Our Prufrock Summer 2025 tour begins in Massachusetts. Our travel trailer was parked for a few days in Hyannis while our families gathered in a rental house over Father’s Day weekend for what is becomming an annual tradition. (This was the third consecutive year we got together.)
Temps were on the cool side, but we got in some beach time, clams with bellies and a ferry excursion to Nantucket for a day of walking and shopping. But soon it was time to depart.
Our 2025 Happier Camper tour is taking us through the Adirondacks, into Canada’s Ontario province, then Michigan, the Upper Peninsula and Wisconsin. All terrain that is new to us.
Our first stop was still in Massachusetts. We reserved a spot through the Harvest Host app at Bright Ideas Brewing in Westfield. We pulled up to quiet spot along some trees, and headed inside for a couple of beers and the first set of a British Invasion cover band that calls itself Union Jack.
The next day, we ran on the Columbia Greenway Rail Trail in Westfield, one of the most beautiful and well-maintained rail trails we’ve been on. Then we set up shop in a downtown cafe for a bunch of work.
I grew up about 100 miles east of Westfield – in a town that billed itself as one of the shoe capitals of the states – but had no idea about the city’s history as the premier whip manufacturing local in the U.S. While it’s hard to think of a more archaic product than a buggy whip, Westfield is leaning into its history as “Whip City.”
Several businesses have taken on the name, and the city is seeking to preserve a few sturdy whip manufacturing facilities near the river. One factory still produces leather whips.
We love seeing how small cities adapt, evolve and try to work with their strengths.
