Newport, RI

Akshay and I recently went on a weekend getaway to Newport, Rhode Island and we absolutely fell in love with that city. Mansions, beaches, ocean fronts, cruises and not to miss the fantastic food, ample parking space … everything picture perfect and easy on the nerves but what really stood out was the *feel* the place had.

Every part of the city had it’s own story and people were dressed aptly to play their part. For instance, on that street where all the mansions are, you could see the ladies roaming around in pretty dresses arm in arm with their men dressed handsomely ( well, as handsomely dressed as a man can possibly get when he is on a vacation :-) . Also noticed a couple of them wearing those long flowy dresses and looking so regal in them. And just a couple of streets away from these mansions, the contrast was so striking - the rest of the city was dressed in beach wear!

The hostesses at the waterfront restaurants and shopkeepers at the Brick Marketplace , though busy trying to manage large throngs of crowd were always ready with a smile and a joke and you didn’t mind waiting 25-30 mins to get your table. The food rocked. The drinks could have had more alcohol in them for the price at which they came but given the ambiance, it wasn’t difficult to be forgiving.

Everybody looked fresh, relaxed and ‘chilled out’ in the real sense of the word and maybe that’s why I, for once, didn’t feel any depression seeping in as it always does whenever a vacation came to an end.