We set out early, leaving the Manchester/Bedford, NH area and headed for Oak n Spruce Village in Lee, MA where we had planned to stay for the week.

Along the way, we had to stop at the River View Cemetery in Sunderland, MA to look for the grave sites of Graves’, who are related, several generations back.  While there were many Graves’ graves, none of them were in my direct ancestral line.  The spot along the river and among small farms, however, would vie any great cathedral.  It made a fine place to worship and say a prayer of gratitude for so much beauty and grace – and for these people, so many years distant from me, without whom, I would not be!  Because we didn’t find the Graves’ we wanted, we made another stop farther down the road in Whatley, MA to look for more of the Grave’s graves.  There we did meet success.  We found Thomas and Sarah Graves (my 9th great-grandparents) and their son John and his wife Mary Graves, (my 8th great-grandparents) all who died and were buried there in the 1660’s and 1670’s.

As the day stretched into late afternoon, we began to feel anxious to find a base camp.  Changing plans on the fly, we made the decision to skip Springfield, MA for the time being and go straight to Lee to find our lodgings for the week.