Portsmouth, New Hampshire

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From Portland, Maine I drove to Portsmouth, New Hampshire and then to Manchester.  I drove because the bus schedule was impossible -- a circuitous route that would have taken 15 hours to make a two-hour drive.

Portsmouth is a quintessential New England coastal town with lots of red brick commercial buildings.  The buildings along the waterfront evoked images of clerks with ink-stained fingers counting barrels of incoming freight and making marks in their ledgers.  Now, in these same buildings, waiters watch for customers in the tony bars and restaurants.

The pier along the waterfront was a tad inaccessible -- I had to lift a latch and commit trespass to get onto a restaurant's summer deck and take this picture.  Inaccessibility of waterfronts is nearly an unforgivable sin in my town-planning book.  But Portsmouth almost made up for it with interesting boutiques and great coffee shops throughout town.

Tugboats in Portsmouth, NH harbor.