This post is a little delayed.... We traveled on the Freedom Trail 3 weeks ago in downtown Boston. It's about a 2.5 mile tour throughout all of Boston. Since it can take 3+ hours to walk it, Dave suggested we bike it instead. Biking around downtown was awesome! You get around so much quicker and it's a lot of fun.
Throughout all of Boston there is either a yellow painted line or a nice red brick line to guide you through the tour. It was extremely helpful to know where to go next. :)
Our first stop was the Public Garden. Dave found an ice cream vendor outside of the park, so of course he needed to purchase some!
Next we biked where John Kerry has an abode. These houses were all right next to each other, but looked pretty expensive! On the top of the hill was the Capital. Every year Boston spends a lot of money refinishing the gold top! It was made of wood, but in order to stop it from leaking they began covering it with gold.
The cemetery where Paul Revere, Sam Adams, and others were buried was surrounded by all these large buildings. So odd to see these old headstones sandwiched between buildings.
Kings church was used by the British. The beams look like some beautiful type of stone, but really it is wood painted to look like stone. Neat trick, huh? :)
The Old State House below was originally used for the British until the Revolutionary War. In here the concepts of 'taxation without representation' and the 4th Amendment, 'no unreasonable search and seizure' started here!
The Custom House Tower was built in the early 1900s. There was an unwritten rule that no building could be built higher than the tower. Unfortunately in 1964, the Prudential Tower was built taller than the Custom House Tower. Lame! Now this tower is the 17th tallest building.
We wandered past Faneuil Hall and the nearby markets. We'll have to spend some more time down there because there's so much to see and do right here! Ok, trivia time.... what is on top of the weather vane on Faneuil Hall?? Give up? You must be a British spy!!!!
The answer is: a grasshopper! The grasshopper was a 'shibboleth' during the Revolutionary period. If the suspected spy knew the grasshopper was on top of Faneuil Hall, they were free, if not they were convicted as British spies. You better remember the grasshopper... :)
We biked to the oldest part of town where the roads are uneven brick and barely fit one car down the lane. We saw Paul Revere's home, but didn't go into the musuem. We should have though - it isn't that expensive to get into. Look how funny it is, though, this building from 1680 is just chilling right up against a much younger building.
Since Paul Revere's house is right by Little Italy, we stopped at Mike's Pastry. Dave's coworkers raved about this place and man is it happening! We waited in a big line for 15+ minutes, and actually got serenaded by a guy's college acapella group. Not just us... there was a large group enjoying them singing Coldplay. :)
The canoli and tiramisu were huge! We could hardly finish them. Were they the best we ever had? No, but they were delicious and crazy big, and it was fun to experience this packed out place. Mom - just got your letter today about Mike's Pastry... we've been, as you can see, but can't wait to take you when you visit. :)
Old North Church was one of our last stops. Thankfully it was free, so we went inside. :) Each family had their own 'box.' The door/walls of the box were quite high (4ish feet maybe) and could fit 6ish people. You had a little lock on your door, too. All I thought was, I can hardly see over the wall to look up to the pulpit - how did people not just take a little snooze in their boxes... seemed quite easy cause no one could see you!
Last stops were over the bridge to the Bunker Hill monument and Old Ironsides. There's Dave biking on the road over the scary bridge. I biked on the sidewalk ... too scared to be biking next to cars on a bridge.
If there isn't a long wait, the USS Constitution is worth it!! It was one of 7 warships commissioned by George Washington and is the oldest functioning ship in the US. They said they actually took it out on the water the day before we were there. It takes a couple hundred people to run the ship - there are ropes everywhere, so it kind of makes sense.
Some of the original cannons.
Dave chilling on the boat, notice all the rope!
Yay! End of the trip and a quick self portrait. :)
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