Boston: Day 1 & 2

Our much anticipated trip has finally arrived! I feel like the wait was agonizingly long. I spent the past few days just holding on to KT, I started having some anxiety about leaving her a few days before we left. Voluntary vacation? away from our baby? what were we thinking!? But, here we are, already two days into our trip. I'm trying to be good about blogging as we go. I've found this is the best way for me to keep up with trips. Otherwise, the amount of work that will have to go into recapping the entire thing afterward is just to overwhelming for me. At least I can admit this much about myself!Our flights yesterday went pretty smooth. We had a slight delay in Baltimore (only 20 minutes) due to the connecting flight coming in. Nothing to write home about (oh, right....). We finally made it into Boston around 3:30pm. By the time we got to our hotel and checked in the sun was quickly setting. Plus, being in the downtown area, surrounded by tall buildings blocking the sun, doesn't help with lighting either. So we grabbed what we THOUGHT would sufficient warmth, you know, jacket, that's about it. Uh huh... yeah. freaking. right.

Our hotel room

King's Chapel Burying Ground (right near our hotel)

As soon as we got out the door we were slammed with a bone chilling cold that went right to my ears, straight to my fingertips and froze my nose. We decided to just check out the blocks around our hotel and quickly came upon an outdoor mall. Score. Hat. Bought. Gloves. Bought. Another scarf. Bought. Ahhhhh, that's better. Silly, Texans.

Finally prepared, we continued our trek. The buildings and history here are completely amazing. Red brick and aged (green) copper everywhere. It's gorgeous. I am in love with the architecture here. We skimmed Boston Common and came back to our hotel to get ready for dinner. We decided to treat ourselves to some seafood, and that was an easy decisions. Legal Seafood. Recommended to us by pretty much everyone we've talked to, and by most travel guides we've read. Sold.

Crab cake at Legal Seafood

Our meal was delicious. We tried some crab cakes, Jeff had an assortment of fish (tuna, salmon, swordfish) and I had some delicious stuff shrimp. I didn't have a single bit of remorse, and we had already walked several miles earlier. After dinner, we took a stroll through Boston Common to enjoy the Christmas lights and check out the Frog Pond, where all the ice skaters were.

Since we had been up since 3:45 that morning, we headed back to the hotel to call it a night. Pluse, we wanted to get an early start on Sunday and jam in as much as possible (I know, we really do kill ourselves on these trips).

Boston Common Brewing Co.

Gorgeous architecture

Sunday morning was spent searching for a coffee shop. We found a great local shop, Boston Common Brewing Co. - great muffin tops. Yum! Then we headed off to the much anticipated Beacon Hill! Let me just say, if I had $2-$3 million just lying around, I'd buy here in a heartbeat. Absolutely gorgeous. Streets upon streets of rowhouses (one of my favorite styles), some cobblestone streets, gas lamps (all decorated for Christmas). It was breathtaking. I could of spent all day in this area.

Beacon Hill Rowhouse

Beacon Hill - Mount Vernon Street

Beacon Hill - Acorn Street (my favorite!)

Boston, I'm in love.

Massachusetts State House

We made it back to our hotel around noon, enough time to relax for about an hour till we headed for the North End of Boston. Everyone and everything I had read said this is where it's at. Old world Italian. I was excited. Plus, Paul Revere's house and the Wharf were also in this area, so might as well spend some time over there.

Paul Revere's House

The hotel recommended a place called Regina Pizzeria. So we took a chance and tried it out. The atmosphere was awesome. We were greeted by the best accents I had heard all trip. It was JAM packed in this tiny restaurant. I was surprised we got seated so fast. The pizza was delicious - but I think the atmosphere was probably the best part about it.

Regina Pizzeria

Pizza at Regina Pizzeria

We walked up and down the Italian neighborhoods, just taking it all in. We went down to the Wharf to check out the water. And we walked through Copp's Hill Burying Ground. This may sound strange, but these "burying grounds" are kind of awesome. The headstones are something straight out of scary movies. Thin, worn, crooked, crumbling, amazing. I think seeing some of the dates on the gravestones (some as far back as the 1600's) really made me absorb the history of the area. Completely insane. Or "wicked awesome" in Bostonian terms.

Copp's Hill Burying Ground
Graves of George Worthylake & his wife

down by the wharf

We hit up Mike's Pastry on the way out of North End to try out some cannoli's, Jeff's favorite. I will admit, they were pretty good. I don't eat cannoli's enough to tell you if they were amazing, but Jeff loved 'em, so I'll take that as a good sign.

Cannoli from Mike's Pastry

We needed another break, so we headed back to our hotel. We got some great rates at the Omni Parker House, a historical site (of course!) in itself. The hotel is gorgeous, the room is fantastic, the staff is friendly, but we've had a few issues. Yesterday, after our first excursion we came back to find that our keys didn't work. We thought we had demagnetized them, but after Jeff went down, exchanged the keys, came back up and still they wouldn't work, we knew something else was wrong. It took about 30 minutes, and 3 people to "fix" our door. But they were sincerely apologetic and even comped us a breakfast for one morning. Everything has been good, until we came back this afternoon to discover the same issue. A bit frustrating. They comped another meal. But I can only take that for so long... we'll see what happens tomorrow. :)

Anyway, after a nice hour or so of relaxing, we wandered out again. This time to Quincy Market. It's definitely made for tourists. Boston keepsakes. Chain restaurants. But still it has a beauty to it that you can appreciate. Jeff and I weren't really hungry, so we wondered for a few hours just checking out the streets and neighborhoods. We found ourselves back on the North End by the time we decided we could go for a bite. We didn't want anything too heavy (not such a good idea, in the Italian neighborhood), but we found a quick eats place that was just mediocre.

I'm missing KT like crazy. Mom is doing a great job by texting met at LEAST three pics a day. Jeff and I keep talking about how we can't wait to show her this area some day. This area and many other cities. Travel is going to be a priority for our little family. I think I'm going to hold her for a full day when we get home....

And now we're back. Jeff's crashed and I'm blogging. :) Tomorrow, Fenway, Boston Public Library, maybe Harvard? We're playing it by ear. It's our last FULL day in Boston, so it's all out! Stay tuned for tomorrow night!

Goodnight from Beantown.