This was the first real Fall experience for Soma - last fall we were in the concrete jungle of Jersey City and New York, and we did not have a car either. We were about to lose it this year as well, with the little time we get to spare in the weekends being devoured by the trips to Walmart and Shoprite. We kicked ourselves into getting out in the nick of time - this was the last weekend of peak fall colors in the island. A quick look at the 'net showed us that there are scores of places a stone's throw away, so our plans to venture out to upstate New York were quickly abandoned in favor of a park "next door". This being close to Halloween as well, the roads through deep suburbia that led us to the park happened to go through some pretty fancy scare-decor, like the one below.
Connequot State Park was much larger than we had imagined - and was tougher to get into as well, as Microsoft Streets and Trips sent us into a wild GPS trail search. We had to finally ask for directions from the local populance, and got pointed to the entrance of the park right off 27 West. The person in charge of the park entrance fee collection told us the Mini was her dream car, and that she was planning to get rid of her huge transport in favor of one of these nifty little things! Good for her - and hopefully, a little better for the planet as well. One less SUV on the road has the same benefits as taking a full housing community of smokers on a non-smoking campaign! (Don't challenge me on that, I just made that up)
