Boston, MA

It was an easy drive from Connecticut to Normandy Farms Campground in Foxboro.  They claim they are one of the top three campgrounds in the USA.  It was a great campground with four pools, sport courts of every kind, great public areas and spacious campsites.  I had thought we would try some sightseeing but it felt much better to just hang around the campground.  It was quite a cool day so we tried the indoor pool.  It was extremely crowded and they wouldn’t let anyone younger than 18 into the hot tub so the kids lost interest rather rapidly.  I forgot to mention that when we tried to extend the front bedroom slide it went out a bit and stopped.  So, we have another repair to look forward to but we were still comfortable in the trailer.

It was a very happy coincidence that our campground was in the same town where my cousin, Andy Stone, and his family live so we were able to go to church with them.  I hadn’t seen Andy in a long time.  After church we went back to our trailer, grabbed some quick naps and then went to Andy & Heather’s house.  The kids played outside and the adults gabbed.  The Stones have three kids at home right now, Marek–on break from BYUI, Talia, & Greta.  Talia and Greta are close enough in age to Myra and Will that they had a great time.  Heather fixed us a fabulous meal and we stayed until after 8pm.  It was hard to tear the kids away.  Heather was a great hostess and gave me so much information about how to spend our time in the area.

Monday we had to wait until the mobile RV service guys showed up to have a look at the slide.  It turned out that they were not equipped to do what was needed though they did give us some tips as to how to handle the slide until we can get someone who is equipped (we had called ahead to get someone we think can handle it at our next stop.  We finally got out in the early afternoon and went to Lexington & Concord to visit the Minuteman Memorial National Park.  They had a fun multi-media presentation in the visitor’s center.  We wanted to see Walden Pond nearby but they wanted $30 to let us park our truck while we visited the pond so we just headed on to Concord and the North Bridge.  That evening I started not feeling very well with the start of a cold so I was very grateful when David offered to drive Myra and Will to meet a friend of theirs who moved to Massachusetts last year.  Mustafa lived in our neighborhood and had been friends with the twins since pre-school.  From what I heard the kids bowled and had a great time.  They were expecting some awkwardness which never materialized.

Tuesday, even though Zina and I both had colds, we headed out to see Boston.  Heather had introduced me to “Spothero” that helps you find a good parking spot ahead of time.  This was especially helpful since our truck is 6’10” and the highest garage only allowed 6’8”.  But, I was able to find a surface lot that was pretty close to what we wanted to see.  It takes us so long to get out of the trailer that getting lunch is usually our first order of business!  What luck that we found the pizza Will wanted and the Chicken Nuggets Zina wanted right next to each other in the train station.  Not only that but with just a few extra minutes I was able to determine that we could get the subway to take ¾ of a mile off our walk.  Since we were walking the Freedom Trail, another 2.5 miles, we thought that would be nice.  We did a self tour since I thought it would keep Zina more interested and give us options for breaks.  The trail starts in the Boston Commons, the place where a guy was paid to watch people’s animals in colonial times. I think by coincidence, the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture had a display on the commons and the kids enjoyed seeing a cow, some baby goats and baby sheep. We took one of the breaks to go into King’s Chapel.  The placards they had placed around the church were very informative.  Apparently the Puritan’s were all in favor of being able to worship as they pleased but they didn’t embrace that same right for others.  They owned all of the land in Boston and refused to give any to the Anglican church! By some scheme, an Angilcan official sent from England seized some land and built a wooden building that was later eclipsed by the current building.  When the tensions between colonists and British became more intense, the British Anglican official fled so the church members appointed a new guy, educated nearby, as their new minister.  After the war, the Anglican church wouldn’t sanction the minister because he wasn’t official.  The church members decided they would rather have the minister instead of the church and started the Unitarian Church!  King’s Chapel has been Unitarian ever since!  We saw all the usual points of interest on the Freedom Trail, including where they first read the Declaration of Independence on July 18, 1776 with Abigail Adams in the listening crowd.  The trail passes right down Hanover Street where we were told we would find excellent pastries at Mike’s.  We bought our pastries and continued along the trail looking for a bench to sit on. We turned into a square that contained a statue of Paul Revere with the North Church tour at the end of it and there were benches built into the walls surrounding the square.  The benches were occupied by many others eating pastries!  Zina’s Boston Cream donut was yummy but I would have to say that most of the pastries we chose looked better than they tasted.  If I remember when I return to Boston in a gazillion years, I am going to pass on the iconic cannoli.  I think they are related to schneeballen in Rothenburg!  The next part of the trail took us across to the Charlestown Naval Yard and we saw the USS Constitution, old Ironsides. The Constitution Museum was very fun for kids. They interviewed each other to determine if they would make a good sailor and tried out the hammocks.  The very helpful man at the visitor’s center at the start of the Freedom Trail told us that the best way to get back to Boston was on the water shuttle.  The ride was very fast and fun.  As we exited the shuttle we were right by Legal Seafoods.  David really wanted real New England Clam Chowder.  Their chowder was great but we would pan the rest of the meal.  We had hoped to make it to the Boston Tea Party Museum recommended by Adrianne but we were just too late to fit that in.