Road Trip New England: Boston

Boston is amazing! I loved Boston. I don't know exactly why I loved it. Let me see if I can explain. If you have never been there, go there. How's that? We just spent one day there (and it was a Saturday), so I guess I'm really not in a position to judge, but I really did enjoy our day.

We headed in to town on a Saturday morning around 9:30, and went straight to Boston Common. Negotiating streets in new cities is always an adventure, but we didn't have any problems (thank you google maps). We started the morning with a stroll around the lagoon at the Public Garden, then crossed the Common to the Freedom Trail, a great little brick trail through the center of the sidewalk all over town. (I recommend printing this map if you're planning on a self-guided tour. It came in handy when we lost the trail at an intersection or needed help identifying historical landmarks.)

We saw plenty of old buildings, plenty of new buildings, street construction (the highlight of Owen's trip), shopped and had lunch at Faneuil Hall (food court style offerings from Greek to sushi - if it's cold out, grab your food and head upstairs for an easier to snag and more quiet seat), browsed an impressive farmers' market with a pint of strawberries or a whole pineapple for $1, passed through Little Italy and saw the Old North Church where two lanterns were lit on the night of Paul Revere's ride, toured "Old Ironsides", the USS Constitution (very similar to the USS Constellation in Baltimore), and took a commuter boat from the Navy Yard back to Long Wharf before Owen gave up and crashed in the middle of the sidewalk. He got to see the last couple of blocks of Boston on the way back to our car from Dave's shoulders - well-deserved, considering we had walked more than two miles and been on our feet for probably at least four hours (without complaining from anyone! I'm telling you Boston is great!).

(Also, on the way to our hotel we drove through the Harvard area in Cambridge. It was interesting, but uneventful, since we were all too exhausted to get out and wander around. We were hoping to see a cool place to grab dinner, but nothing jumped out at us, so we continued on out of the city and on to mac n' cheese at the hotel.)