mybigadventures.com

It was an early start today, we had alarms set for 7am and were up soon after as tickets were booked 9. After checking directions again in the morning, we found that there was a partial closure on the metro so we were going to have to walk a bit further when we arrived. With this in mind, we decided to get going and grab some breakfast enroute. We took the metro from Arlington station which is close to the hotel and got off the stop before Fenway as the rest of the route was replaced by bus. We decided to walk the rest of the way as it was only supposed to take 10 minutes and we had plenty of time. We stopped at Starbucks and grabbed some Pain au chocolat's for breakfast and then headed on to Fenway park to pickup our tickets for the 9am tour. 

The tour was interesting even though some of the sports talk went over our heads, the ground has quite a bt of history and is the oldest ball park still in use dating back to 1912. The tour took us all over the ground giving us a chance to see the view from the different areas including in the media box. The whole stadium is much smaller than you might think, and you could sit pretty much anywhere and still have a good view of the game. I took quite a few photos of the ground, but unfortunately it was a bit cloudy so the sky looked a bit washed out. The tour finished up in the museum where there is lots of memorabilia including signed baseballs from each of the world series games including signatures of well known players including Babe Ruth.

Following Fenway Park, we stopped for a drink and ice-cream in McDonalds, they're running a promotion at the moment so all sizes of soft drinks are $1. After a bit of refreshment, we caught the metro over to the aquarium. We had toyed with getting the combination ticket for the whale saightseeing tours and the aquarium but the only tour tickets left were leaving at 5 and wouldn't be back until dark at 9 so we decided to stick with just the aquarium this time. The queue was pretty long, but we managed to connect to the WiFi and buy tickets online instead so skipped the queue. We came here last time we were in Boston and despite being very busy, it didn't disappoint. The highlight again had to be the penguins and the giant turtles, we managed to hit both areas during feeding, so with the giant turtles it meant they were swimming around the top of the big tank.

Feeling tired we caught the metro back past the hotel to the Cheesecake factory for dinner. It was very filling although service was a bit hit and miss. After a long day, we made it back to the hotel just after 8pm for a bit of rest. 

We've been trying to make the most of the rest of the school holidays before September rolls around so have made a couple more trips out. We visited Buckingham Palace in the first week of September last year, and if you sign the back and keep the tickets, you can revisit as many times as you like within the year. It suggests on the website to book in advance but we thought we'd wing it, and, in a worse case scenario, get tickets for another day. Dani had found some city walks on the TFL website (tfl.gov.uk/modes/walking/top-walking-routes) which looked good so either way we had a plan. As it happened, when we got to the palace we were given tickets for about an hour later, so we decided to wait. 

This time, there was an exhibition celebrating the Queen at 90, so several of the state rooms were set out differently to last year. There were 3 rooms showcasing some of the Queen's many outfits including christening, wedding and coronation dresses, in addition to outfits from several foreign tours. For each outfit, with matching hat, there was a short description of where it had been worn and who had designed it. It was very interesting. 

It was a nice day, although by the late afternoon it was a little cloudy. There's a few photos, but only from the outside as no photography is allowed inside the palace. Not that it stopped some people...grumble grumble... Enjoy!

We were up a little later after the long day yesterday, but made use of the hotel Starbucks to grab some breakfast. Once we were ready, we set off for the information centre on Boston Common. We were initially after a map, but once there we decided to buy the Freedom Trail map for $2. The Freedom Trail takes you around all of the historic landmarks in Boston, but last time we were here in 2013, we bought trolley bus tickets, so had never actually followed it properly. The trail is clearly marked by a red brick path and can be followed for free, but the map we bought gave us some additional information about each of the stops. There were 16 stops in total, taking you across the city by foot, starting at Boston Common and ulimataely finishing at the Bunker Hill Monument.

Along the trail, we stopped off in churches and burial grounds tracing the steps of legendary American patriots including Benjamin Franklin and Paul Revere. There is plenty to see and covering the whole trail took us the whole day. The real highlight was visiting USS Constitution or old iron sides as it was knicknamed due to the way cannon balls bounced off the sides. Last time we were here in 2013, we managed to see the ship sailing out into the harbour and firing cannons, we since found out this happens only 6 or 7 times a year, so this time when we visited it was docked for visitors. You go through some security and have to show photo ID before you're able to board the ship as the site is an active military base but then we were on board. We spend some time exploring the ship both above and below deck, taking a few pictures as we went before moving on to our final stop at Bunker Hill. Just before we left, we made full use of the water vapour spray they had on the way into and out of the base - it was another scorcher today and so the water spray was a welcome treat.

By the time we reached the last stop at Bunker Hill, we were feeling pretty tired so we decided to get a drink and look for somewhere to eat on the way back to the hotel. We stopped at Starbucks and making use of their WiFi, we found a place to eat close by. It was a pub and so we both got ID'd on the way in - first time in a while! I had a steak sandwich whilst Dani had a seafood sandwich, it was very nice, but feeling tired we headed back to the hotel soon after. We spent the evening catching up on some journal and photos, booking tour tickets for Fenway park tomorrow, before calling it a night.