I have a strong preference for staying in a B&B, but getting a reservation for a single weekend night isn't always possible. Is that a New England thing, or is it common in other locations as well? I wonder... My first choice of B&B was full for the next 3 or 4 weekends. My second choice had some rooms available but they weren't willing to rent them for just one night. I suspect that if I just showed up and there was a room available that I'd be able to take it for one night - but given that this is a holiday weekend and that I really wanted to stay in the center of Portsmouth, I turned to hotels.
Most of the reasonably priced hotels are not in the center of town. They tend (in this area anyway) to be in commercial strips, near big box stores, and not in my preferred downtown location. There are two hotels in town, both a bit on the expensive side. Funny though, as the days crept closer to the night I needed the room, the prices started dropping. At first I thought that maybe they charged less for Friday nights than for Saturday, but that just doesn't make any sense. And I verified that isn't true by checking the room rates for next weekend. Very interesting. I ended up paying less than I would have at one of my B&B choices, and a little more than I would have paid at my first choice B&B. I suppose it makes a certain amount of sense that the room rates would go down. After all, an empty room brings in no money at all.
My first task after showing my bike to her home for the night was to find someplace to pick up some Gatorade for tomorrow morning. Success, time for a little relaxing... the whirlpool was calling. Even though it was a very very hot ride today, it still felt good to soak in the hot tub for a while. And yes, I really took a quick shower first. My face was caked with salty remnants of sweat, and somehow I couldn't jump into the hot tub wearing all of that salt.
Time to eat... it was early, but I needed food - not too much of a surprise! I grabbed my camera in case interesting things jumped out at me as I searched for food. There are so many restaurants within walking distance of my home for the night that I actually had to make a decision! Dinner was at Chiangmai Thai Restaurant. And wow - my stomach is definitely happy. I had a dish called Heart to Heart, described as "large shrimps marinated with curry powder then chargrilled to perfection, served over steamed broccoli and squash, then dressed with peanut sauce". Yum... I could happily eat that quite often!
After dinner, walking, watching the sun glow as it started dropping in the sky. A good day...
