Becky makes a habit of subscribing to tourist and travel email newsletters for our area, in order to keep a finger on the pulse of weird and unique local events. It came across her desk that a historic little town between here and Salem, whose sign we had seen a hundred times but never visited, was throwing an outdoor walking tour in December. How could we resist?

This is part of our 100 Things in 2017 challenge. Click on the photos for a closer look!

The town’s name is Aurora, and the event was a wine-and-chocolate walk. Turns out the town is chock full of antique shops, too, as well as a fair amount of small-town charm. We dropped Lucy off at Trackers, drove down to Aurora, and when we left it was time to pick her up, so we spent all day doing this.

We really liked this town. All the people we talked to were very nice and welcoming, and while we didn’t buy very much, the shops were charming. We even found a dollhouse shop, and the owner told us she’d hire Lucy!

In this super busy life, this was a nice chance to just. Slow. Down. We had a nice walk on a beautiful day, drank some good wine, tasted some chocolate, and got to know another little town. Lovely.