Boston: Todd-a-plop on the Freedom Trail

The next stop on our East Coast tour was Boston, home of a favorite friend, Todd-a-plop! You may remember his visit with us in Buenos Aires, his yummy bus chicken and a not so yummy dead body sighting in Paraguay and our tour of Iguazu Falls. Todd was unable to meet us the night of our arrival and our first day of touring but gave us directions on how to get there and what to do, explaining that he lived on the Freedom Trail.

Um, what? I didn’t come out and say it because I was embarrassed. I figured I should know what the heck the Freedom Trail was and probably learned what it was in school. Maybe. Maybe not. Despite there being this so called Freedom Trail nearby, we decided to head to the Bunker Hill Monument just a couple blocks away. It’s like a miniature Washington Monument, but unlike the D.C. version, this one was open for climbing to the top.

After “conquering” the monument, we set off to see what else we could visit. Our map of Boston showed the USS Constitution was just a few blocks away. Strangely, we found there was this red line on the sidewalk that seemed to be going where we were going. We turned left, it turned left, we went right…you guessed it, right. Wait a second…we passed through a park near Todd’s house…wait a minute….ahhhhh…the Freedom Trail. So slow sometimes.

The Freedom Trail is basically a historical walking tour through Boston, stopping at many important monuments and traversing through many a neighborhood. I had noticed there was a constant stream of people walking through the park in Todd’s neighborhood, but figured that people just walked a lot around here. I should have clued in that this was abnormal because let’s face it, there are tons of small parks in tons of neighborhoods and rarely do they have a constant stream of people crossing through them (at least not in the ’Nati). These people were literally walking on The Trail.

I have to say, the trail does make things much easier. No need to think, just follow. Although, I do wonder about what the trail does to real estate prices, business sales and a constant stream of tourists in certain neighborhoods. I mean it was all just made up by some columnist in 1951. Although, I guess everything was just made up by some dude (or dudette) at some point, so…

Ramble much?

We did actually see some stuff, although our photos would suggest otherwise. Must have been a close up day because that’s all we have is close ups. The ships in the naval yard provided many an opportunity for us to work our lenses.

USS Constitution Museum

USS Cassin Young

The next day Todd returned home and we went on a Todd tour of random places such as graveyards of famous people, ingesting delicious clam chowder, swinging by Cheers and other Boston landmarks. I applaud him for his effort to show us his fine city. Boston is way cool.

While we very much enjoyed our walking tour, the rain was finally getting to us. In fact, we were so worn out from waterpolo in Knoxville, galavanting around D.C., tastings in Virginia and partying in New Jersey, we were D-O-N-E. You’d think we’d have more stamina after traveling South America top to bottom over the course of 7 months! Sadly, we’re out of practice. I’m beginning to realize how much rest we got on those marathon bus rides.

Thank you Todd for showing us the ropes in Boston! Even though we were party poopers, we did totally enjoy ourselves. Hope you can make it on our next adventure!