Serenity in Connecticut

The day begins casually in Chester, without so much as a whimper. While sidewalks are swept clean by shopkeepers, locals gather to exchange bits of gossip outside a 1750s bookstore and to snack on cheese pates and deli meats at Jerry Beaumier’s grocery and sandwich emporium.

Set in the Connecticut River Valley, the 300-year-old village attracts visitors in search of a New England experience without the crowds of Groton and busy Mystic. Katharine Hepburn drives up from her home in Fenwick, and TV’s Morley Safer prowls the streets now that he’s a resident.

Urbanites sift down from Hartford, and weary Manhattanites come in search of serenity. Chester and the surrounding Connecticut River Valley is a balm for frazzled nerves, an escape route for stressed-out crowds from the cities.

Springtime is particularly pleasant, when the earth comes alive once more with the greenery of meadows and the leafing out of maples, birches and copper beeches.

From Chester, visitors explore antique shops and pre-Revolutionary homes and dozens of arts and crafts centers. Excursion boats drift along the river and motorists cross the oldest swinging bridge in Connecticut to look in on spooky old Gillette Castle and Goodspeed Opera House, where musicals are introduced that frequently move on to Broadway (“Annie” and “Man of La Mancha,” to name a couple).

From Chester there is the joy of discovering riverside cafes and studying scenes that capture the imagination of romantics. A ferry that’s been in operation since 1767 chugs across the Connecticut. Birds wheel overhead and the fragrance of springtime stirs the air.

In summertime, crowds gather on the green in Chester to watch performers of the world-renowned National Theater of the Deaf. Others attend an old-fashioned fair that features horse and ox pulls. And in July the neighboring town of Deep River welcomes dozens of fife and drum corps at a muster that’s gained international acclaim.

Nationally known basket weaver Sossee Baker teaches her craft to visitors, and proprietress Lois Nadel of the Chester Book Co. invites the passer-by to pore over her collection of rare, out-of-print publications.

Chester is that sort of town. Friendly and laid-back.

In the center of this old, old New England village, youngsters pause by Pattaconk Brook while grown-ups gather at Jerry Beaumier’s Wheatmarket to stock up on hot rum peppers, Vermont cheddar cheese, New England preserves, pickle sauce from Britain, soups from Scotland, cheeses from Holland and sweets from West Germany.

Picnic hampers are stuffed with angel hair pasta, quiches and marinated shrimp and scallops wrapped in smoked bacon. Beaumier does hot jalapeno mustard cheese puffs; brochettes of chicken, beef and seafood, and a smoked salmon mousse. His sandwich list ranges from roast beef with a garlic-herb cheese to chicken breast with mozzarella.

Besides picnics and groceries, Beaumier caters parties for boaters. A recent river trip attended by 400 billed out to $5,000.

A couple of doors from the Wheatmarket, the Chester Bread Works displays sausage rolls, cherry turnovers, blueberry strudel, eclairs and take-home soups prepared fresh daily by Carol Kerr, who also does oven-ready dinners. Others drop by the Pattaconk Inn for blackened prime rib, Cajun broiled scrod and Louisiana crawfish.

At the One-of-a-Kind antique store, a 100-year-old spinning wheel was priced at $275 and a vintage roll-top desk sold for $3,250.

Chester is a compact, law-abiding village where, according to one resident, the only workout the constable gets is ticketing a youngster who might be tooling around town with a burned-out taillight.

That should tell you something about the low-gear pace of this corner of New England.

Few Connecticut villages claim a more comfortable spot to doze than the Inn at Chester, a one-time farmhouse dating from the Revolutionary War. The inn is a rare retreat for the traveler concerned with comfort as well as quiet. Framed by a forest on the outskirts of town, the tastefully furnished, 48-room inn provides New England fare in a restaurant whose chefs prepare picnics for guests hitting the road. Tree frogs sing at night and ducks grace a pond in spring and fall.

At Ivoryton the proud 101-year-old Copper Beech Inn has provided shelter to dozens of celebrities appearing at the Ivoryton Playhouse. Four guest rooms are up for grabs in the inn, and others with Jacuzzi tubs and queen-size beds are booked in a new carriage house behind the Copper Beech.

Proprietress Louise Ebeltoft, a transplanted New Yorker, tells visitors confidentially that the Copper Beech will become “the finest inn in Connecticut.” No retiring wallflower, this refugee from the corporate madness of Manhattan. The Copper Beech has won widespread acclaim for its restaurant, with its sense of age and refinement. Kerosene lamps glow and fresh flowers grace the room.

New Englanders travel for miles to dine at the Copper Beech. Without question, its menu is a masterpiece: clams topped with crabmeat, garlic butter and hazelnut dressing; wild mushrooms served in a puff pastry and a cream sauce with white wine, cheeses and Dijon mustard; roast baby pheasant stuffed with minced mushrooms, shallots and butter, with a sauce of game stock and red wine, and sauteed veal sweetbreads in white wine with lemon, capers and butter.

It goes on.

One gourmet described the whole affair as “the timeless cooking of Escoffier.”

As for the desserts, well, mark them down as outrageously seductive. If the menu were displayed in the Louvre, the Copper Beech would be more famous than the Mona Lisa.

That said, I confess I was impressed by another old-fashioned inn only a whisper from the Copper Beech. No question, the Copper Beech is by far more elegant. It’s just that I enjoyed the casual mood of the Riverwind Inn, a restored 1820s B&B; that’s crowded with antiques and glows with the personality of its proprietress, Barbara Barlow, who left her daddy’s hog farm in Smithfield, Va., to restore homes in Connecticut.

Barlow, who has the energy to ignite the entire Connecticut River Valley, took over Riverwind in 1983. Since then she’s knocked out walls, wired and tiled the inn and replumbed its baths. Barlow also serves as chef, housekeeper and, in her spare time, chauffeurs her guests around town in a 1960 Bentley.

Honeymoon Suite

During the renovation Barlow collected barn board and wooden beams for the old home, preparing a honeymoon suite that would gladden the heart of the fussiest romantic.

Guests gather around a stone fireplace and coffee perks throughout the day. The Riverwind draws both celebrities and the ordinary wayfarer. Jazz musician Dave Brubeck took over the entire inn to play for his son’s wedding.

Guests do pilgrimages to neighboring Essex, the Connecticut River town that’s big on antiques and high on history. Until Pearl Harbor, Essex was renowned as the site of America’s greatest naval disaster. It was during the War of 1812 that British troops slipped into Essex, torching 28 ships. Afterward they retired to the old Griswold Inn that continues to host guests every day but Christmas.

On Sunday, crowds gather for a hunt breakfast that features fried chicken, scrambled eggs, a grits-and-cheddar-cheese souffle, ham, bacon, sausage, chicken livers, creamed mushrooms and ham, English muffins, hot corn bread “and whatever else the chef can find at the market.”

Dating from 1776, The Gris is a combination of buildings that were hauled to Essex from throughout New England. The Taproom, with its steamboat Gothic bar, was a schoolhouse and, beyond the bar, a century-old covered bridge serves as a dining room. Other guests take their meals in a book-lined parlor as well as the Steamboat Room with its binnacles and bells and a giant mural that rocks like a ship, giving diners the impression they’re off on an ocean voyage.

Inn Without a Clerk

The Gris--its guest rooms possess neither telephone nor TV--is an inn without a clerk. Guests checking out are instructed to pay up in the dining room. Or in the event the dining room is closed, the idea is to lay the cash on the bartender.

A couple of hundred years ago Essex made headlines by turning out the Oliver Cromwell, the first warship belonging to the Continental Navy. To stroll through town is to turn back the clock. Homes and shops from Colonial and Federalist eras line Main Street, and the steamboat dock at the foot of the thoroughfare has served Essex since 1848.

Art galleries do a brisk business, and dozens of antique shops operate along the avenues of this old New England village.

During the Christmas holidays carolers march down Main Street, and hot buttered rum and chocolate are served in the old town square. Summer and autumn are seasons for sailing. River boats cruise the Connecticut, their throaty blasts echoing along the shores, and a steam train does trips from Essex.

Nostalgia weighs heavy as the Essex choo-choo puffs along, plumes of smoke rising from its old-fashioned locomotive, its steam whistle sending thunderous waves through the valley. Small New England towns pass and white-steeple churches etched on the horizon bring to mind a scene that fulfills the traveler’s search for serenity.

--The Inn at Chester, 318 W. Main St., Chester, Conn. 06412, (203) 526-4961. Rate: $80.

--Copper Beech Inn, Main Street, Ivoryton, Conn. 06442, (203) 767-0330. Rates: $70/$125.

--Riverwind Country Inn, 209 Main St., Deep River, Conn. 06417, (203) 526-2014. Rates: $70/$135 (including a full breakfast).

--Griswold Inn, Main Street, Essex, Conn. 06426, (203) 767-1812. Rates: $68/$165.

Other accommodations:

--Old Lyme Inn, P.O. Box 787B, Old Lyme, Conn. 06371, (203) 434-2600. Rates: $75/$115. On Main Street in Old Lyme’s historic district, circa 1850. Handsomely furnished. Four dining rooms.

--Water’s Edge, 1525 Boston Post Road, Westbrook, Conn. 06498, (203) 399-5901. Rates: $70/$175 (summers are higher). This property overlooks Long Island Sound. Tennis, health club, indoor-outdoor swimming pools. Shops, golf, fishing nearby.