As soon as we stepped foot into Raven Used Books during our Northampton trip, Josh told me he had to take me to the Book Barn. And once he showed me pictures, I was 100% in. We ended up planning an entire trip around going to the Book Barn, and that’s how we spent our Labor Day since we both had the day off. We planned out the whole day to spend time in Niantic and Mystic, and we were both really excited to go on the adventure.

It took us about an hour to get to the Book Barn, and we got there just after they opened at 11:00 a.m. It was like I had died and gone to heaven. Literally the best place on earth.

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Luckily the weather was nice that day so it was enjoyable to walk around outside and poke around in the little sheds and buildings. They were labeled, so I spent most of my time in the fiction sections. Josh just followed me around and held the books I wanted to buy.

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There are 3 Book Barn locations in Niantic, but we went to the original one. There are cats and goats on the grounds there, and even the website has a run down of the cats and goats and their names. The cat pictured above is named Cheesepuff. I tried to pet her but she wasn’t having it. We also briefly saw Pipkin, an orange and white cat. From what I can tell, I believe the goat pictured is Teddy.

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As the caption on my personal Instagram account says (featuring the picture on the right): “Get yourself a boyfriend who fuels your book addiction by bringing you to a used book place that has cats.” I ended up with 7 books, and I’m honestly surprised how many newer books they had. I spent $36 on all 7, which is definitely a deal, considering a hardcover book is usually around $26.

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For lunch, we went into town to Cafe Sol. It was busy during lunch time, and we got there around 12:30-ish. After we ordered, it took about 20 minutes for us to get our food, but we waited outside on the patio. I got the BLaT and a lemonade, and Josh got the cuban and a water. We both really enjoyed our sandwiches; everything on mine tasted really fresh.

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After we finished eating, we weren’t too far away from the boardwalk, so we walked down there right by the ocean. It was absolutely perfect, and the pictures just don’t do it justice. People were out on the beach which was to the right of the boardwalk, and there were other people out walking like us. I think we spent about a half hour walking there, and it was so peaceful.

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Our next stop was B.F. Clyde’s Cider Mill in Mystic. It took less than a half hour to get there, and we ended up having to park about a quarter of a mile down the road because it was so busy. They had just opened for the season on September 1, plus it was Labor Day.

There was an incredibly long line to get into one of the buildings for cider and cider donuts, so we weren’t even going anywhere near that. We took a quick lap around the grounds before getting hard cider slushies from the tasting room. And all was going well until we kept getting attacked by bees. They were everywhere since pretty much everything there was super sweet. We ended up going into the tasting room/gift shop area just to get away from them.

Josh got a hoodie and I got a bottle of apple wine with pumpkin spices and a bottle of hard cider. We would have like to have stayed longer but we were getting really annoyed with the bees. It’d probably be a better place to go to when it’s cooler, like in October or November, since they’re open seasonally.

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Since we still had some time to kill, we went to Old Mistick Village and walked around. We went into a few stores to just look, and I ended up buying a small red Dala horse, similar to the one I bought at IKEA, as a friend for the other horse I have. Because this is going to be a thing I guess. They’re guarding my router and modem.

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For dinner, we went to Mystic Pizza. Yes, that Mystic Pizza—although I’ve never seen the movie. (But it’s on Netflix and I plan on watching it this weekend!) Josh and I split a small house special (with no mushrooms) and each had a Bud Light. It was super cute inside and the pizza was really good.

After dinner, we walked around the downtown area for a little while. It was pretty busy; a lot of people were out and about but we ended up on some side roads that were quieter.

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Then we got ice cream! We had to, of course, since on our second date we got ice cream together. We went to Mystic Drawbridge Ice Cream, aptly named after the drawbridge that’s right out front of the store. I got Pumpkin Pie, and Josh got Wild Maine Blueberry. It was super cute inside, too, and I was very happy we could get ice cream to end the day.

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After we got our ice cream, we walked down by Mystic River Park, which is right next to the Mystic River. There were benches to sit on, so we found an empty one and sat there to eat our ice cream and watch the sun go down. We also got to see the drawbridge in action, which was pretty cool.

We ended up leaving a little after 7:00 p.m., and we were both pretty exhausted from our day. We did a lot but it was so much fun, and I really enjoyed exploring Niantic and Mystic together.