kirkcudbright | newport

Spent the weekend in Newport, visiting Francie's dad. It was Folk Festival weekend, but we were there to watch polo instead.

USA vs India. India is the birthplace of the modern game of polo, and Newport was (I'm told) the first polo club in North America. India started with a 2-goal handicap, and won by 1 goal (9-8), so a very exciting match.

I don't do sports photography, so it's a happy accident this shot came out so well. The US player is Jimmy DeAngelis, who scored 7 of the 8 US goals. He may or may not have just hit the ball, but he's setting up to hook the club of the Indian player.

Another nice shot below, with all the players in frame. Note also the fans tail-gating on the sidelines. This really is a fairly intimate sport.

Also cruised around the Ocean Drive. This beach rose is mostly past blooming, and is setting big hips.

Big juicy Cthulu-like rose hips.

Next day we went to Belcourt Castle.

My good camera had a dead battery, so these are crappy phone cam pix. No photography allowed in the house, and there are better exterior shots on the web, so these are just some things found around the grounds.

[EDIT for my own remembrance, and for anyone reading this late. Belcourt was built by Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont (for whose father the Belmont Stakes horse race was named). It's an object lesson in what happens when a young man inherits a huge pile of money. The entire first floor was devoted to horses - carriage room where the Italian banqueting hall is now, tack room where the English library is now, and a 30-stall stable. He always had a horse tacked and ready to ride at a moment's notice. The house had only one bedroom and one bathroom (with the first standing shower in Newport), and no kitchen. He loved to entertain, but put his friends up in a hotel rather than at his house. He also disdained the nouveau riche - the house literally has its back to Bellevue Ave. When he married the wife of his (former) best friend and business partner, she made a few changes...]

After the Gilded Age, a lot of mansions went derelict, and some were demolished. Belcourt was bought by the Lorillard family to host the first two years of the Jazz Festival. When the town said it was too small to continue that way, they sold it to the Tinney family, who started filling it with their art collection, and with fixtures rescued from mansions that were being demolished (possibly including items from Villa Rosa, demolished in 1962 to build the butt-ugly apartment building where Francie's dad now lives).

Anyway, most of the rescued bits live inside (including a pair of priceless 2nd century Roman columns that were going to be dumpstered), but some of the bigger and less valuable bits are stored in the yard.