We were so blessed to be able to take a short mini vacation to Boston a couple weeks ago. We live only about 4 hours from this historical city and we love taking the kids to places where they can see the things they've learned about in history class. A young couple whose parents go to our church live in a nearby suburb and opened their home to us for a few nights so we could stay for free. They even got us local library passes to some of the places we wanted to visit. We enjoyed meals with them each night. Each of the kids even had their own bed to sleep in in their basement while Brett & I had a comfortable guest room. They were extremely hospitable and their house was about an hour drive from Boston.
The first day we hit the Freedom Trail. This probably wasn't as exciting for the kids but it was the history part we wanted them to see. It was a lot of walking but it was a nice day. We started at Boston Common Visitor Center and headed toward Massachusetts State House. The gold roof was pretty cool but we decided not to go in.
Next we visited Granary Burying Ground. It is one of the oldest cemeteries in the United States. Apparently people that came over on the Mayflower are even buried here! Also buried here were Paul Revere, John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and the woman alleged to be Mother Goose. It was a little difficult to find some of the grave stones but it was still kind of surreal being in such an historic place.
There were a few other stops along the trail, including the King's Chapel, one of the first Anglican congregations in Boston in the 1600's, which was beautiful inside. We saw the Old South Meeting House, where the idea for the Boston Tea Party was developed. We did decide to go inside the Old State House, since the kids were free (although we paid $10 for each of us and didn't think it was worth the money in the end). We missed the guided tour but went around ourselves. They had a few rooms with interactive exhibits for kids upstairs but they were not too exciting. We did take a minute to see the site outside where the Boston Massacre occurred.
Lunch was tricky because we weren't really close to many familiar fast food places. Quincy Hall Market was extremely crowded and had several more upscale fast food places. We ended up with some Chinese and some Greek food to share and ate outside the famous Fanueil Hall. One of the kids' favorite things was a one-man band playing outside Fanueil Hall-- had made drums out of household items and was playing for everyone-- it was pretty cool.
In the afternoon we headed for the Boston Aquarium, which was a huge highlight for everyone. They have a 4-story round giant ocean tank of all kinds of fish, turtles, and sharks that was the center of the whole building. You see different fish on every floor.
Leah is obsessed with sea turtles now, so the giant 100-year-old turtle was her favorite part. It was really a cool creature.
Jacob's favorite part, by far, was the shark and ray touch tank. He loved putting his hands in the water more than even touching the creatures. All the others were a little timid to touch the rays but ended up doing it anyway and they enjoyed it as well.
We were pretty exhausted that night and the kids had wanted to play board games but we didn't end up having much time after dinner and everything else, but when I woke up in the morning and went downstairs to see them, I found they had started a game on their own and were happily playing together-- a rare site in our ordinary days.
The second day we went a different direction and started at the USS Constitution Museum. We wanted to be able to get on the real naval ship from the War of 1812, but it was a rainy & stormy day and if there is lightning they don't let you on. So we explored the museum, which had lots of hands-on exhibits.
Jacob loves anything that involves blocks so he stacked these up high.
They had fun pretending to load and shoot a cannon to fire on the enemy ship.
Our favorite part of this museum was pretending to go through the process of becoming a real soldier in the War of 1812. They started with the recruiting station & answered questions they would have had to answer in order to become a soldier. They saw what items they'd be allowed to take aboard the ship, then they pretended to say goodbye to loved ones, and then went through several stations that told what life would be like aboard the ship. It was very interesting.
Here Andrew is swabbing the deck. And Jacob & Daddy are resting in the hammocks in the sleeping quarters.
You can see how dreary and rainy it was outside but we tried to make the best of it. This is the most we saw of the USS Constitution ship itself.
We had brought some Lunchables to save time on lunch but since it was so rainy there weren't many places to sit and eat. We ended up finding a covered waiting area for the commuter fairy and ate quickly as we waited for the ferry to go across the Harbor back downtown. It was a short ride and not a lot to see but the kids really enjoyed it.
The last stop was the kids' personal favorite, although we didn't have as much time as we would have liked-- the Boston Children's Museum. It is a huge place-- 4 stories and we were barely able to see more than half. The first thing they wanted to do was climb the giant climbing structure.
Andrew loved the dinosaur exhibit with a life-sized moving dinosaur.
They spent some time in the mock town where Leah manned the cash register.
Jacob could have easily spent days in this museum and it was just the right age-level for him, although there were a lot of activities the older kids enjoyed. Jacob loved driving the trucks in the giant construction place.
But his absolute favorite part was the water tables. He always loves playing in water, especially moving water with buckets and cups and things to pour. We had a hard time pulling him away!
There was so much more to the museum that I can't even share it all, but they had a blast and were tired once again when we got back to our place. We ate a late dinner and got to stay up and talk with our friends a little after the kids were in bed.
The next day we decided to have breakfast at Cracker Barrel, which we rarely ever get to do. We took our time and enjoyed the morning.
Our last stop on the way home was the Montshire Museum back in Vermont, to which we bought a season pass back in the beginning of the summer. I didn't take many pictures since we had been recently but they did have a good time and enjoyed the music exhibit, where they pretended to be rock stars. All in all, we made many good memories and hope we can go back to Boston again soon to see even more!
