Daytrip to Newport, Rhode Island

During tourist season Brush Hill Tours offers several low cost bus tours leaving from Boston. Today I took the package to Newport that included visits to the Breakers , Marble House, and a narrated tour along Ocean Drive. The price for the package was $55. This is much less than it would cost to take a Peter Pan bus from Boston, pay for transportation around Newport by trolley, and pay the admissions to the mansions. The company also offers tours to Maine and Plimoth Plantation that are well worth the money.

The Breakers and Marble House were built by the Vanderbilt family in the late nineteenth century. They were only used for eight weeks in the summer and were the site of parties that lasted until dawn. Marble House was only used for a few years before Alva Vanderbilt divorced her husband and married one of his friends. She was an early proponent of women's rights although she seems to have been less concerned with the rights of unaffluent women. The Breakers is the larger of the two, but in my eyes, less visually appealing.