Boston

We've been in Boston for three days now, and a very busy three days they have been. We arrived at the Hostel on Monday afternoon and were greeted by a group of British travellers in our dorm room. The hostel itself is clean and pleasant with free tea. After unpacking we went round the corner to Little Stevies and ordered the biggest pizza either of us had ever seen, even Rick Waller would have had to take a breather. We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening getting lost in the centre of Boston to familiarise ourselves with our surroundings. We explored the boutiques of Newbury Street, and the hustle and bustle of the cities commercial centre. We ended up in the ridiculously affluent Beacon Hill district where four storey town houses built by the first Pilgrims sit along leafy boulevards. On our return to the hostel we signed up for a trip to the local Irish pub The Crossroads where we watched Monday Night Football and got to know our lovely roommates.
On the second day we visited the public library, an enormous temple to learning, and had a long conversation with an outspoken Californian about the state of world politics against the backdrop of a courtyard that wouldn't look out of place in an imperial palace. We then assaulted the famous Freedom Trail, a two and half mile stroll through all of our Boston's historic landmarks. We stopped at Paul Revere's house, famous for his Midnight Ride to warn of the imminent British invasion of Boston over two hundred years ago, the house has been lovingly restored and is the oldest building in Boston. The city itself looks like an amalgamation of New York, San Francisco and parts of Europe, huge sky scrapers make way to cobbled streets, traditional town houses and public gardens. At the end of the trail we retraced our steps to the Green Dragon Tavern, the site in which the Boston Tea Party was supposed to have been planned. We were invited to test out a series of scotch whiskies including Famous Grouse which has yet to takeoff over here, which was nice.
Day three began with us trekking in the direction of the Boston Tea Party boat only to find that it was not in the harbour. We consoled ourselves with an enormous plate of noodles in nearby Chinatown. We then made our way over to the city's elegant public gardens to watch the swans and catch up on some reading and painting. In the late afternoon we hopped on the tube in the direction of Harvard to meet up with Asha who showed us where to get the best burgers in Boston. She seems to be doing fine in college if not a bit overworked but she may be joining us for a few days in New York.
This morning we managed to make contact with Joe Holloway who is studying on Long Island. We hope to stay with him for a day or so when we go to New York and he has invited to his college's Homecoming football game on saturday which promises to be a raucous affair. We plan to catch the $15 Chinatown bus at some point tomorrow and should be in the city by the evening. Today we will be visting the Samuel Adams Brewery for a free tour and some taste testing. We'll let you know what that was like at some point in the next few days.

P.S. We have a working mobile phone now so if people want to contact us in an emergency or for any other reason our number is: 347 217 5750