Day 9: October 7, 2015--Boston, MA

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Don't miss today's Gallery!

Click to enlarge; click again to enyuge.
Red Star 1: We started the Freedom Trail.
Red Star 2: Our guide dumped us.
Red Star 3: We kept going to about here.

All we did today was walk around Boston, partly with an organized tour. But we saw a lot!

I guess we got a sort of late start (laundry, maybe?) because we didn't reach today's goal--the Freedom Trail--until 3:33 PM, according to the receipt.

I really wanted Lila to see the Trail, which I did on my own one day in the mid-'80s (1980s, wise guys) when the school where I was principal sent me to a conference. That was, until this trip, the only time in my life I had explored a city on the east coast.

So we walked a few blocks to the Visitor's Information Center on Boston Common to buy our tickets, and the incredibly nice ladies gave me my first-ever Senior Discount. I didn't know whether to thank them or weep uncontrollably.

Proof of purchase

The ladies also indicated that there was some question whether our guide would arrive on time--or at all. Jeremiah Poope (or so he calls himself) did indeed arrive on time, and with verve. Click the link and you'll find he's something of a celebrity. He's all over the Freedom Trail Foundation Youtube Channel, he has a Facebook page, and his bio is way... way... way down the page of the "Freedom Trail Players" (it includes the regrettable line, "The first Poope landed on these shores in 1629..."). Yes, he was funny.

Anyway, I'll leave you to the Gallery to see the highlights of the Freedom Trail.

Mr. Poope dumped us (ha ha) at the government center, waaaaaay before the end of the Freedom Trail. But it was after 5:00 PM, so...

Lila and I made our own way through Quincy Mahket (see what I did there?) and up to the North End, catching the Paul Revere House (he wasn't home; we left a note) and the Old North Church.

We walked as far as Copp's Hill Burial Ground, hoping to make it to Bunker Hill (off the top of the map), but we, like the colonists, were defeated.

At that point, exhausted, we turned our feet homeward, not forgetting to take the advice of our friend Mike, who highly recommended Mike's Pastry (no relation) on Hanover Street. He wasn't wrong. We also had a pleasant chat with an older couple there (yes, even older than me... I...). I'm pretty sure we had some Italian food (easy enough in the North End), then found a "T" Station (Haymarket, Orange Line to Back Bay?) and headed back to our domicile, spent.

Photo on Lila's phone by the nice man we met at Mike's Pastry in the North End.

Don't miss today's Gallery!