SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY...

A stop at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut on our road trip deserves it's own post.  Like the song (Sentimental Journey) says, I was like a child in wild anticipation!  I hadn't been there since I was 16, and I was excited to share my memories with The Hubs.  

Backstory:  When I was 16 years old, my Dad, a professor of Mathematics at Oklahoma Christian University, was honored to get to study Babylonian Mathematics at Yale for the summer of 1980.  It was a wonderful experience for him academically and a great surprise for our family, as we had taken "our last big road trip as a family" the summer before to California.  Dad arranged for my mother, sister and me to fly up to Connecticut and join him the last month.  We had an apartment, with no air conditioning (which was common there) but the summer of 1980 is known historically as one of the hottest!  I thought the people up there must be crazy to not have air conditioning.  

For a month, my sister and I walked all over New Haven, stopping often in the Peabody Museum to see the dinosaurs, eating pizza at a local diner, going to the mall, even taking sewing lessons at a fabric store.  We were extras in a commercial filmed at the mall.  We went to several events on the Yale campus with our parents- a tour and film nights; a picnic with the other professors.  We went to church and doubled the size of the youth group, enjoying time in one of the member's homes.  On the weekends we went to other states - saw Boston, New York City, and Princeton, New Jersey, even staying with another professor and his wife in their home.  We enjoyed Hamonasset Beach and Mystic Seaport.  We grew to love Italian bakeries.  I realized on the way home I had not seen a Mexican restaurant in a month!  On the drive home we stopped to take in more history and culture in Washington, D.C., Virginia, and Nashville.  I actually kept a journal of the trip, so it's fun to read and see what my 16 year old mind thought about all these new experiences.  

 Our first stop in New Haven was at an Italian bakery for some goodies!

 Peabody Museum of Natural History, on the campus of Yale University.

They had a special exhibit on Babylonian Antiquities, which is what my Dad studied there!

The Peabody also has an excellent dinosaur room!  This was my first time ever as a kid to see actual dinosaur bones!

 In the Children's Area, they have Hissing Cockroaches and Leafcutter Ants!

What they believe the Dodo bird may have looked like, based on the skeleton.

So, I mentioned in my teenage trip journal that Clark's pizza was the best.  And they are still there!!!! 

This beautiful bell tower on campus was chiming as we walked by!

Entrance to the Sterling Memorial library, which has interesting architecture and history.  

This is something I've always been in awe of on the campus since I first saw it - the Beinecke Rare Book Museum.  They have one of five Gutenberg Bibles in the US displayed here.  But what I really loved are the walls.  They are made of marble.  On the outside of the building it looks like a plain white building.  But when you get inside, if it's a sunny day, you can see the sun shining through the marble and all the striations of the stone.  It's always been so amazing to me!  I was tickled to just walk around inside and show this to The Hubs as well.

The few hours we spent here were really special to me.  I loved seeing the sights and eating the foods I remembered.  I never really had memories of living anywhere else except Oklahoma, so New Haven, Connecticut was a real eye-opener for me in so many ways: historically, an ivy league university, small churches, and the culture.  It was such a wonderful experience and I'm so glad I got to share a little bit of it with The Hubs.