New England heralds the arrival of fall. Although the sun’s rays still feel like summer on your skin, the leaves become more colorful with each passing week.

Before we reach Gloucester in Massachusetts, Maine lures us to make one last summer stop, and we mingle with beachgoers in Cape Neddick. The promenade brings back fond memories of days spent swimming in southern England.

We spend some time in Gloucester. We lie on the beach, read in the library, and learn about the inventor John Hays Hammond Jr. and his peculiar castle, which incorporates various European architectural styles. Considering he filed hundreds of patents and invented things like the folding propeller and remote radio control, it’s amazing that we’ve never heard of him.

After traveling back home, some of the crew return to Gloucester with family support. Nikola stays at her mooring buoy while we explore New Hampshire and the White Mountains in a rental car, searching for an Indian summer.

Scenic roads and hikes in New Hampshire

After missing out on fall and winter last year, we are thrilled to be walking through colorful, crunchy leaves this year. We imagine what it must look like here when there is snow on the ground, the lakes are frozen (they are used as landing strips), and the ski lifts are whirring.

The trip is too long for just a day, so we’re spending the night in Lincoln. We wonder when we were last this far from the coast? Inland, that is. By the end of our little adventure, our cell phones are full of photos of Mount Cannon, Mount Major, Flume George, Franconia Notch State Park, and hikes along picturesque Route 112.

The dry weather has affected the intensity of the leaves’ colors, making the Indian summer rather moderate this year. At least the locals assure us that the colors are usually much more vibrant. The young and older participants on the tour are not bothered by this. They surpassed themselves and rest their hiking legs on the return trip to Gloucester.

Cranberries and mushrooms

As soon as the fickle weather settles down to “fine”, we venture out of our hideaway in Onset and continue our fall tour through New England. From Gloucester, we took Nikola first via Plymouth and then through the Cape Cod Canal.

In Onset, we rent another car for trips to Cape Cod. It’s cranberry harvest season there, and we’d like to see how the red berries are fished out of the water. Unfortunately, we’re out of luck with the cranberry bogs.They’re closed, inaccessible, or require advance planning to visit. So, we drive to the very tip of Cape Cod to Provincetown, a remote little town between the sea and the dunes, full of galleries and small, charming shops.

Not far from the village, trails wind through the wild landscape. Hikers gather in the parking lot, wicker baskets in hand. The recent rain has caused mushrooms to sprout from the ground. Our ambition is piqued, and we keep our eyes open for tasty ones. But we are unsuccessful. We seem to have more luck finding food in the water than in the forest. Although there are edible mushrooms, we don’t find any tasty ones. Nevertheless, mushroom hunting in the forest was a welcome change from our usual activities, and it was a perfect end to our autumn excursions through New England.