About ten minutes down the road from the Weirs Boardwalk is a giant outdoor concert stadium called Meadowbrook that tends to book a lot of 70s and 80s acts, like the Moody Blues, Pat Benatar, and Lenyrd Skynerd (I don’t really care whether I spelled that right). Anyway, more than ten years ago it was just a spot in the middle of a field where you could set up your own lawn chair and enjoy some surprisingly well-known country acts. I saw Johnny and June Carter Cash there in 1997, with my dad and Elizabeth Hatmaker. We sat on the lawn on a warm August night and sang “Ring of Fire” while the sun set. For “Rock Island Line” the production involved sound and light effects that made it seem as though a train were coming into the station, and June even took the stage for a while and told stories about her upbringing in between songs, like the Loretta Lynn character in Nashville, but less crazy. It was a great night. I even bought Scott a shirt from that concert, which he still has.
I have been back twice since, once when I bought my mom tickets to see Linda Ronstadt and another time with Scott when we gave both sets of parents tickets to see Prairie Home Companion a couple of years ago. Meadowbrook had become a concrete and steel behemoth, and I was really missing that “concert in the middle of farmland” feel, and also missing Johnny Cash.
Just for the heck of it, I looked up the concert schedule for this summer and was delighted to find that Styx is playing their "Don't Stop Rocking" Tour at Meadowbrook (that's really what they are calling it) with Reo Speedwagon and 38 Special the night of our wedding! Maybe that means that on the boat they'll have "The Styx Experience" play? I hope so! There would be something weird and cool about a tribute band playing 10 minutes away from the actual band, but I'm not all that sure Styx has a tribute band.
Not that I have really listened to Styx regularly since the age of 12, and I run screaming from the room when Scott blasts “Mr. Roboto,” but perhaps the somehow perfect use of it in the Freaks and Geeks pilot (both “Sailing” and “Renegade”) has endeared them to me. There’s also the story Scott has told me of going to Springfield, Illinois to visit the Quackenbushes when he experienced the “greatest Rock and Roll moment ever” when the band came on the stage, screeched “We are Malachai!” and jumped right into “Oh Mama/I’m in fear for my life/From the long arm of the law.” Only in Springfield!
After the wedding ship docks, at 10:00, we have reserved several booths at the back of Patrick’s Pub in Gilford. They have assured me that we can still order food if we’re hungry from the bar menu (their food is good). It’s a ten-minute drive from the Weirs normally, though Patrick’s is next door to Meadowbrook, so we may be fighting the Meadowbrook traffic coming the other way. I wonder if Styx will go to Patrick’s after the concert? Well, one thing is for sure: there will be a lot of Styx fans around, in case you are wondering what the people willing to shell out $80-$100 to see them look like.
So when you are on the Mount Washington on June 27, head up to the top deck at about 9 PM and listen really hard. You just might hear Styx, rocking out over the water.
Saturday, May 23, 2009
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Paradise Lost
Weirs Beach has enjoyed summer inhabitants since 8,000 BC, when Native Americans would fish on its shores, constructing baskets called weirs that trapped the shad as they migrated to the Merrimack River. By 10,000 BC, one tribe stayed year-round and claimed the area around the Weirs as their own. The legend of how the lake got its name involves a wedding. Apparently a Native American Chief, Wonaton, had a daughter, Mineola (like the orange!) who was in love with a chief from an enemy tribe. Wonaton was angry and tried to kill Adiwando, but Mineola shielded him from her father’s wrath. Mineola and Adiwando were married, and after the wedding, for some reason the tribe decided to travel by canoe to the middle of the lake. It had been a cloudy, overcast day, but at that time the sun emerged, and Wonaton saw that as a good omen, naming the lake Winnipesaukee, or “Smile of the Great Spirit.”
The train was the best thing to ever happen to Weirs Beach. The first tourists to the area started arriving in 1848, mostly due to the convenience of several trains moving through the area on the way to the White Mountains and Canada. At one point in the late 1800s, four trains stopped in the Weirs from Boston each day. The time between 1848 and 1910 is considered by many to be the heyday of the Weirs, when it was an upscale vacation resort. Gorgeous, elaborate hotels lined the seashore, and the Weirs Boardwalk was built, with a music hall pavilion called “Winnepesaukee Gardens”(which still stands today, as an arcade) restaurants, tea houses, and shops. It’s truly hard to imagine that the place that now sells $1 earrings, dreamcatchers, and boasts of motorcycle weekend as the premier event of the year was once one of the most upscale and elegant tourist destinations in New England, but it’s true.
The first steamship for tourists was the Lady of the Lake, which was launched in 1852. It essentially acted as a ferry, bringing tourists to the different ports around the lake, such as Wolfeboro and Center Harbor. It soon had competition: the original Mount Washington, launched on July 4, 1872. The Mount was faster, bigger, and more beautiful than the Lady of the Lake, and soon eclipsed the competition. In its prime, it transported as many as 60,000 tourists to various destinations around the lake. Cool fact: The Lady of the Lake served from 1897-99 as a floating hotel for workers building Kimball Castle in Gilford (see my previous post: “Castles Made of Sand”). Yes, that’s the haunted castle. In 1899 the owners sunk the Lady of the Lake in Glendale Cove, where it remains today.
The invention of the automobile changed everything, and not in a good way. Although tourists were still flocking to the area, many were not using the railroad, or the ferries, with as much frequency. In 1924, a fire burned down the largest of the luxury hotels (another, the Lakeview House, still stands, but it contains a sort of mini-mall with a pizza place and ice cream shop) and many other landmarks. The original Mount Washington also burned down in yet another fire in 1939. The Great Depression didn't help, either, and the "Golden Age" of the Weirs was over.
There wasn’t really a swimming beach at the Weirs until the 1950s, when it was re-imagined as an affordable family tourist destination; before that time, the shoreline was rocky and not amenable to swimming or sunbathing. A new Mount Washington was constructed in the 1940s, this one a longer, faster ship made of steel (the same one where the wedding will be held, but it has been refurbished and updated since then). When my parents were young, the Weirs was much more of a family spot than the teenage wasteland it was when I was in junior high and high school. Families still visit, but bike week is still a major attraction, as well the Loudon racetrack, so now you’re probably more bound to see people in their 40s and 50s acting like teenagers than you would actual adolescents, whose parents don't let them run free anymore (do they?). But the location is still beautiful, and when you’re there it really feels like summer vacation.
The train was the best thing to ever happen to Weirs Beach. The first tourists to the area started arriving in 1848, mostly due to the convenience of several trains moving through the area on the way to the White Mountains and Canada. At one point in the late 1800s, four trains stopped in the Weirs from Boston each day. The time between 1848 and 1910 is considered by many to be the heyday of the Weirs, when it was an upscale vacation resort. Gorgeous, elaborate hotels lined the seashore, and the Weirs Boardwalk was built, with a music hall pavilion called “Winnepesaukee Gardens”(which still stands today, as an arcade) restaurants, tea houses, and shops. It’s truly hard to imagine that the place that now sells $1 earrings, dreamcatchers, and boasts of motorcycle weekend as the premier event of the year was once one of the most upscale and elegant tourist destinations in New England, but it’s true.
The first steamship for tourists was the Lady of the Lake, which was launched in 1852. It essentially acted as a ferry, bringing tourists to the different ports around the lake, such as Wolfeboro and Center Harbor. It soon had competition: the original Mount Washington, launched on July 4, 1872. The Mount was faster, bigger, and more beautiful than the Lady of the Lake, and soon eclipsed the competition. In its prime, it transported as many as 60,000 tourists to various destinations around the lake. Cool fact: The Lady of the Lake served from 1897-99 as a floating hotel for workers building Kimball Castle in Gilford (see my previous post: “Castles Made of Sand”). Yes, that’s the haunted castle. In 1899 the owners sunk the Lady of the Lake in Glendale Cove, where it remains today.
The invention of the automobile changed everything, and not in a good way. Although tourists were still flocking to the area, many were not using the railroad, or the ferries, with as much frequency. In 1924, a fire burned down the largest of the luxury hotels (another, the Lakeview House, still stands, but it contains a sort of mini-mall with a pizza place and ice cream shop) and many other landmarks. The original Mount Washington also burned down in yet another fire in 1939. The Great Depression didn't help, either, and the "Golden Age" of the Weirs was over.
There wasn’t really a swimming beach at the Weirs until the 1950s, when it was re-imagined as an affordable family tourist destination; before that time, the shoreline was rocky and not amenable to swimming or sunbathing. A new Mount Washington was constructed in the 1940s, this one a longer, faster ship made of steel (the same one where the wedding will be held, but it has been refurbished and updated since then). When my parents were young, the Weirs was much more of a family spot than the teenage wasteland it was when I was in junior high and high school. Families still visit, but bike week is still a major attraction, as well the Loudon racetrack, so now you’re probably more bound to see people in their 40s and 50s acting like teenagers than you would actual adolescents, whose parents don't let them run free anymore (do they?). But the location is still beautiful, and when you’re there it really feels like summer vacation.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
The Emperor of Ice Cream
Whenever anyone asks me my favorite childhood memory, I usually share the story of my first time on a horse, or the summer when my parents put a pool in the backyard, or the time I spotted a live wire in a tree and saved the neighborhood from certain peril. This is because I’m aware of the gluttony inherent in my real best memory, which is the time the ice cream man’s truck broke down in front of our house. Even typing those words now gives me a thrill, because it was a chain of events so serendipitous as to lead to free ice cream for weeks and a story that my first-grade peers begged me to tell again and again. Our freezer housed casualties of the truck’s malfunctioning electrical system: rocketpops, root beer popsicles, those push-up sherbet things with the gumball at the bottom, the chocolate fudge pops with the real chocolate bar inside. And it was all ours!
There are three things people in New England can’t get enough of: the Red Sox, Dunkin Donuts Coffee, and ice cream. Per capita, New Englanders eat more ice cream than anyone else in the United States, a baffling statistic when one considers that we spend a third of the year covered in snow.
Because we love ice cream so much, we spend a lot of time debating who has the best ice cream, and the only kind that qualifies is homemade. Signs at candy shops and country stores will make sure to remind you that the ice cream is “our own” or “made on the premises.” There are at least two places within walking distance from the Weirs that offer homemade ice cream: JB Scoops and Kellerhaus. Kellerhaus is where we are getting the chocolate wedding favors, and their ice cream is good, but they are best known for their sundae bar with tons of toppings. Of course, they pile up the waffle bowls with ice cream so there’s not much room to fit toppings, but there are ways around this. They also turn the sundae bar into a waffle bar in the mornings. If a lunch item existed that could be topped with fudge, marshmallow, and blueberry sauce, you can bet that they would have a bar for that, too.
JB Scoops, which has a shop right in the Weirs and another in Meredith, has two flavors I count among my all-time favorites: cappuccino butter crunch and chocolate obscene, a dark, rich chocolate that I have enjoyed since high school. JB Scoops also still makes ice cream sodas: ice cream, soda water, chocolate syrup, sometimes a little milk, and whipped cream on top. If you’ve never tried one, they are a hundred times better than shakes, frappes, and malts, mostly because the kick of the fizzy water. Kind of like an egg cream with the chocolate and the carbonation.
Unfortunately, you will have to miss out on one of the best ice cream experiences in the area: Frankensundae. Elizabeth Hatmaker has always referred to this place as “The Frankensundae,” and it was an ice cream place with a picture of the Frankenstein monster on the sign. While I don’t remember the ice cream at Frankensundae being spectacular, it was right by the water and had good frappes and that my friends and I would stop drink down before going dancing at the nearby under 21 club, the Station. Alas, Frankensundae has gone the way of Aqua-net and John Hughes movies, and is now the more respectable “Franky’s,” an ice cream stand attached to the Town Docks restaurant.
Popular flavors in New England include Grape Nuts (yes, it has grape nuts cereal in it!), rum raisin, blueberry, maple walnut, birch bark (no, it does not have birch bark in it), and coffee, plus the ever-popular moose tracks (of which I fail to see the appeal). My dad swears by something called “frozen custard” or “frozen pudding” which I have discovered is just like ice cream but contains eggs. There's a place in Belmont (Jordan's) that sells ice cream sandwiches using warm, fresh-baked oatmeal cookies. For other sweet treats, try Chutter's candy store in Littleton, NH, which boasts the longest candy counter in the world (it's in Guiness book of world records!) or Winnipesaukee Chocolates in Wolfeboro (on the other side of the lake) which sells gourmet chocolate bars named after landmarks in the area. I really want to try these, actually--they won "Best chocolate in NH" in New Hampshire Magazine this year, and the bar wrappers are beautiful, too.
If I had to vote on the best ice cream in NH, I would have to say that it’s the kind made by the Sandwich Creamery. I have never actually been there, but my parents love it—they say it’s just a farm in the middle of nowhere where you can just pick up a quart and leave your money. What the Sandwich Creamery’s ice cream lacks in variety of flavors they make up for in pure deliciousness—it’s creamy but somehow light and fluffy. Sandwich only about a half hour, forty minutes from the Weirs, and its claim to fame the fact that in the center of town they have that direction sign from the introduction to Newhart (you know, the show with Larry, Darryl, and Darryl?) which my dad never fails to point out if you happen to be in the car with him on the way to Sandwich Creamery. He has even taken pictures of that sign.
There are three things people in New England can’t get enough of: the Red Sox, Dunkin Donuts Coffee, and ice cream. Per capita, New Englanders eat more ice cream than anyone else in the United States, a baffling statistic when one considers that we spend a third of the year covered in snow.
Because we love ice cream so much, we spend a lot of time debating who has the best ice cream, and the only kind that qualifies is homemade. Signs at candy shops and country stores will make sure to remind you that the ice cream is “our own” or “made on the premises.” There are at least two places within walking distance from the Weirs that offer homemade ice cream: JB Scoops and Kellerhaus. Kellerhaus is where we are getting the chocolate wedding favors, and their ice cream is good, but they are best known for their sundae bar with tons of toppings. Of course, they pile up the waffle bowls with ice cream so there’s not much room to fit toppings, but there are ways around this. They also turn the sundae bar into a waffle bar in the mornings. If a lunch item existed that could be topped with fudge, marshmallow, and blueberry sauce, you can bet that they would have a bar for that, too.
JB Scoops, which has a shop right in the Weirs and another in Meredith, has two flavors I count among my all-time favorites: cappuccino butter crunch and chocolate obscene, a dark, rich chocolate that I have enjoyed since high school. JB Scoops also still makes ice cream sodas: ice cream, soda water, chocolate syrup, sometimes a little milk, and whipped cream on top. If you’ve never tried one, they are a hundred times better than shakes, frappes, and malts, mostly because the kick of the fizzy water. Kind of like an egg cream with the chocolate and the carbonation.
Unfortunately, you will have to miss out on one of the best ice cream experiences in the area: Frankensundae. Elizabeth Hatmaker has always referred to this place as “The Frankensundae,” and it was an ice cream place with a picture of the Frankenstein monster on the sign. While I don’t remember the ice cream at Frankensundae being spectacular, it was right by the water and had good frappes and that my friends and I would stop drink down before going dancing at the nearby under 21 club, the Station. Alas, Frankensundae has gone the way of Aqua-net and John Hughes movies, and is now the more respectable “Franky’s,” an ice cream stand attached to the Town Docks restaurant.
Popular flavors in New England include Grape Nuts (yes, it has grape nuts cereal in it!), rum raisin, blueberry, maple walnut, birch bark (no, it does not have birch bark in it), and coffee, plus the ever-popular moose tracks (of which I fail to see the appeal). My dad swears by something called “frozen custard” or “frozen pudding” which I have discovered is just like ice cream but contains eggs. There's a place in Belmont (Jordan's) that sells ice cream sandwiches using warm, fresh-baked oatmeal cookies. For other sweet treats, try Chutter's candy store in Littleton, NH, which boasts the longest candy counter in the world (it's in Guiness book of world records!) or Winnipesaukee Chocolates in Wolfeboro (on the other side of the lake) which sells gourmet chocolate bars named after landmarks in the area. I really want to try these, actually--they won "Best chocolate in NH" in New Hampshire Magazine this year, and the bar wrappers are beautiful, too.
If I had to vote on the best ice cream in NH, I would have to say that it’s the kind made by the Sandwich Creamery. I have never actually been there, but my parents love it—they say it’s just a farm in the middle of nowhere where you can just pick up a quart and leave your money. What the Sandwich Creamery’s ice cream lacks in variety of flavors they make up for in pure deliciousness—it’s creamy but somehow light and fluffy. Sandwich only about a half hour, forty minutes from the Weirs, and its claim to fame the fact that in the center of town they have that direction sign from the introduction to Newhart (you know, the show with Larry, Darryl, and Darryl?) which my dad never fails to point out if you happen to be in the car with him on the way to Sandwich Creamery. He has even taken pictures of that sign.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
Freaks and Peaks
Weirs Beach is about 40 minutes away from the most picturesque and strange part of NH, the White Mountains. Although I like to think of the terrain where we live in Chesterfield as fairly mountainous, it has nothing on the Mt. Washington area, which is part of the Appalachian trail and has a lot to offer visitors, especially those who are not afraid of heights. The area is a geologist’s dream: Winnipesaukee itself is a glacial lake, and there are many caves and gorges. Unfortunately, our state landmark, the Old Man in the Mountain (a face-shaped rock formation on a peak in Franconia Notch ) crumbled three years ago today. But truth be told, there wasn’t much to do there except to say, “yup, looks like an old man,” so his demise should not deter anyone from visiting the area--there's still a lot to see.
Mt. Washington is the highest point in New England, with a summit at 6, 288 feet. It’s also the site of the “worst weather in the world” (a question I got right in trivia last year!) because the weather station at the summit recorded the highest winds on record: 231 MPH. The average mean wind speed is 35 MPH, with, according to the website, “hurricane force winds every third day.” More than 100 people have died on Mount Washington, mostly because of exposure to low temperatures (the wind chill has been recorded at -120 degrees Fahrenheit). They get 566 inches of snow on average annually.
The tourist activities in the White Mountains can be summed up in three words: trains, trams, and trained bears. Yes, there is hiking, biking, fishing, and all of that, but the hiking aspect of it is surprisingly underplayed in its advertising. What IS emphasized are all of the other ways you can get to the top without breaking a sweat. These include three trains that traverse the area, including the Cog Railway, which makes a 2 ½ hour round trip to the summit and back. You could also take one of three gondolas/trams, including the Aerial Tramway, a tram that seats 80 people (this makes me nervous just writing it) suspended by a cable, up to the 4200 ft. summit of Franconia Notch. You can also take your car up Mt. Washington. Driving around NH in the summer, you can often see bumper stickers reading “This Car Climbed Mt. Washington.” There’s an auto road designed just for this purpose. Just make sure your brakes are OK--they emphasize the importance of a functioning braking system. If you decide not to take your own car, they provide guided tours in what appears to be an airport van or, in winter, the Snow Coach.
Another activity for the adventurous set: mountain bike trails at Attitash (the same location as the Alpine Slide), bike trails that you need a ski lift to take you to, that go straight down a mountain (one trail is called “scrambled eggs.”) However, if risking your life is not your thing, you can rent a mountain bike and take some of the 12 miles of scenic bike trails on the “family friendly” route. This is a good place to add that northern NH in general embodies the "Live Free or Die" spirit of our state motto. Lots of interest in "extreme" activities (Bode Miller is a local hero here) and personal freedoms (Bode Miller's cousin was shot by a local vigilante after he--the cousin--shot and killed a police officer a few years back)and you will find some, uh, eccentrics among the locals, some of whom are not particularly friendly to tourists. Do not turn around in anyone's driveway if you make a wrong turn, is all I'm saying.
If you like caves, whether in a Freudian or academic way, you are in for a treat. There are three different cave parks in the area: Polar Caves, Lost River Gorge, and Flume Gorge. I have not been to any of these since grade school and I would love to go again. Both involve hiking, but on the way you get to see waterfalls inside of caves, pan for gold, gemstones, and fossils, and learn about rocks.
The only thing I clearly remember from childhood visits to the White Mountains was watching the trained bears at Clark’s Trading Post. Now, it’s kind of hard to describe Clark’s Trading Post. It’s kind of a museum, kind of an amusement park, kind of a freak show, kind of a gift shop/pitstop. It contains “The Mysterious Tuttle House,” a house that, according to Curious New England, “somehow breaks the laws of physics…everything is a little off-kilter.” And “Merlin’s Mystical Mansion,” which Curious New England describes this way:
Merlin, an eccentric magician, mesmerizes you in his dreamy
Victorian parlor until—zap—reality starts to shift, you feel
weightless,and—well—we won’t spoil the surprise. The ruse is
brilliant…using a combination of motors, computers, trompe
L’oeil, and sheer trickery.
The site contains this warning: If you suffer from claustrophobia, motion sickness, or epilepsy, or are afraid of the dark, you will not want to enter. Duly noted.
Clark’s also has a museum which houses animals with extra appendages (including a calf with two heads), antique typewriters, weaponry, and rare china. They also have two Mutoscopes, those very early film devices in which you put a penny in to see an animated picture, and one of them has a striptease show.
The trained bears swing on swings, play basketball, pretend to talk on the phone, and drive little cars. The site emphasizes that “no bears are forced to perform,” but I don’t know what that means. They have a talk with them beforehand, and if the bear says no he doesn’t go on stage?
If you are coming to the wedding and want to take a day trip to the White Mountains (if you can't tell from this, I highly recommend it), here is a map (see Weirs Beach at the very bottom?)
Mt. Washington is the highest point in New England, with a summit at 6, 288 feet. It’s also the site of the “worst weather in the world” (a question I got right in trivia last year!) because the weather station at the summit recorded the highest winds on record: 231 MPH. The average mean wind speed is 35 MPH, with, according to the website, “hurricane force winds every third day.” More than 100 people have died on Mount Washington, mostly because of exposure to low temperatures (the wind chill has been recorded at -120 degrees Fahrenheit). They get 566 inches of snow on average annually.
The tourist activities in the White Mountains can be summed up in three words: trains, trams, and trained bears. Yes, there is hiking, biking, fishing, and all of that, but the hiking aspect of it is surprisingly underplayed in its advertising. What IS emphasized are all of the other ways you can get to the top without breaking a sweat. These include three trains that traverse the area, including the Cog Railway, which makes a 2 ½ hour round trip to the summit and back. You could also take one of three gondolas/trams, including the Aerial Tramway, a tram that seats 80 people (this makes me nervous just writing it) suspended by a cable, up to the 4200 ft. summit of Franconia Notch. You can also take your car up Mt. Washington. Driving around NH in the summer, you can often see bumper stickers reading “This Car Climbed Mt. Washington.” There’s an auto road designed just for this purpose. Just make sure your brakes are OK--they emphasize the importance of a functioning braking system. If you decide not to take your own car, they provide guided tours in what appears to be an airport van or, in winter, the Snow Coach.
Another activity for the adventurous set: mountain bike trails at Attitash (the same location as the Alpine Slide), bike trails that you need a ski lift to take you to, that go straight down a mountain (one trail is called “scrambled eggs.”) However, if risking your life is not your thing, you can rent a mountain bike and take some of the 12 miles of scenic bike trails on the “family friendly” route. This is a good place to add that northern NH in general embodies the "Live Free or Die" spirit of our state motto. Lots of interest in "extreme" activities (Bode Miller is a local hero here) and personal freedoms (Bode Miller's cousin was shot by a local vigilante after he--the cousin--shot and killed a police officer a few years back)and you will find some, uh, eccentrics among the locals, some of whom are not particularly friendly to tourists. Do not turn around in anyone's driveway if you make a wrong turn, is all I'm saying.
If you like caves, whether in a Freudian or academic way, you are in for a treat. There are three different cave parks in the area: Polar Caves, Lost River Gorge, and Flume Gorge. I have not been to any of these since grade school and I would love to go again. Both involve hiking, but on the way you get to see waterfalls inside of caves, pan for gold, gemstones, and fossils, and learn about rocks.
The only thing I clearly remember from childhood visits to the White Mountains was watching the trained bears at Clark’s Trading Post. Now, it’s kind of hard to describe Clark’s Trading Post. It’s kind of a museum, kind of an amusement park, kind of a freak show, kind of a gift shop/pitstop. It contains “The Mysterious Tuttle House,” a house that, according to Curious New England, “somehow breaks the laws of physics…everything is a little off-kilter.” And “Merlin’s Mystical Mansion,” which Curious New England describes this way:
Merlin, an eccentric magician, mesmerizes you in his dreamy
Victorian parlor until—zap—reality starts to shift, you feel
weightless,and—well—we won’t spoil the surprise. The ruse is
brilliant…using a combination of motors, computers, trompe
L’oeil, and sheer trickery.
The site contains this warning: If you suffer from claustrophobia, motion sickness, or epilepsy, or are afraid of the dark, you will not want to enter. Duly noted.
Clark’s also has a museum which houses animals with extra appendages (including a calf with two heads), antique typewriters, weaponry, and rare china. They also have two Mutoscopes, those very early film devices in which you put a penny in to see an animated picture, and one of them has a striptease show.
The trained bears swing on swings, play basketball, pretend to talk on the phone, and drive little cars. The site emphasizes that “no bears are forced to perform,” but I don’t know what that means. They have a talk with them beforehand, and if the bear says no he doesn’t go on stage?
If you are coming to the wedding and want to take a day trip to the White Mountains (if you can't tell from this, I highly recommend it), here is a map (see Weirs Beach at the very bottom?)
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