Ramble the Travelling Ram

Ramble hasn’t missed out on some of the iconic Mystic landmarks, lest you worry we might have skipped the obvious.

I realize I’ve talked a lot about Mystic Pizza landmarks without Mystic Pizza itself. In part this is because the location of the original Mystic Pizza is not the location used in the movie. As other New Englanders reading this can attest to New Englanders, while giving vague driving directions, know exactly where they’re from and where they’re going. For instance, Abbott’s, lest you think wrongly, is in Noank, not Mystic. To the average guest this difference is tiny, to someone from Noank the two places are not only distinct, but should never be confused as one and the same (let’s ignore the fact that both are villages, one in one town and the other (Mystic) is actually in two towns with no local government). All this wind up is to just to explain that those of us from Mystic are extremely aware of how little of Mystic made it into the movie itself, which is understandable…except. Except Noank and parts of Stonington (part of Mystic is Stonington, the other Groton) that are not the Mystic part of Stonington (read that again, slowly, and it will still not make sense) made it into the movie. Both of which are right next to Mystic, but not Mystic itself. Also, the very tipiest of tops of the iceburg when it comes to the weriditudes that come with living in the Northeast.

Ok, ending the rant…where was I? Oh right. So! Mystic Pizza the real place, but not the place you see being Mystic Pizza in the movie. It used to be very small. It is still small, but it used to be the small shop front in a building that consisted of two store-fronts and an upstairs apartment. Slowly but surly, in the years after the movie became famous, all three parts of the building became restaurant.

Enough blather? Here’s some photos:

Ramble and I used some poor tourist in the making of this shot. We won't lie.

This is the bar/take-out side, which used to be the whole place.

The people behind Mystic Pizza are good people. They sponsored my brother’s soccer team, way back when. The photo is still up in the restaurant, next to stills from the film.

Ramble and I were once again rude (sorry!) and took this photo while reaching over some diner's heads. We asked first though...My brother is just barely visible peaking out from behind Ramble. I would have tried to take a better photo, but we didn't want to push it.

After pizza we needed some dessert, so we went to Mystic Drawbridge Ice Cream Shoppe.

The store front opens on the bridge (not the part that opens) and the building itself, while on Main Street, is built on pilings over the river.

I used to be one of these people. It is nice to be on the other side of the counter. Ramble got some attention from the girls, who thought he was cute!

The shop has a deck on which you can eat your ice cream and watch the bridge and boat traffic.

Here's the view of drawbridge from the deck.

The Mystic River splits the village of Mystic (read above rant for further confusion). This bridge, on Route 1, opens every hour at 20 of (it used to be quarter past) and on demand (you call in advance) in the summer and on demand in the winter, to allow boat traffic to go up and down the river. Why do we care? Well, it has a fancy schmancy French name, for one. It’s a Bascule Bridge. It’s also very old and one of a few of its design.

Looking up river at the bridge from the park and dock.