Portsmouth Meeting:Sep 21, 2007

***If you are signing up to attend this meeting after June 1, please send me an email and let me know so that I can forward to you the information I have already sent out. Thanks!***

Come to the beautiful New Hampshire Seacoast this September 21-23 to see your VT friends and meet new VTers! Just 45 minutes north of Boston, Portsmouth, New Hampshire is a quaint New England seaside town with lots of history, great restaurants, museums, theatre and a working harbor offering day cruises, whale watches and deep sea fishing to visitors.

The city is also within an hour's drive of New Hampshire's Hampton Beach area and Portland, Maine.

How to Get There

Portsmouth is accessible via either Boston's Logan International Airport (BOS) or Manchester, New Hampshire's Manchester-Boston International Airport (MHT), each about 45 minutes away. Bus service to Portsmouth is available from both (www.cjtrailways.com). Portsmouth is also home to Pease International Tradeport, offering limited flights to and from Chicago and several Florida cities. The discount airline Skybus (www.skybus.com) also offers flights directly to Portsmouth (their Web site says "Boston", but it's Portsmouth.)

Where to Stay

Several hotels are available in Portsmouth, in a variety of brands and price ranges. There are three hotels and a few B&Bs in the immediate downtown area, within walking distance to all attractions, and several more hotels and B&B's a short distance away. I have a listing of low-cost and regular hotels, just email me and I'll send it your way!

Other Stuff You Might Need

Also below are some links that you may find helpful in getting to know the area better, or for finding answers to any questions you may have. If you can't find what you're looking for, please don't hesitate to email me.

http://www.portsmouthnh.com/visitors/transportation.html
http://www.portsmouthnh.com/index.cfm
http://www.chamberworks.net/portsmouthchamber/visitors/welcome.cfm
http://www.seacoastonline.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portsmouth,_New_Hampshire

Local Weather Forecasts: http://www.wunderground.com/US/NH/Portsmouth.html

Our Meeting Itinerary!(NOTE THAT SOME INFO HAS CHANGED)

On Friday the 21st there will be a drop-in happy hour from 4:30-7 PM at the Portsmouth Brewery (www.portsmouthbrewery.com). Dinner on Friday night will now be at 7:30 PM at The Rosa (http://www.therosa.com) which is a great, casual Italian place with really good pizzas and lots of other fab stuff, even seafood. **Note** For anyone who is planning to drive to The Rosa, rather than walking, they have their own free parking lot across the street.

On Saturday those who are interested can take a narrated Historic Isles of Shoals/Portsmouth Harbor cruise. The boat sails at 1:25 PM and returns to port at 4:15 PM. The cost is $25 for adults. If more than 25 people decide to go we can get a group rate, so let me know if you're interested. However, you don't need a reservation to go, so if you're one of those last-minute decision makers you can still come. If you want to read more about the boat tours you can visit the Steamship Company's web site: (www.islesofshoals.com).

If you don't have sea legs there are still a lot of fun things to do. Portsmouth is home to the beautiful Strawberry Banke Museum (www.strawberybanke.org) and the Albacore Park Maritime Museum (www.ussalbacore.org) as well as many, many unique shops, boutiques and historic homes. The city also has a theatre and a very cool independent book shop (www.riverrunbookstore.com).

Saturday night's drop-in happy hour will be at Poco's Bow St. Cantina (www.pocosbowstreetcantina.com) from (approximately) 4:30-7 PM. Dinner on Saturday will now be at The Oar House (http://www.portsmouthnh.com/oarhouse) at 7:30 PM. The Oar House serves traditional New England seafood (Lobsters!!) and also has NON-seafood items for all of you people who don't eat fish (or meat).

After dinner Saturday night those who are up for it can join us for some dancing at the Portsmouth Gaslight Company's nightclub (www.portsmouthgaslight.com/club.php). There is a small cover charge to get in. Note that if you are from outside the U.S. you MUST show your passport as ID to get into the club. People with out-of-state U.S. drivers licences can use those without a problem.

Sunday morning starting at 10:00 people will be meeting for a casual breakfast/brunch at Popovers on the Square (www.popoversonthesquare.com). This is a really nice, casual little bakery/cafe with tables outside. This will be sort of a drop-in event, as I'm not making reservations, so come when/if you can!

If you'd like to join the Misc. Forum discussion about this meeting go to this link: http://forum.virtualtourist.com/discussion-356056-2-1-Miscellaneous-0-0-World-discussion.html#answerID_2460781