Boston

Saturday:

"2 tickets for the 10:40 ferry to Boston, please."

From the recommendation of our rental car dude, we took a ferry into the city from an outlying suburb yesterday. It was such a neat way to make our way into Boston. It was scenic, relaxing, and incredibly cheap!
Once checked into our hotel, we headed for the Museum of Science. It was on our list of "things we'd like to do in Boston", and we wanted a way to kill a few hours before I forced Jay to take a Duck Tour of the city. Truth be told, I was not in a mood to be in a museum. I was feeling impatient, and had a short attention span. Once inside however, we ended up learning a lot. I lightened up and had some fun, although it was rough going for a while. Jay discovered an exhibit called "Mathematica", which was pretty much my idea of hell on earth.

One particular exhibit was for kids to understand classification and how museums make exhibits.

You were supposed to pull from a bucket of random objects, and Make Your Own Musuem. Here is my museum:


And here is Jay's:

The non-English speaking people next to us could not understand what we were laughing hysterically at. Oh, just ourselves.

After the Museum of Science, we took a Duck Tour of Boston. I thought it would be a fun way for us to get a quick sweep of the city and see where we'd want to go later. Also, I really think it's cool that a vehicle can drive on land, and then float on water.

Our tour guide was actually really cool, and we learned a few things about the city. I took this picture of our boat in the reflection of the tallest building in Boston about a block from our hotel.

The tour also gave us the confidence we needed to conquer the city by foot. We both felt assured that we now had a pretty solid mental map of some major locations within the city. Seen it once, seen it a million times, right? Sure. We could totally get where we needed to go.

After the tour, we decided that since our hotel was near the tallest building in Boston, we'd just keep our eye on that building, and walk back to the hotel. A couple of miles later, we confidently arrived HERE. This building is NOT the tallest in Boston, it just looks like kind of like it. Whoops.
The good news however, was that this building was next to the Old State House and Quincy Market. An open market/street fair area with lots of shopping, restaurants and fun things to do. Jay said it was really no accident, but rather it was God's will that we found our way to Quincy Market that night. He thinks God really wanted him to have a beer. Here, Jay experiments double-fisting a bucket of meat with a large beer.

Here I am with a street performer in Quincy Market - my hat is from our waitress at Dick's Last Resort. It said "Pole Dancer", ha ha - yah right.

Sunday:
After our run-in last night and since we had not yet picked up a proper map of Boston, we pulled out the GPS to get us where we needed to be this morning. Jay got this from my parents for Christmas, and we've used it so many times! Unfortunately, thanks to Joe, Jay downloaded a Homer Simpson voice that can be our GPS tour guide. It's not obnoxious at all.


Most of our day today was spent walking the Freedom Trail. We opted to take a guided tour, although I was originally reluctant to pay someone to walk us through something we could do for free. Most of the tour guides dress in costume and stay in character throughout the whole tour, and I thought that would be kind of hokey. Our guide was a history professor from Quincy College and although he was dressed in character, took a teaching approach to the tour. I'm sure he's the kind of professor whose classes are always packed, because he had us hanging on his every word. I know we learned a whole lot more with him than we would have walking through on our own.

This is the building where the Sons of Liberty decided they were going to dump the tea into the harbor for the Boston Tea Party.

This is John Hancock's grave. This was also the burial ground of many historical figures -Sam Adams, Paul Revere, Ben Franklin's parents, the five "victims" of he Boston Massacre, etc.

Below is the pub across the street from the burial ground. Our tour guide told us the joke that this is the only place in the world where you can have a cold Sam Adams while looking at a cold Sam Adams .

We saw SO much more on the Freedom Trail, but there's just not time in this day to pass it along on my blog. If you're ever in Boston, I highly recommend you check it out for yourself.

Jay and I have maneuvered through nearly every neighborhood in Boston in the past 2 days, and we have done miles and miles of walking. I've really enjoyed all of the access to history and information here. I've been impressed by the friendliness of the people and the pride they take in their city.

Lastly, tonight we walked to the Fenway district and planned to watch the Red Sox beat the Yankees at a local pub with some true Red Sox fans. Unfortunately during dinner, the people in the table next to ours kept sneaking off to smoke pot in the alley outside the patio. After about 2 innings, we decided this wasn't quite the crowd we were looking for, and that we'd have just as much fun watching the game back in our hotel room!

Tomorrow will be our last day in Boston and we're headed to Fenway (hopefully) to watch the real deal. It's supposed to rain and as my blog and the game are wrapping up, the Red Sox haven't won in 6 straight games. Ouch. Cross your fingers that the sun will shine on the Green Monstah tomorrow. :)