Hello.
I would like to travel (by car) to the East coast and/or southern coast and am looking for info on Rhode Island, and anywhere that would be unique/ small townish, and whimsical, with great local food. Would an unplanned, unbooked adventure July 20 - Aug. 4 be too dangerous, or should we book our rooms in advance?
Thank you!
Eastern & Southern Coast
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Do not try and travel to any beach towns from July 20-August 4 without reservations or you may find yourself sleeping in your car.
Actually, for Rhode Island towns like Newport, Jamestown, Bristol/Warren, Narragansett, and even Block Island, you could probably find rooms somewhere Monday-Thursday without reservations. It is over the weekends you would absolutely have to have reservations in order to stay near the coast. However, you could still find rooms near the Airport (Warwick) and frankly that is about a half hour drive from almost any point in Rhode Island (except Block Island of course). So if you didn't mind spending a little extra time in your car driving around, and maybe staying a little away from the coast, you could do what you suggest. If it were me I would reserve the weekends and play the weekdays by ear.
There are several unique, small townish type areas in RI. On the West Bay there is Wickford, Wakefield and East Greenwich. None is a beach community per se, but near water and all have main streets, old houses, and retain some old town flavor ( though there are also overly developed areas in them). On the East Bay, there is Bristol which is next door to the more popular Newport but which offers more "normal people/normal houses".. I rode through recently and was happy to see a Main street that looked like it was thriving. there are old homes, water views, antique shops to poke around in. Not sure where to tell you to eat... RI generally offers good Italian and seafood and I know all these areas also have their share of more upscale dining spots. Look at the Projo.com for dining ideas of if you can pick up a copy of magazine called RI Monthly. They always have some reviews.
Thanks for the info!
I lived in Bristol, RI for about 3 years before moving back to Houston a year ago. There's now a new inn in town:
www.bristolharborinn.com
It's really a quaint little town with several seafood restaurants in town (and in Warren, the town just to the North), a couple of Irish pubs, etc.
Good thing about Bristol is that it's only about 25 minutes from Providence, and 30 minutes from Newport center; surrounded by water on three sides, a nice bike path. Anthony Quinn lives there before he passed away.
It has a major July 4th parade - longest running one in whole of US, with people from all of southern New England coming. But the crowds will be long gone when you arrive.