NEWPORT COACHING WEEKEND

The drive down Belleveue Avenue in Newport, R.I., is one of the most beautiful in America. But visitors should take note: The best way to go is by coach. That is, the cloppety-clop kind attended by grooms that requires the driver to wear a full skirt and top hat.

Last weekend was Newport’s coaching weekend, organized by the Coaching Club and the Preservation Society of Newport. It brought 13 coaches from Florida, New Jersey, Virginia, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania for a festive itinerary of rides through the streets, a formal presentation Saturday morning, and many parties.

“It’s the return of elegance that we knew in the Gilded Age. It’s nice to keep that tradition alive,” Jay Gwynne, who retired from manufacturing Certs mints and Chiclets and Dentyne gums, said. “It’s very comfortable and relaxing. And everybody smiles at you. It’s a very uplifting, cheerful event,” Mr. Gwynne’s wife, Ursula Gwynne, a founder of Newman’s Own and the Hole in the Wall Gang Camp, said. The couple comes to Newport every August.

Tours of the grand homes maintained by the society — the Breakers, the Elms, and Rosecliff, to name a few — help one imagine the lifestyle of those who lived there, but the sight of elegant and gentle people riding atop English coaches made it vividly real.

Yet a few wondered what kind of person pursued such a hobby. “I don’t see any young New York industrialists here,” a spectator quipped.

The privileged passengers — earning their seat through friendship or social position — had only praise for the coaching experience. Frances Billups of San Antonio, Texas, noted a key advantage of the coach: “You’re up so high, you get to see things you wouldn’t see in a car. You can see over the fences and the hedges.”

“It’s like a hot air balloon trip. You’re up above looking down on everything. You feel like you’re royalty riding in a coach,” Jackie Cowell of Palm Beach, Fla., said.

“Riding on a coach is delightful,” Jamie Comstock of Chappaqua, N.Y., said. She rode on the Venture, the coach her grandfather gave to the preservation society, after it had passed out of the hands of its original owner, Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt. “I have a photo of my mother with my grandfather sitting on the Venture. She is holding the reigns.” “What may appear to be a relic of today was state of the art back then. I tell you, bouncing around, you have great respect for those who traveled great distances in these coaches,” John Mannix, a fellow San Antonian, said.

Newport takes the arrival of the coaches quite seriously. Bicyclists trail them as they ride through the streets, and spectators, holding copies of their published routes in hand, line up to greet them.

Coaching Weekend takes place every three years. “If we did it annually, we’d all be dead,” the head of the preservation society, Pierre Irving, said.

It’s not just the energy required but also the expense. The owners of the coaches pay to ship them and their horses from all over. From Chadds Ford, Pa., came Richard Sanford’s Tantivy and George “Frolic” Weymouth’s park drag, which has rode through the Royal Ascot Races, and the Loire Valley and Normandy.

Walter Eayres didn’t have too far to travel: He lives in Bristol. R.I. The youngest driver, or whip, Mr. Eayres was at the command of a light, two-passenger roof seat break. “It’s the race car of the bunch,” he said, referring to the mail coaches and park drags, which carried up to 20 passengers. His vehicle is pulled by polo ponies (he has played polo for 18 years and driven for 10 years).

“The idea is, you pull up to the field, detach your horses to play, and then people sitting on the coach have a great view of the field,” Mr. Eayres said.