Last night, I had dinner in Gloucester, a real mccoy fishing village North of Salem, with Dana and David, the guys I'd met through my friend Lu. The drive to Gloucester takes you through Manchester by the Sea, a gorgeous, wealthy town with the most beautiful houses on large green lawns sloping down to the sea. I had a great time with Dana and David and feel we all hit it off really well.

David, Dana and Keith reviewing the menu in Gloucester

They're a curious couple - really very different from each other. Dana's an impulsive, outgoing, cocky, assertive, salt-of-the-earth kind of guy who has his own contradictions in that he's a homebody who's hardly ever left Marblehead, even on vacation. Dana and I were flinging jibes at each other within five minutes of our first meeting.

David is from an old, Maine family, probably from money, although he didn't say so - very reserved and controlled on first encounter. He slowly unwound as the evening went on and I'd thoroughly warmed up to him by the end of the evening.

On first take you wonder how their relationship has lasted for twelve years. But I saw last night how they really give and take a lot to accomodate their differences. Having never lasted more than two and a half years in a relationship, I was taking notes.

When I awoke this morning, Marblehead had changed its mood again, as gentle rain speckled the surface of the water lapping just across from my deck.

I was week and tired yesterday, slept terribly last night, and then was full of energy today. Go figure.

I was sorry to leave my wonderful guest studio, the "Compass Rose", but nonetheless, I got packed quickly and was on the road shortly after eight o'clock, as I had a lot of ground to cover today. There's something about driving in the rain when on vacation that floats me away into memories of other vacations. And even back to childhood, when I'd go with my family to the Lake District, in north-western England, where it seemed to rain every other day. I remember one day - I must have been about ten years old - I was staring out of the window at the rain imagining what it would be like to be an adult, and have my own car. I imagined driving in the rain, listening to "Lonely Days and Mondays" by the Carpenters (don't ask me why!)

I was planning on driving Route 2 right across the top of Massachussets, and, to get there, I had to first head South on I95. I passed Route 1, and started to watch for Route 2. Then suddenly I saw signs for Route 3. When I saw the signs for Route 4, I got so distressed, thinking I'd missed my road, that I got off and went to Dennys for a chicken-caesar salad and a pee. The snotty young kid who took my order told me it was actually called a caesar salad with grilled chicken. They should have called it a crouton/cheese medley with accents of lettuce and chicken! No wonder America has an obesity crisis if they're serving crap like this in the name of food. They didn't even have to-go "silver-ware", so they had to give me real silver-ware; well steel-ware at least.

With complete illogic, Route 2 came right after Route 4, and soon I was speeding along the rustic old highway which, half-way along, becomes the "Mohawk Trail", a highway built purposefully for early New England motorers to enjoy a scenic ride.

By noon, the day had blossomed into yet another beautiful Summer's day, although dramatic clouds threatened for most of the afternoon.

Along the Mohawk Trail, the original builders erected three steel observation towers at the highest points, from where you can see anywhere between three and five states. The views were worth the $2.00 fee at Greenfield, at least today, since the clouds added a severe beauty.

View from Poet's Seat Tower on Greenfield Mountain

Shelburne Falls gets prime billing on the Mohawk Trail with it's exciting Bridge of Flowers (a bunch of flower-mad, dotty old ladies reclaimed an old trolley bridge to attract sucker tourists like me) and it's enthralling glacier pottholes (think rocks and rushing water).

The Bridge of Flowers at exciting Shelburne Falls

The Glacier Potholes, also at exciting Shelburne Falls

The views and cloudes from the final steel observation tower, on Whitcomb Summit, were even more spectacular, taking in five states, reputedly.

The view from Whitcomb Summit :)

The final compelling attraction on the Mohawk Trail is the natural stone bridge in the gritty industrial-turned-artsy town of North Adams, where waterfalls have bored a deep shaft through solid marble.

The Natural Bridge

Finally, I turned South on Route 7, one of the most beautiful routes in New England, with well-kept old houses and antique stores sitting in sun-dappled roadside lawns, with the woods beyond and the grey-green hills in the distance.

By the time I reached Lenox, and my motel, which wasn't at all bad for the price and the location, I felt hot, tired and grimy and was dying for a coffee. I took a quick shower then set off towards Becket. Since there was nothing exciting playing at the Tanglewood Music Festival tonight, I'd decided to go instead to the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, where they were having a free, outside dance-workshop performance by "Doug Varone and Dancers" I grabbed my precious coffee and another sandwich (mental note - too many carbs today and yesterday!) and got to the festival in time to park and get a good seat close to the stage.

There was a rarified and genteel air to the festival grounds, it seemed that everyone was either young and willowy or old, rich and rickety with no in-betweens. But it was lovely to sit in the open-air, and watch the sun descend behind the trees while the dancers performed.

Doug Varone and Dancers at Jacob's Pillow

The most interesting part was when Varone illustrated how they put dances together, by just looking around him at the shapes he sees and translating them into movement. In just five minutes, he and a fellow dancer put together an improvised five-phrase dance whose complex steps both dancers could repeat immediately from physical memory. Ten years ago, I took a modern dance class. I was horribly awful, and it would take me weeks to memorize series of movements. So here I was very impressed. I'm always guilty of envying other people their professions, and now I wanted to be a dancer all over again. Oh well - in my next life :)

By the time I got back to my motel, the sun was almost set, but there was still time to go for a run. I set off down the nearest lane away from Route 7. At first, I was running past old houses in landscaped gardens. But this gradually gave way to farmland, and soon there was literally nothing I could hear but birds, and not a soul nor even a house in site. A pickup truck roared past at one point, with two leering youths, and I realized that if I'd been black I probably couldn't have gone on this run in this neighborhood. On the way back, the pale blue sky was fading to a distant orange on the horizon and it was a moment I couldn't have captured on my camera.