canyon to the other: from Lake Mead to Lake Powell, logging many hours on that bus.
Our next stop was the one most visited by tourists–the south rim. The advantage to going a little later in the season was that the park was not crowded. Fortunately, we didn’t go TOO late. Had we waited another week, we would have found the park closed, thanks to our fine congressmen. But that’s another story.

There are so many possible captions for this next photo. “Death Wish”, “Just one more step back, honey”, “Did you send the check to the insurance company?”…

For the more adventurous, the South Rim offers the opportunity to hike (or ride) along Bright Angel Trail.
Dinner at El Tovar was not part of our tour package, but we decided to forgo the Maswick Cafeteria and enjoy that beautiful setting.

Mike and Augusta on the porch at El Tovar

The next morning, while my two favorite traveling companions caught up on their beauty sleep, I returned to the edge of the rim to catch the sunrise.

I had the view pretty much to myself.

Our last leg of the journey was to Glen Canyon where we enjoyed another raft trip and a tour of the dam.

If you look closely at the next photo, you will see our rafts on the left hand side of the river. We get there via a two mile tunnel carved through the rock.

Drew, our fantastic river guide, kept us informed and entertained, as he guided us down the river. A former Marine and lawyer, he chooses to spend his days piloting rafts on the river, and we all benefited greatly from that decision.

Drew explained the significance of the petroglyphs, including the “modern” one. Can you make out the word “Trent” carved into the rock? it seems Trent just had to leave his mark, and in doing so, he also contributed many dollars and hours of community service for defacing a historical site. Yep, he got caught.

Some people never learn. Once again, I sat in the front. Once again, I got SOAKED from head to toe.

We spent our final night in Marble Canyon.

Here it is--the town of Marble Canyon — Here it is–the town of Marble Canyon

The best part about being in such a remote area is the skies are magnificently dark. We were lucky enough to have a professional astronomer with us–Mike gave us a wonderful impromptu lecture on the heavens. It was a great finale to a fantastic trip!

Off to The Grand Canyon

Colin Fletcher called the Grand Canyon a “huge natural museum of the earth’s history”. Okay, so I didn’t know who Colin Fletcher was either, until I signed us up for this Road Scholar trip. Now that I am a retiree (excuse me, “lifestyle manager”), I have time to actually READ the suggested background materials.

Colin Fletcher wrote “The Man who Walked Through Time: The Story of the First Trip Afoot Through The Grand Canyon”. Given that the canyon was inhabited by Native Americans for about 10,000 years before the first Europeans arrived, it isn’t hard to imagine that one or two of them might have sauntered from one end of the canyon to the other before he did, but then again, THEY never published their adventures and thoughts. I shouldn’t be too hard on Mr. Fletcher, though. After all, his book was written in the early 1900’s; half a century later, when I was in school, we still were being taught that Columbus “discovered” America, as if it were completely devoid of human inhabitants when he arrived.

So, now that I’ve gotten beyond the title, what did I learn from his book? Other than that I would never, ever even CONSIDER hiking through the canyon, I learned that you can tell the age of the rocks from their colors. I created this little chart so I’d know what I was looking at when we get there, starting from the rim and moving on down to the bottom:

Rock	Color	Thickness	Age
Limestone	White	400 feet	225 million years
Sandstone	Pale brown	350 feet	250 million years
Shale and Sandstone	Red	1,000 feet	275 million years
“The Esplanade”, Limestone	Blue gray, stained red	800 feet	450 million years
Bright Angel Shale	Layered greenish gray and purple	600 feet	475 million years
“Tonto Platform”Tapeats Sandstone	Brown	225 feet	500 million years
Schists	Dark gray with granite	Depth is unknown	Almost 2 billion years

Okay, so I have no concept of what 400 feet (or any of the other number of feet, for that matter) looks like–but when I get there, and take photos, and post them, well, then we’ll ALL know. And we’ll also know how long those bloody rocks have been plopped there.

I do better with visuals. So here’s a picture of where we will be for the week, starting and ending in Phoenix.

This trip will have an added element of adventure. The original plan was that this trip would be my father’s day present to my dad. He and Mike were going to room together, and I would be rooming with my “childhood” friend, Augusta. My dad’s knee became uncooperative, causing him to have to cancel out. Well, I notified Road Scholar and told them to change my roommate to Mike. I then learned that doing so would mean that Augusta might be assigned a female roommate, which wasn’t quite what she’d had in mind. So, Mike being an all around wonderful guy, decided to ‘take one for the team’ and agreed he’d be the solo traveler. No, that doesn’t mean HE gets the female roommate. He will only be matched up if there is another solo male traveler. The adventure part? We won’t know how this will shake out till we arrive tomorrow night.

Just think of the possibilities… Mike’s assigned roommate is a Sean Connery look alike, who gazes upon the lovely Augusta and is immediately smitten, causing us to swap roommates faster than your average college freshman. Beautiful sunsets, the canyon as a backdrop..could this be a made for TV movie, or what? Lifetime channel, perhaps?

More likely, Mike will be roommate-less. Hmmm. Maybe we shouldn’t mention that we’ve been married for 37 years. That way, if I am spotted doing the “walk of shame” out of his room some morning, it might liven up breakfast discussions.

So, which part of the blog did YOU find more interesting– rock colors and ages or the possibility of “seniors gone wild”?

Home Town Hero

Every town should have its very own super hero. Henry Huttleston Rogers was Fairhaven’s. If you’ve never heard of him, that’s an indication that you don’t live in Fairhaven and you probably took I-195 from Providence to Cape Cod, instead of the more scenic Route 6. Sure, I-195 will get you to the beach faster, but what you miss is a chance to see the impact one of Standard Oil’s “robber barons” can have on a sweet little town.

Henry Huttleston Rogers Memorial on Huttleston Avenue

After you clear the bridge from New Bedford, the highway’s name changes to Huttleston Avenue, and if you look to your left, you’ll see one of the many reasons the town has chosen to honor its home town hero.

The gorgeous Elizabethan stone structure, completed in 1906, is actually Fairhaven High School, Henry Huttleston Rogers’ last gift to the town before his death in 1909. I have never been inside–I attended a regional high school–but my sister Sue (the source of all my inside information) tells me the school has marble floors, wood paneling, and carved gargoyles in the auditorium. The adolescent version of me probably wouldn’t have noticed these grand architectural features anyway. I would have been too busy hoping one of the other auditorium “creatures” would ask me out after the assembly ended.

I DID pass many afternoons during my teen years as a volunteer at Our Lady’s Haven.

Completed in 1905, the building was originally known as the Tabitha Inn. Designed to resemble a Shakespearian era Inn, it was described as the grandest hotel outside of New York and Boston. Samuel Clements, better known as Mark Twain, was one of its frequent guests. It became a home for “the elderly and infirm” after it was purchased by the Catholic Diocese in 1944.

I stopped in to say hello and to take a look around the lobby. Back in my day, it was run by the Carmelite nuns, but today only one nun remains. Lovely Sr. Eileen from Ireland is now running the show, making sure Fairhaven’s senior citizens receive tender loving care.

Next to the Tabitha Inn is a red brick schoolhouse, another gift from Rogers. The school’s last class graduated this year, and the building is now closed, so all future students will be studying in a more modern building.

Rogers Elementary School, closed in 2013

From June through September, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the Fairhaven office of tourism offers 90 minute guided tours, starting at 10 AM from the town hall — and yes, Rogers donated that too. Click on this link for more information about the tour and the town.

I wasn’t crass enough to photograph the interior of Our Lady’s Haven, (not everyone enjoys getting their image blasted into cyberspace) but the interior architecture of the town hall is very similar…so you get the idea of how lovely both places are.

Town Hall Interior--grand staircase, with arches and carved wooden railings — Town Hall Interior–grand staircase, with arches and carved wooden railings

My very special childhood place is across the street from the town hall. The Millicent Library was built in 1890 as a memorial to one of Rogers’ daughter’s, who was 17 when she died.

I don’t think this is a statue of Millicent. Pretty racy for a small town in the 1900’s, wouldn’t you say?

My summer days were spent in the children’s reading room, where I discovered that “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was only the first in an entire series L Frank Baum wrote about the magical land of Oz. Those books kept the 9 year old me entertained for an entire summer!

As I was leaving the library, one of the friendly residents (did I mention that Fairhaven people are VERY friendly?) asked whether I had noticed Dante atop the library. I never had before–but here he is, for your viewing pleasure.

So, who was Henry Huttleston Rogers–and how did he amass such a huge fortune? Rogers got his start in Pennsylvania, where, in 1861, he and a partner started a small business refining oil. By 1885, he had joined with John D Rockefeller, eventually becoming one of the three key men of Standard Oil. Known as “the Brains of Standard Oil Trust” and “Hell Hound Rogers”, he was a captain of industry.

He was also a generous man who befriended Booker T Washington and paid for Helen Keller’s Radcliffe education.

The “giving” tradition continued with Rogers’ granddaughter, (official name when she died: Mary Millicent Abigail Rogers von Salm-Hoogstraeten de Peralta-Ramos Balcom, but she went by Millicent Rogers–and who can blame her?) who founded the Millicent Rogers museum in Taos, New Mexico to house native American art. The daughter of Rogers’ only son, she was quite a fascinating character–but that’s a subject for another time.

Visitors to Fairhaven should stop at Margaret’s or Elizabeth’s for a great meal. The restaurants are side by side, near the waterfront. If you are lucky, you might get lovely Kristen for your server, and Kevin may be your chef!

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