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JOURNEYS; 36 Hours | Northampton, Mass.
By PAUL SCHNEIDER
Published: October 29, 2004
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THIRTY years ago, downtown Northampton was looking pretty
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bleak. True, there were always Smith College students to keep a few
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shops busy, and the lawyers doing business at the county courthouse
where Calvin Coolidge once practiced had a few places to eat lunch.
But once the Woolworth's went bust, there was no escaping the sense
that Northampton's time had come and gone. Then, by the late 70's,
blood began to flow again, and by the mid-80's, locals who used to call the place Hamp
were sliding into NoHo. Today the music bars and art galleries are stacked several stories
high, the old theaters are reupholstered in plush velvet, the number of sushi bars per
capita is unsustainable, and the street corners are full of jugglers and jug bands. It's so
happening that local artists and musicians are migrating to cheaper digs in nearby
Easthampton. So if you hear someone say E-Ho, say, ''Oh, yeah, E-Ho.'' PAUL
SCHNEIDER
Friday
6 p.m.
1) Do You Have an Advocate?
Your first mission is to pick up a free copy of The Valley Advocate, everyone's go-to
source on what's going on around town, at one of the kiosks at most major street corners.
Read it at the Woodstar Café (60 Masonic Street, ), in a former
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firehouse, while you enjoy a fresh-baked something and a fresh-brewed (or pressed)
coffee -- caffeinated please, this may be a late night. Then check in at the Broadside
BOOK A
Bookshop (247 Main Street, ), above, the best in a valley overrun
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FLIGHT
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with bookstores, to see if any interesting readings are planned. (If you're interested in
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advance tickets to the national acts that occasionally play in relatively small spots in
Leaving from:
town, you'll find them at www.iheg.com.)
Departing:
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7 p.m.
Adults:
2) A Hearty Dinner
2
6
By now you're in the mood for a duck confit spring roll ($10) followed by spice-dusted
filet mignon with a shallot and lemon compote, asparagus and braised mushroom
bruschetta ($29) at the moderately elegant Del Raye Bar & Grill, (1 Bridge Street,
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), a perennial contender for the best restaurant in town, especially if
413-586-2664
you like grilled meats and a reliable wine list.
All the news
9 p.m.
Celebrate your
3) A Little Night Music
You can't go too wrong at Bishop's Lounge (41 Strong Avenue, ),
413-585-9200
where the music's often pretty good and the cover is usually only a couple of dollars. It's
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not a sit-down-and-clap-after-the-solos jazz bar so much as a place to stand and sway in a
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Irish-Jewish-folk-punk does its thing in the corner and smokers do theirs out on the
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balcony. The Pearl Street Nightclub (10 Pearl Street, ), a few doors
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12/28
down, is more of a rock and hip-hop club, while across the street is the entrance to the
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Tunnel Bar (), a former train tunnel and now a fine place to get the
413-586-5366
MontBleu
ringing out of your ears when you've had enough.
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Saturday
8:45 a.m.
4) Want S'mores?
The universal favorite place for a full-on, ''how about some apple pancakes with those
eggs'' breakfast is the former home of Sylvester Graham, inventor of the cracker that
bears his name and a man famous in his day for wandering around town in his bathrobe.
But get to Sylvester's (111 Pleasant Street, ) early; if you wait until
413-586-1418
much past 9 to show up chances are you'll wait until after 9:30 to sit down.
10 a.m.
5) Good Impressions
Monet, Manet, Courbet, Cézanne, Gauguin, Degas, O'Keeffe, Hopper, Picasso -- an easy
stroll across town brings you eventually to the Smith College Museum of Art (Elm Street
at Bedford Terrace, ), which has at least one painting by almost every
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old master you might hear of in freshman art history. Arguably more memorable, if you
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JOURNEYS; 36 Hours | Northampton, Mass. - New York TimesPage 3 of 5
get there before the show closes at the end of the year, is the art from Kyoto, Japan,
especially the giant Morimura Yasumasa ''Self-Portrait (Actress)'' series, and a haunting
full-scale representation of a wrecked World War II Zero fighter plane, above, by
Nakahashi Katsushige.
Noon
6) Kalahari Dreaming
In addition to adding an architectural sense of transparency and freedom to the lovely
but occasionally cloistered feeling of Smith's campus, the new Campus Center, fronting
the green, also houses the best lunch deal in town. After a Santa Fe salad with chicken,
assorted vegetables and tortilla chips ($4.45), you're due for a session at the Lyman
Conservatory (), where a minute or two at the center of the Palm
413-585-2740
House has restored more than a few local souls suffering from mid-winter doldrums.
More interesting are the countless cactuses of the Succulent House, including a deeply
strange looking South African elephant's foot. And what, you may wonder, goes on
behind the steamed-up windows of the ''Warm Genetics'' house, which is strictly off-
limits to all but certain card-carrying Smithies?
3 p.m.
7) Before Ben, Before Jerry
Wander down Main Street, stopping for whatever looks interesting. This might include
Herrell's (8 Old South Street, ), a sometime center of the high-
413-586-9700
butterfat ice cream wars of the 1980's and 1990's. Herrell's leads right into Thorne's
Marketplace, a smorgasbord of busy boutiques that will either catch your interest or send
you fleeing back to the slightly less crowded sidewalks. A few doors down, you will find R.
Michelson Galleries (132 Main Street, ), an immense place with an
413-586-3964
almost dizzying range of works by local artists, some nationally known. There's also a
wide selection of original children's book illustrations at the back on the second floor, if
you're looking for that perfect little collectible to hang on Junior's wall. Then drop by
Gallery TK, (114 Main Street; no telephone) a tiny place founded by a group of students to
give their fellow artists a place to struggle in public.
5 p.m.
8) Blast From the Past
Going south on Pleasant Street, NoHo reverts back to Hamp somewhere around Ye Ol'
Watering Hole and Beer Can Museum (287 Pleasant Street, ). As the
413-585-0990
name suggests, it's an unprettified dive with a truly insane number of beer cans from
around the world and the beginning of time (or at least the beginning of canned beer).
The collection is not as well lighted as you might wish, but that's probably for the
preservation of the artifacts.
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JOURNEYS; 36 Hours | Northampton, Mass. - New York TimesPage 4 of 5
7 p.m.
9) Mediterranean Moment
After the ice cream and the beer, you're hoping to restore your dietary balance with
something healthy. The Amanouz Cafe (44 Main Street, ) is a little
413-585-9128
Moroccan hideaway with delicious vegetarian couscous creations for under $10.
9 p.m.
10) Here We Go Again
All the notes about Friday night still apply unless a midday review of The Advocate
sensibly steered you in the direction of, say, a film at the meticulously restored Academy
of Music Theater (274 Main Street, ), the sixth-oldest continually
413-584-8435
operating theater in the country. If music's still the thing, at the Basement (21 Center
Street, ), you can usually sit at a table, have a responsible glass of red
413-387-6345
wine, and enjoy an acoustic trio. For that matter, there are usually two or three acoustic
combos playing on the street corners by this hour on a Saturday night.
Sunday
10 a.m.
11) The Footsteps of Giants
Drive south out of town on Route 5, and stay on it about five miles after passing the
junction with Interstate 91, until you see a well-marked pullout on the left. A path takes
you to a place where 190 million years ago a family of carnivorous dinosaurs, the largest
of which is thought to have been 10 to 15 feet tall, walked across a mud flat. The fossilized
footprints are hard to see at first, but stand with your back to the river at the bottom of
the slate outcropping, looking up toward the road revetment. Suddenly they'll pop into
view and make you feel young indeed.
THE BASICS
Visiting Northampton
Northampton is 20 miles north of Springfield, Mass., and 100 miles west of Boston. It is
about a half-hour's drive from Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks, Conn.
Amtrak stops in Springfield as well as in nearby Amherst, Mass.
The grand old Hotel Northampton (36 King Street, ) is luxurious and
413-584-3100
convenient; its 99 rooms are $200 to $255 a night.
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Another in-town option is the Autumn Inn (259 Elm Street, ), with
413-584-7660
32 rooms starting at about $100 in the off-season and the kind of mid-20th-century hotel
décor that's not quite an asset but is clean and functional.
The Best Western (117 Conz Street, , rooms starting at $129) is about
413-586-1500
a 15-minute walk from downtown but very near a bowling alley.
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