After dropping Kevin at Northeastern, we hung around Boston until Sunday morning.
Walked down to Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall for dinner. Grabbed this picture of what is now the Marriott Custom House….
The North End, as we walk back, is a very Italian neighborhood. And the Feast of St. Andrew was Friday through Sunday night; this picture is earlier in the week. A big open air market, lots of fair-type foods (zeppoles. they are awesome!). This street was impossible to get through over the weekend; just tons of people and every Italian stereotype you can think of….
The view from Bunker Hill monument. This climb was a lot more strenuous than the one in Provincetown…it is all stairs and there are really no landings for breaks.
The monument. Raising my irk-level to high, the boys and Mom decided not to walk across the street to the actual museum but instead hung out in the shade. I guess they had a good time; I enjoyed the walk through history. At least made sure that both boys knew we lost this battle to the British at the end of it!
Thursday morning was devoted to a “DUCK” tour…one of those half land half water deals on a DUKW based on designs from World War II. Always had been on our list to do one of these (the boys in particular had seen them in other cities and clamored to do one.). So off we go….
A really nice day. Got a lot of nice views of Boston and Cambridge as we motored around….
Not having fun….
Better….trotting out one of his ‘newer’ looks, duck face!
We passed this bridge about twenty times this trip but never went on it to go over it…it is the Bunker Hill Bridge and carries I-93 north out of Boston.
Our DUKW. The driver is all in costume and is a little over the top for my taste. Nevermind that he damned near got us rundown by a Boston bus almost first thing! But it was a good way to see Boston…..
Thursday night was a sunset cruise of Boston. This is Castle Island; once an island with a fort protecting the harbor (not an island anymore. Never realized how much of Boston was ‘made’-land…..). Will talk more about this later…..
It was pretty, but, I thought the cruise was kind of…boring…just tacked back and forth and there wasn’t really much point to the cruise other than being out on the water for sunset. Not even a lot of touristy pointing things out.
I will say that we did tack and forth between the city and Logan airport. And I did enjoy getting the close up views of planes taking off and landing.
Friday morning, because my wife is awesome, we travelled back out to Castle Island for the the USS Constitution turnaround. Once or twice a year they ‘sail’ the ship out to Castle Island and back so that they can turn the ship around and have it weather evenly in drydock. Because the ship is going in for refitting for four years, they did an extra turnaround. And we got to see it.
When they get to Castle Island, they do a 21-gun salute and, well, turn around. You can click the next picture to see the video.
Things that surprised me: 1) how notable the police presence was around the ship. Any ship you see in these two pictures is law enforcement. and 2) when the ship came into view I was under the impression that it was under it’s own power. Turns out that there is a tug boat on the other side near the stern (much more visible in the video which occurs when the ship is turning).
We hung out on the grass, played some Hearts, and then called it an afternoon and headed over to the USS Constitution museum (because of the turnaround we weren’t going to get to go on the ship).
Saturday morning was a walking tour of Boston. Again, this isn’t Suzanne and my usual thing…we much prefer exploring on our own. I think the boys liked it; Matthew and Cpher have both spouted off information passed along by the guide so I guess that means it was worth it.
The Old State House…site of the the Boston Massacre and where the Declaration of Independence was read once it made its way to Boston (and is read aloud every July 4th since then as well).
