Boston Weekend

We went to Boston last weekend and it was a great time!

We got up at like 5 on Friday in order to get everything together and into a cab by 6 a.m. Delightful friends were cat-sitting, so there were no cat worries, but he still is funny when he senses something's up.

The airport was entirely uneventful, well, aside from the part where the strap broke on the bag we were using as a carry-on (whose zipper had already failed on this summer's road trip.) We ended up turfing it and throwing all our stuff into this Trader Joe's reusable shopping bag that I carry around.

A short flight later and we were on the ground in Boston, where we navigated the shuttle and the T to our hotel, no problems. Was a nice enough room, somewhere to rest your head and not much more. We were directly located between two hospitals though, so there was a lot of siren noise much of the time - it's funny what you can get used to though.

We rested for a little while, but were starving after several hours on the move, so we ended up grazing on the hot bar at the Whole Foods next to the hotel. From there we wandered our way through Beacon Hill, took a look at State House, and crossed the Boston Common, taking in the Nova Scotia Christmas tree (which they'd lit just the day before.)

We started poking through the stores after that, waiting to hear from [info]ruthling who was putting in her last few hours before lunch. When we found her we did a whirlwind trip through Faneiul Hall and Quincey Market and right on down to the New England Aquarium.

Let me tell you, ladies and gents, that is a stellar place! A whole schwack of penguins, an exhibit on jellyfish, all kinds of pretty exotic things, and a giant four-story tank with sharks and giant turtles and all kinds of lovely fish. The staff are really passionate and helpful and will come right up and start telling you about the animals as you're watching them. We even got to watch them feeding the penguins!

Then we took in a bit of the North End where John and R got cannoli and I had a waffly cooky thing, then down town for beer/pop and we all hung out in a downtown crossingish bar until it was time to meet R's husband G. Dinner at Pho Pasteur was super tasty, and then John and I were exhausted.

I had a bath back at the hotel and when I got out and flopped on the bed, Mr. Petey had a hell of a kick party.

Saturday we got up and headed for Cambridge, where we did a bit of shopping and wandered Harvard. John's cold was making him a bit miserable and cranky, which was wearing off on me, so we eventually came in out of the cold and headed for Newbury street to look for somewhere to lunch.

We found the most bizarre restaurant with an identity crisis. Something Joe's. It was sort of dressed up to look like fine dining, but then it had this sort of patriotic theme, with the waiters in American flag ties and everything... and a pretty standard mid-range restaurant sandwiches-pasta-mains menu. Still, I had a peppered burger and it was very tasty.

We wandered Newbury street then, until it was getting cold and dark and we'd reached the other T station. Lots of interesting shops and galleries along there! We sacked out in the hotel room for a while, then went downtown to look for somewhere nice for dinner. After a bunch of wandering in the cold, we ended up at the reasonably-notorious Legal Seafood. It was busy, so we went to the bar to wait for a table, then ended up being convinced to dine right there, which was a very good decision, as the Montreal bartender was a real pro. The food was really very good as well - we even finished off the night with some mocha ice-cream bon bons, and did not regret it.

Sunday dawned pretty snowy, so once we'd Finagle'd a Bagel (these shops have a pretty fancy assembly line, let me tell you!) we headed for the Museums. We looked at both the Gardner and the Fine Arts Museum and thereby killed most of the day. They were both quite the experience! So much amazing art! Had a weird moment in the Gardner where Petey decided to stretch really hard against my tummy while we were in this poky, dim, not very well ventilated gallery of religious artifacts... I had to high-tail it to the next room that looked out over the central courtyard to deal with the lightheadedness that accompanied.

We had some amazing, cheap Mexican food across the street from our hotel for dinner, then a little rest and change before heading back downtown to the Orpheum to see Black Kids and Vampire Weekend. The Orpheum is this Vaudville-era theatre, with high balconies up all kinds of stairs and beautiful architecture around the stage proper, murals, the whole deal. The rest of the building was a little run down, and I must admit that the way the floor swayed when people were dancing did not make me feel very safe. After all the walking we'd done that weekend, the four flights of stairs to our seats were not all that welcome either. Still, it was a pretty amazing show, and the crowd was really, really into it. We had fun!

Monday we dedicated mostly to more shopping, heading downtown, along Charles Street and back up to Newbury. It was bitterly cold, though, so after we took refuge in the beautiful public library for a while, we decided we'd be just as well off grabbing a bite at the hotel and heading for the airport.

Ran into some people from Church there - on the same flight back. They'd been in Boston with some friends from Ontario. It was kind of cool to chat - they have little girls about 7 and 4, so we've been periodically watching them parent for years.

Had some weird delays back in Halifax because the gate wouldn't attach properly to the plane, but otherwise we got back with little event. We sure were tired when we got here though! And I must admit my hip ligaments haven't been the same since...