World Tour of America #7: Week 1
I've now been in Boston a week and as today is a day of doing stuffs at home, it seemed like a good time to do an update post.
Wednesday:
My first day here wasn't a very exciting one and mostly featured getting stuff sorted ready for the next few weeks. Once I was all unpacked, ftmichael and I went to the supermarket to buy foods, mostly for me but also thrilling things like chicken broth and jelly for Michael post-surgery. After that, we went over to T-Mobile to see about getting a pay as you go sim card for me so that I could have a lovely shiny US phone number for the duration of my stay. I had one for my previous visit and with Michael having surgery this time, it seemed like it would probably be a good idea. I'd brought Michael's old phone back for that reason but the T-Mobile bloke said that it was a bit water damaged and he wasn't sure if it would work. As it turned out, when the sim card was put in it, it couldn't find the network at all. We even tried putting it in my HTC Tattoo to see if that would accept it but that was locked to Vodafone. It was rather annoying, especially as I'd spent all the money getting a phone number set up before finding out that I didn't have a working phone. T-Mobile bloke was very nice and recommended we try asking on Facebook and offering cookies to anyone who had a spare phone we could use. Michael decided to try asking an extremely geeky friend first as well as the family he childminds for. The latter said they had a spare phone that we were welcome to try so we arranged to pick it up the next day.
Thursday:
We had initially said we'd go to Plymouth today but Michael had started with a cough and had a bit of a raised temperature so he didn't feel up to it. Our alternate plan was to pick up the spare phone and then go into Boston to do a walking tour from my Lonely Planet guide book. When we got the phone, it didn't have a sim card slot at all so that wasn't any good. Most disappointing. Michael wasn't sure he felt up to walking round Boston so we had a look at the map to see if there was anything nearby. We weren't that far away from Concord so we decided to go there instead. After a very scenic drive back and forth, we finally found Sleepy Hollow cemetery and went in to have a look at Author's Ridge. It has the graves of Henry Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Alcott family. From there, we went into Concord itself where there was a large central car park next to the Visitor's Centre. A nice man in there gave us a free walking map of the town and marked off various points of interest.
One thing I particularly wanted to see was Orchard House where Louisa M Alcott wrote and set Little Women. My mother introduced me to that book when I was quite young and it's always been a favourite. We walked down to the house which didn't take long at all and was a very nice walk. It cost $9 to see the house but Michael got in for free because of being a certified teacher, the jammy sod. There was a short video about the house and Alcott family, and then we were taken on a tour of the house. There was a guide that took us round each room in turn and as none of the rooms were roped off at all, you could go all over them. It was nice to be able to walk properly through all the rooms, although obviously, you weren't allowed to touch anything. Except the bannister; the guide pointed out that when we were going up and down the stairs, we were touching the same bannister that the Alcotts touched. I was more impressed with actually seeing the little desk that Bronson Alcott built specially for Louisa in between two windows in her bedroom and where she wrote Little Women. It was a shame that it was such a short tour but I'm very pleased that I got to do it.
We had a bit of a look round Concord after that, but it's only a small place and other than a toy shop and a stationary shop, there's not a great deal to it. It's still a nice town though, it has a very historical kind of air to it.
Friday:
Michael had asked on Facebook if anyone had a spare phone for me and had had a response from Zander. We arranged to meet him this morning at the T stop. He even had the phone charged and ready which was very nice of him. I'm sure you can imagine how confused and disappointed I was when that phone couldn't find the network either! We went straight to T-Mobile to have words with them about it. It turned out to be a faulty sim which was quickly remedied but I was rather annoyed that I'd had 2 days with no phone and been told it was the phone at fault, not the sim card. At least it was all sorted so I now have a lovely shiny phone to go with my lovely shiny US phone number. And if anyone wants it, let me know.
We spent the rest of the day in quiet contemplation, mostly so that Michael could relax and try to shift his cough and temperature, but also because we were hoping to have a busy weekend. It seemed to work as Michael's temperature went back down to normal by bedtime which greatly relieved him, although he still had a bit of a cough.
Saturday:
Our busy extended weekend started off with the walking tour from the Lonely Planet guide that we'd not done on Thursday. It was called North End Nosh and takes you round the North End, the major Italian neighbourhood in Boston. The tour pointed out particular shops of interest and I found it amusing how it said things like, "Here is the best deli for cheese, olives and white bean spread, but don't buy any bread here. Okay, this is the best bakery, this is where you should buy some bread. And here is a lovely park where you can sit and why not have a picnic with all the food you just bought?' All it was lacking was 'and have you called your mother, she worries.' We dutifully went in all the shops, although we refrained from buying the recommended stuffs. There was an inordinate amount of bakeries on the tour, and the very first one had some extremely tasty looking biscuits which were hard to refuse! I got some gnocchi from of the little grocery shops and when it got to dinnertime, we got sandwiches from a deli. They were seriously stuffed full and mine had a really yummy honey mustard on. We also treated ourselves to cannoli from Mike's Pastry where the queue stretched out the door to at least two doors down, I kid you not. They were fairly large cannoli and about a dozen different varieties; I got chocolate chip and Michael got chocolate cream. They were soooo good, it was easily the best cannoli I've ever had. We walked it off afterwards by going up to 44 Hull Street, the smallest house in Boston which was built solely to block out light from the house behind, having a look round Copp's Hill Burying Ground, and walking from the Zakim bridge down to Park Street where we got the T home.
Sunday:
We'd found out about Oktoberfest last year purely by chance and had made sure it was on our list of things to do this time. We'd only caught the tail end of the parade then so we made sure to arrive early enough this time to see the whole thing. While we waited, we listened to one of the live bands performing; they were called Gentlemen Hall and they were very good. So good in fact, that I went and bought their CD afterwards. The parade was late in arriving and it was a very bizarre parade with lots of marching bands and groups that seemed to be protesting about something, although I wasn't sure what. It was also a very long parade, it took about an hour to go past. It was bright and sunny, and had come out quite warm so it was nice to walk around without needing a jacket. Several streets around Harvard Square were full of stalls, although a lot of them seemed to be selling food, clothing or jewellery. We were mostly interested in the ones with freebies ;) There were quite a few that were giving things away either for signing up to a mailing list or for entering a spin the wheel type contest. It was really busy but we went round each street in a very organised manner to make sure that we saw each stall. We didn't do too badly for freebies either. We took part in a couple of spin the wheels where I won a yelp.com chapstick, a sample bag of jasmine rice from Carolina Rice and some sweets from some student testing stall. STA Travel had a contest where you had to throw pingpong balls into a group of plastic steins and if you got a ball in one of them, you won it. I won one of those and also got a card for a free retro bag filled with goodies. I think the only other freebie of note that I got was a large purple reusable shopping bag from Wainwright Bank. It was definitely a fun day and worthwhile going. And to make it even better, we went to Friendly's for tea! They have two new ice cream flavours at the moment: maple syrup and whoopie pie. The first sounds like it might be nice in a small dose but the second is mostly whipped cream flavour ice cream with chocolate bits and that sounds like it would be really sweet and sickly. I just stuck with my favourite Hunka Chunka PB Fudge.
Monday:
Monday was Columbus Day which meant that the majority of stuff was going to be closed. Michael had checked online and found out that the stuff in Plymouth would be open so we decided to do that. It was a bit of a trek down there so we didn't arrive till dinnertime. We went to Plimoth Plantation first where they had a mock up of a Wampanoag village to show the Native peoples that were there when the English arrived, and another mock up of the English settlement from 1627. It had turned out to be another sunny and warm day though so it was really nice to walk through the woods without needing a jacket or worrying that it was going to rain. Both of the mockups had roleplayers there, although the Native village had actual Native people who weren't acting as though it was the 17th centuary as the ones in the English village were. There weren't that many Native people or English roleplayers so it was bit disappointing in that respect. The Wampanoag village was rather small, there were only three buildings but a couple of the men were making a boat by burning out the centre of a log. Two of them were very nice and seemed eager to explain what they were doing and why. Some of the tourists were having their photos taken with them which I thought was really rather invasive and disrespectful, it made me embarrassed. The English village was much larger than I expected and all of the houses were open to look inside. They were all a bit samey after a while so we only looked in a couple. The roleplayers there had the strangest English accents I've ever heard, they sounded more Irish than anything and I wasn't entirely sure the language was accurate. It was interesting but would have been better with more roleplayers to talk to. We had a quick look in the craft centre where they made items for use in the village such as carved wooden chests and boxes, pottery dishes and jugs, and various pieces of clothing.
It was getting on for after 4 by this time and everything closed at 5. We'd got a combined ticket which got us onto Mayflower II but that was moored 3 miles away so we had to hurry over there. We got on board just about half past 4 which wasn't too bad, even though the information said to give 45 minutes to see all of the ship. I don't think it really warranted that long, it's not a very big ship at all and there's not really a great deal to see. There was a crew member sitting in the captain's cabin who was very happy to talk at length about the ship so I suppose he could take up 45 minutes easily! When the ship closed, we were able to have a bit of a look at the exhibit that went with it before we were asked to leave. Plymouth Rock was nearby so we went over to have a look at that but it wasn't anything special, just a huge boulder on the sand. There were a few shops of the touristy type on the road but most were closed due to it being a holiday. One large gift shop was still open so we had a look in there. They had pick n mix salt taffy in about 10 different flavours so I got some to try. I've heard it mentioned a lot but it's generally in a large box that costs upwards of $5 and I don't want to spend lots on a huge amount and then not like it! We finally left Plymouth around 5.45 but there was an accident on the way home so we got caught up in that for a while. Just typical as we were both starving and knackered!
And that brings us up to today which has been a day of Doing Stuffs Ready For Tomorrow. Michael went to visit his doctor this morning to put his mind at ease that he was okay for surgery tomorrow. Then he had to go off to the surgery centre to pay half of the total cost upfront while I stayed in the house doing fun stuff like laundry. It's been a very busy first week but most of that was to make sure we got stuff done while we could. There's a couple of things coming up later on in the month to look forward to though:
Oct 23&24: Head of the Charles Regatta
Oct 30: Boston Vegetarian Food Festival
Oct 31: Hallowe'en
Wednesday:
My first day here wasn't a very exciting one and mostly featured getting stuff sorted ready for the next few weeks. Once I was all unpacked, ftmichael and I went to the supermarket to buy foods, mostly for me but also thrilling things like chicken broth and jelly for Michael post-surgery. After that, we went over to T-Mobile to see about getting a pay as you go sim card for me so that I could have a lovely shiny US phone number for the duration of my stay. I had one for my previous visit and with Michael having surgery this time, it seemed like it would probably be a good idea. I'd brought Michael's old phone back for that reason but the T-Mobile bloke said that it was a bit water damaged and he wasn't sure if it would work. As it turned out, when the sim card was put in it, it couldn't find the network at all. We even tried putting it in my HTC Tattoo to see if that would accept it but that was locked to Vodafone. It was rather annoying, especially as I'd spent all the money getting a phone number set up before finding out that I didn't have a working phone. T-Mobile bloke was very nice and recommended we try asking on Facebook and offering cookies to anyone who had a spare phone we could use. Michael decided to try asking an extremely geeky friend first as well as the family he childminds for. The latter said they had a spare phone that we were welcome to try so we arranged to pick it up the next day.
Thursday:
We had initially said we'd go to Plymouth today but Michael had started with a cough and had a bit of a raised temperature so he didn't feel up to it. Our alternate plan was to pick up the spare phone and then go into Boston to do a walking tour from my Lonely Planet guide book. When we got the phone, it didn't have a sim card slot at all so that wasn't any good. Most disappointing. Michael wasn't sure he felt up to walking round Boston so we had a look at the map to see if there was anything nearby. We weren't that far away from Concord so we decided to go there instead. After a very scenic drive back and forth, we finally found Sleepy Hollow cemetery and went in to have a look at Author's Ridge. It has the graves of Henry Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson and the Alcott family. From there, we went into Concord itself where there was a large central car park next to the Visitor's Centre. A nice man in there gave us a free walking map of the town and marked off various points of interest.
One thing I particularly wanted to see was Orchard House where Louisa M Alcott wrote and set Little Women. My mother introduced me to that book when I was quite young and it's always been a favourite. We walked down to the house which didn't take long at all and was a very nice walk. It cost $9 to see the house but Michael got in for free because of being a certified teacher, the jammy sod. There was a short video about the house and Alcott family, and then we were taken on a tour of the house. There was a guide that took us round each room in turn and as none of the rooms were roped off at all, you could go all over them. It was nice to be able to walk properly through all the rooms, although obviously, you weren't allowed to touch anything. Except the bannister; the guide pointed out that when we were going up and down the stairs, we were touching the same bannister that the Alcotts touched. I was more impressed with actually seeing the little desk that Bronson Alcott built specially for Louisa in between two windows in her bedroom and where she wrote Little Women. It was a shame that it was such a short tour but I'm very pleased that I got to do it.
We had a bit of a look round Concord after that, but it's only a small place and other than a toy shop and a stationary shop, there's not a great deal to it. It's still a nice town though, it has a very historical kind of air to it.
Friday:
Michael had asked on Facebook if anyone had a spare phone for me and had had a response from Zander. We arranged to meet him this morning at the T stop. He even had the phone charged and ready which was very nice of him. I'm sure you can imagine how confused and disappointed I was when that phone couldn't find the network either! We went straight to T-Mobile to have words with them about it. It turned out to be a faulty sim which was quickly remedied but I was rather annoyed that I'd had 2 days with no phone and been told it was the phone at fault, not the sim card. At least it was all sorted so I now have a lovely shiny phone to go with my lovely shiny US phone number. And if anyone wants it, let me know.
We spent the rest of the day in quiet contemplation, mostly so that Michael could relax and try to shift his cough and temperature, but also because we were hoping to have a busy weekend. It seemed to work as Michael's temperature went back down to normal by bedtime which greatly relieved him, although he still had a bit of a cough.
Saturday:
Our busy extended weekend started off with the walking tour from the Lonely Planet guide that we'd not done on Thursday. It was called North End Nosh and takes you round the North End, the major Italian neighbourhood in Boston. The tour pointed out particular shops of interest and I found it amusing how it said things like, "Here is the best deli for cheese, olives and white bean spread, but don't buy any bread here. Okay, this is the best bakery, this is where you should buy some bread. And here is a lovely park where you can sit and why not have a picnic with all the food you just bought?' All it was lacking was 'and have you called your mother, she worries.' We dutifully went in all the shops, although we refrained from buying the recommended stuffs. There was an inordinate amount of bakeries on the tour, and the very first one had some extremely tasty looking biscuits which were hard to refuse! I got some gnocchi from of the little grocery shops and when it got to dinnertime, we got sandwiches from a deli. They were seriously stuffed full and mine had a really yummy honey mustard on. We also treated ourselves to cannoli from Mike's Pastry where the queue stretched out the door to at least two doors down, I kid you not. They were fairly large cannoli and about a dozen different varieties; I got chocolate chip and Michael got chocolate cream. They were soooo good, it was easily the best cannoli I've ever had. We walked it off afterwards by going up to 44 Hull Street, the smallest house in Boston which was built solely to block out light from the house behind, having a look round Copp's Hill Burying Ground, and walking from the Zakim bridge down to Park Street where we got the T home.
Sunday:
We'd found out about Oktoberfest last year purely by chance and had made sure it was on our list of things to do this time. We'd only caught the tail end of the parade then so we made sure to arrive early enough this time to see the whole thing. While we waited, we listened to one of the live bands performing; they were called Gentlemen Hall and they were very good. So good in fact, that I went and bought their CD afterwards. The parade was late in arriving and it was a very bizarre parade with lots of marching bands and groups that seemed to be protesting about something, although I wasn't sure what. It was also a very long parade, it took about an hour to go past. It was bright and sunny, and had come out quite warm so it was nice to walk around without needing a jacket. Several streets around Harvard Square were full of stalls, although a lot of them seemed to be selling food, clothing or jewellery. We were mostly interested in the ones with freebies ;) There were quite a few that were giving things away either for signing up to a mailing list or for entering a spin the wheel type contest. It was really busy but we went round each street in a very organised manner to make sure that we saw each stall. We didn't do too badly for freebies either. We took part in a couple of spin the wheels where I won a yelp.com chapstick, a sample bag of jasmine rice from Carolina Rice and some sweets from some student testing stall. STA Travel had a contest where you had to throw pingpong balls into a group of plastic steins and if you got a ball in one of them, you won it. I won one of those and also got a card for a free retro bag filled with goodies. I think the only other freebie of note that I got was a large purple reusable shopping bag from Wainwright Bank. It was definitely a fun day and worthwhile going. And to make it even better, we went to Friendly's for tea! They have two new ice cream flavours at the moment: maple syrup and whoopie pie. The first sounds like it might be nice in a small dose but the second is mostly whipped cream flavour ice cream with chocolate bits and that sounds like it would be really sweet and sickly. I just stuck with my favourite Hunka Chunka PB Fudge.
Monday:
Monday was Columbus Day which meant that the majority of stuff was going to be closed. Michael had checked online and found out that the stuff in Plymouth would be open so we decided to do that. It was a bit of a trek down there so we didn't arrive till dinnertime. We went to Plimoth Plantation first where they had a mock up of a Wampanoag village to show the Native peoples that were there when the English arrived, and another mock up of the English settlement from 1627. It had turned out to be another sunny and warm day though so it was really nice to walk through the woods without needing a jacket or worrying that it was going to rain. Both of the mockups had roleplayers there, although the Native village had actual Native people who weren't acting as though it was the 17th centuary as the ones in the English village were. There weren't that many Native people or English roleplayers so it was bit disappointing in that respect. The Wampanoag village was rather small, there were only three buildings but a couple of the men were making a boat by burning out the centre of a log. Two of them were very nice and seemed eager to explain what they were doing and why. Some of the tourists were having their photos taken with them which I thought was really rather invasive and disrespectful, it made me embarrassed. The English village was much larger than I expected and all of the houses were open to look inside. They were all a bit samey after a while so we only looked in a couple. The roleplayers there had the strangest English accents I've ever heard, they sounded more Irish than anything and I wasn't entirely sure the language was accurate. It was interesting but would have been better with more roleplayers to talk to. We had a quick look in the craft centre where they made items for use in the village such as carved wooden chests and boxes, pottery dishes and jugs, and various pieces of clothing.
It was getting on for after 4 by this time and everything closed at 5. We'd got a combined ticket which got us onto Mayflower II but that was moored 3 miles away so we had to hurry over there. We got on board just about half past 4 which wasn't too bad, even though the information said to give 45 minutes to see all of the ship. I don't think it really warranted that long, it's not a very big ship at all and there's not really a great deal to see. There was a crew member sitting in the captain's cabin who was very happy to talk at length about the ship so I suppose he could take up 45 minutes easily! When the ship closed, we were able to have a bit of a look at the exhibit that went with it before we were asked to leave. Plymouth Rock was nearby so we went over to have a look at that but it wasn't anything special, just a huge boulder on the sand. There were a few shops of the touristy type on the road but most were closed due to it being a holiday. One large gift shop was still open so we had a look in there. They had pick n mix salt taffy in about 10 different flavours so I got some to try. I've heard it mentioned a lot but it's generally in a large box that costs upwards of $5 and I don't want to spend lots on a huge amount and then not like it! We finally left Plymouth around 5.45 but there was an accident on the way home so we got caught up in that for a while. Just typical as we were both starving and knackered!
And that brings us up to today which has been a day of Doing Stuffs Ready For Tomorrow. Michael went to visit his doctor this morning to put his mind at ease that he was okay for surgery tomorrow. Then he had to go off to the surgery centre to pay half of the total cost upfront while I stayed in the house doing fun stuff like laundry. It's been a very busy first week but most of that was to make sure we got stuff done while we could. There's a couple of things coming up later on in the month to look forward to though:
Oct 23&24: Head of the Charles Regatta
Oct 30: Boston Vegetarian Food Festival
Oct 31: Hallowe'en