Thursday 7/30 - Boston to Maine to NY State

We woke up in Somerset, MA and began Maddy's quest for the perfect Boston Creme Pie (for breakfast, of course). Thanks to Google, we found it at Lyndell's bakery (http://www.lyndells.com/). Rather than buying a few pastries like normal folks, we bought a whole pie, a half gallon of milk and broke out the paper plates/cups in a nearby park. Maddy was thrilled with the results!

After pie-breakfast, we headed north through New Hampshire.

We went to Maine with the intention of taking this first picture and turning around, so we could say that we'd been in Maine. But we cruised in a few miles to York Harbor and absolutely fell in love with the Maine coast. We stayed a few hours, which was a long time considering our goal of getting through New Hampshire, Vermont and into NY State. Maine was incredible!

The water wasn't quite as cold as Northern CA ocean water. But it was chilly.

Our future summer home:

The Nubble Lighthouse, on it's own little island.

Back to the car and farewell to our beloved Maine!

And then we did this for about 6 hours...

And some of this...

Lots of this...

It was mostly dark through New Hampshire, which on Route 9 was one long, long series of rolling hills and green forrest. Nice, but a couple hours would've been plenty.

Green Mountain State? We thought that was NH! Unfortunately, our prolonged stay in Maine meant that we cruised through lower Vermont in the dark - boo hoo! We could tell before sunset that the mountains got higher and the space more open, so we're guessing it was pretty and there were a few cows and ice cream lovers. Wilmington, VT had a beautiful little downtown that Joanna may take me back to (yeah, antiques).

We got as far as Schenectedy, NY where all 6 of us crashed in a Holiday Inn, with Lilly and Sophie volunteering for floor duty. ZZzzzzzz...

Boston, Harvard, and Fenway Park!

Our first stop in Boston was leaving Boston for Cambridge and Harvard. Again, suprised by how old all the stuff was. Buildings constructed in the early 1700's, enormous campus and muggy weather. The statue is John Harvard, the plaque was so impressive I had to include it.

We bought tickets to the Old Town Trolley, which was a very good move. We saw all the sites and the drivers were great tour guides. We were amazed to learn all the things that Paul Revere did other than take midnight rides. Boston is a beautiful city, very clean, and sooo much history.

The Old North Church from the other side of the harbor.

We toured this WW2 Destroyer that is mothballed next to the US Consitution - Old Ironsides. The kids thought the ship was cool but the sleeping quarters were a little tight.

Sophie and Joanna fell in love with this townhouse across from Bunker Hill.

Jake and Maddy were the only ones with enough energy to climb the 294 steps to the top of the Bunker Hill memorial (a small Washington Monument). Maddy did calf-lifts on the way down because she is worried that she's getting soft on this vacation. I quit after 75 stairs because I was soft before the trip.

One of the highlights of our trip: Fenway Park! We all loved the park, Yawkey Way, the die-hard Sox fans and the hot dogs with peppers and onions. We ate big, cheered for the Red Sox and sang Sweet Caroline with the crowd. We witnessed 3 homers over the green monster (we were straightaway center field) and a Red Sox loss to the A's. That makes us 0-2 for home-team wins on our trip, so we can expect the Indians to lose next Tuesday night. But that was probably going to happen anyway...

photos by: Jake

Days 4 & 5 - NYC to Plymouth Rock

We started on the Staten Island Ferry to get a view of the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the city. Sophie the packmule.

It was a clear day, so Lady Liberty was beautiful.

For scale, the twin towers were about twice as high as the dark, square building in the center of this picure - from the ferry.

We found the financial district - great balls!

The front of the bull was ok, too.

On the subway again...

Probably the best thing we saw in NYC, Dana Barrett's apartment. No marshmallow mess, but you could still feel the evil of Zool. Thank you Ghostbusters - America's heroes.

The Dakota, where John Lennon was murdered - smile kids!

Jake is really into Natural History and the Museum was right up his alley. This ancient statue was his favorite exhibit.

After leaving New York, we headed through CT with a stop in New Haven to see Yale University. It has beautiful old buildings dating back to the 1700's, a creepy old Skull & Bones building and very clean bathrooms. Go Bulldogs!

No pictures of Rhode Island, its just too small. Weird. Almost the last stop of the day, Plymouth Rock. Beautiful site, cool rock, lousy chowda.

This is the rock. Checkered history, broken in half and put back together, moved and moved again; easily the most exciting rock ever. Pilgrims were awesome, too.

Off to Boston for more sites and best of all - Fenway!