we were hiding from the rain, we were riding on a train

Last Tuesday in Concord we didn't do much of anything. Well, we discovered that we'd booked a hostel in Charleston, South Carolina and a train ticket to Charleston, West Virginia, which was slightly less than ideal. So we spent the afternoon re-jigging that part of the trip. The hostel hadn't been paid for, so we cancelled that and got another train ticket to Cincinnati, so we're going there instead of Charleston, WV and are staying in a Travelodge that's costing us £18 each for the night. We're actually saving money as the train is at such antisocial hours. We get in at 1am and leave at 1am, so that saves two nights' accommodation :P

On Tuesday we were going to go to the beach but it was apparently going to rain, so we went to the aquarium with the Concord Cownies instead - Boris took some time off work so we could have a fun family outing. We had a tasty lunch in Quincy market, where the waitress couldn't understand Oz's English pronunciation of "ranch dressing". Then we went to the aquarium and saw fish and penguins and got to touch some stingrays (with their stings removed) and some extremely small sharks. Afterwards we went back to the market for ice creams and a wander. It was dark when we got back but Oz and I took Blackie to the lake because he'd been indoors all day.

Maureen drove us to the station on Wednesday morning. We chose the right day to leave Concord, as it was raining a lot and was forecast to do so for the next few days. We got to the station early as we had to pick up our extra tickets, and we wanted to make sure we knew what we were doing. But Boston South is easy to navigate and we soon found ourselves on board the Acela regional, which runs from Boston South station to Washington, DC Union station. From Boston to NYC is 431 miles, and we went through Rhode Island and Connecticut on the way. I spent most of the time looking out of the window at the scenery. It might not sound too thrilling but it was so very different from the English landscape that it seemed to be worth looking at: all forests and swamps and lakes and bridges, until you could see the skyscrapers crowning the distance and we went into a tunnel and came out on the other side in New York City.

"I don't wanna go to bed, it's no good"

Today we picked up our rail passes and tickets from Boston South Station. We had a slight hiccup when the man told us that our tickets weren't booked and we didn't have a reference number for any of them, but then he checked again and they were attached to our passes somehow. We had to sign a slip to get our passes, our passes and all eleven tickets. By the time we'd finished there was a rather long queue of disgruntled rail travelers behind us, so we naturally made a hasty exit. Anyway, we now have in our possession the passes and 11 tickets we need to get from here to Los Angeles. Plans are underway for us to fly from Burbank to the San Francisco area via private jet, courtesy of Oz's dad. 

After the station we wandered down to the water for some seafoody lunch. Oz had lobster and I had cod, which was very fresh... perhaps a little *too* fresh ;-) (For those of you not in the Cownie family: when I first visited the USA aged 6, I complained about everything, most notably that my egg was "inside out" - the white was runny and the yolk was firm - and that my fish was "too fresh".) The place we went to was empty apart from us and one other couple, but it was very tasty. It had massive windows looking out over the water that were all open, so we had a completely open view. Oz almost managed to defenestrate his plate (it was stuck to the table so when he tried to push it away it stuck then jumped towards the window) which I found really hilarious for some reason. I think it was partly the thought that if you didn't like your food you could just throw it out of the window, plate and condiments included.

At lunch we decided that it was such a nice day and the water was so lovely that we wanted to go on a boat. (We had been planning to go to the cinema as it was meant to be thunderstormy and rainy, but the sky remained clear all day and we thought it would be a waste to spend the day in a cinema.) So we walked further around the water to Rowes Quay where there were harbour tours being advertised. We went one one of those and for 45 minutes chugged around the harbour while a recording of a nice American lady told us about the things we could see. We learned about when 2.5 tons of molasses were spilled, killing 6 people and injuring over 100 more, and about how Logan airport changed names twice and has 6 runways and occupies approximately 2900 acres. The boat was prettymuch empty and we had the whole middle deck to ourselves, so we had a lovely breezy, shady and relaxing ride around the water.  I wasn't too convinced about the educational value of the nice American lady but still, we just wanted a boat ride and we had a nice boat ride, so that's all that matters.

Afterwards we headed over to Quincy market. We went there before when it was raining but didn't really have a proper look around. I wanted a hat because my head kept getting hot when we went out in the sun, and I didn't want to get a sunburned parting at any point on this trip. We found a nice one on one of the stalls for the very reasonable price of $22. Then we T'd it home and have had a very uneventful evening, namely because we retreated upstairs just as it was declared to the boys that it was time for jammies... now three hours later they are still fussing in their room. Tomorrow we're going to attempt to go to the Science museum again. I hope we do get to go, because I remember going 14 years ago and having a fun time. I think it would be a good test of whether or not I've aged mentally 14 years in the intervening time!

hangin' out with my gnomies

Time for a more comprehensive update...

We got to Heathrow surprisingly quickly on the Piccadilly line on Tuesday, though it felt like being a fish out of water when it went overground. We checked into the Yotel and spent a little while being fascinated by how compact and clever it all was, before showering then going to bed. 

Here is a lovely picture of Oz in the Yotel:

On Wednesday we awoke bright and early, and headed out to drop off our bags. We'd already checked in at 11am on Tuesday and re-seated ourselves. We put ourselves right at the back of the plane where the row was just two seats not three, so we wouldn't have to annoy any other hapless traveller when we wanted to use the loo. It also meant that we got served our food first (well I got mine first anyway because I got veggie meals... more on that in a minute...). Though we did get off the plane last we didn't have to queue too long at immigration. Anyway. After bag drop we went through security and had some breakfast in Costa. I really wanted one of those pot things with the fruit compote and yogurt and granola on top, but the only breakfasty things they had were pastries and muffins, so I had a panini and a giant cup of tea instead. I don't know why I'm writing about this in such detail because I'm sure you all know what it's like to hang about in airports, so anyway.

Spot our plane...

The flight itself was uneventful, though I wasn't too pleased with my vegetarian lunch. The main itself (vegetarian moussaka) was actually quite yummy, but for some reason I didn't get oat biscuits or butter, instead I got some rubbishy sunflower spread. For dessert I had fruit in jelly, where Oz had a yummy Rachel's organic creamy rice pudding thing. Apparently vegetarians can eat cheese but NO OTHER DAIRY NOT ON A PLANE NO YOU CAN'T. 

We were met at Logan by Boris and lots of children. Boris decided it would be "too boring" for us to get the T straight to Tich and Lori's, so he picked us up and attempted to kidnap us. We had a tasty dinner of chowder and other seafood (Crin said we had to try the chowder when we were in Concord). Austin came over for dinner too, then afterwards drove us to Tich and Lori's as it was in his direction. Then we went to sleeeep.

***

Yesterday we met the twins, who at first seemed a little bemused by us. We went to the zoo and saw all sorts of animals, though the kids seemed more impressed by the zoo car and the tractor and the horse merry-go-round (they have never been told that the merry-go-round moves if you put money in...). We stopped for a drink and when we were in the cafe the monsoon started. We thought it had stopped so decided to go back to the car, sadly we missed the short window of dryness and got absolutely soaked. I couldn't have been more wet if I'd jumped in a pond with all my clothes on. Still, we invented the new sport of air swimming, with added handicap of two three-year-olds and a buggy. On the way back some parts of the road were getting flooded, but we made it back ok and had some lunch. 

The munchkins at the zoo - Sammy at the back and Jason at the front.

Oz and I decided to go and explore Boston in the afternoon, so we jumped on the T (the Boston underground system, though most of it's not actually underground) and wandered around downtown. We had a Starbucks and the prices were exactly the same as in England... but in dollars not pounds. Sadly it started raining again, not quite as hard as in the morning but pretty close. As we only had a small umbrella for protection we naturally got soaked all over again. Fun times. (Well, it was pretty amusing I suppose.)

***

Today we wanted to explore some more. The thunderstorms were all over and it was a beautiful sunny and hot day. We started off at the Isabella Stuart Gardner museum, then T'd it to Harvard for lunch at a grill place. Then we went to the Harvard Museum of Natural History and saw lots of glass flowers and stuffed animals in cases and things. After that Oz wanted to find a shop that would sell him expensive jeans, so we went back downtown and walked across the Common to Newbury Street where there were lots of designer shops, including the one with the jeans. There was also a strong contender for the most disturbing shop ever. It basically had in it lots and lots of gnomes. I can't describe very well why it was so disturbing, perhaps you have to see it to believe it. Anwyay, Oz successfully bought jeans, then we headed back. We got a bit confused on the T because it's just weird. Sometimes you have to get a receipt and sometimes you just have to tap in with your Charlie Card like you do with Oyster in London, and at some stations you can change and some you can't, and you can buy tickets on board if you feel like it. We had to do this going inwards because the machine on the platform was broken, but the T man was very nice to us and let us on for free even though we had exact change, I think this is our first example of people loving the fact that we're English. He told us to tell people back home that we'd had something for free here, so there you go.

xx Li