Thursday 24th - Saturday 26th September 2015

We arrived in Boston after an enjoyable train ride through the countryside, it was actually a pretty decent train and we both had two seats between us! I must use the train more when I next come to the states!

Our hostel was actually pretty good too! It was really modern compared to the New York hostel! We had an early night ready for our adventures the following day!

Thursday we got ourselves up and headed to Harvard university, we caught the train, which was less confusing than the New York subway, but some how Alicia still managed to buy the wrong ticket type!!!

Harvard is a private Ivy League university which was established in 1636. It was originally established by the Massachusetts legislature and soon after renamed for John Harvard who was the first benefactor. It is the oldest institution of higher education in the USA.

We had a wonder around the school which is beautifully laid out in some stunning grounds. We came across a statue of John Harvard and overhead a tour guide saying that many people believed rubbing his left foot was lucky. Well we had to get onto this, however Alicia almost tripped up the stairs to begin with! I think she needs more luck at the moment!!

We found a gift shop where Alicia brought all the Harvard branded items! Then put them all on and posed in front of the library for a photo!! She then proceeded to tell everyone she has just transfered schools to study here!!

We headed back into the city centre, walking along some high maintained houses, it was shaping up to be a pretty warm day. We found ourselves the nearest train stop and hopped aboard!

We happened to stumble upon Quincy market where they were selling all different kinds of food! I went for the famous lobster rolls they go mad for here! It was a little expensive...but when in Rome?! It was damn tasty that's for sure!! They had little market stalls around in the area and other stores, we spent about an hour in a comic book store messing around!! They also had a Christmas shop! It'll be rude not to!!

We headed back to the hostel to have a chill night and watch some movies!

Friday we decided to join a walking tour that the hostel put on, it started out well until the tour guide asked if there were any English travelers...sadly I was the only one...which then went on to saying as many bad jokes and showing how horrible us English were in the past...I personally don't think much has changed!

Boston is one of the oldest cities in the USA, founded in 1630 on the Shawmut Peninsula by Puritan settlers from England. It has been the scene of many key events in the American Revolution. The Puritan settles moved from England as they were being subjected to punishment for not being Roman Catholics, so they migrated to the USA, where the proceeded to punish those in Boston for not following their religion...!! How does that work? This guy was making me look bad!!

So we went off on our walk, we headed up the road to the City Hall, whose roof kept getting damaged and destroyed by the salt air they coated the roof in gold leaf! Pretty fancy eh?

We headed towards the town grave yard, where there is over 10,000 bodies buried. When it rains pieces of bones and clothing surface since the graves aren't that deep! All of the tombstones that are there have been moved in line due to the invention of the lawn mower! So know one knows where all the bodies are now!

We carried on walking to the Old State House, where the Boston Massacre occurred, known as the incident on King street by the British, which happened on March 5th 1770. British army soldiers opened fire with no orders into the crowd killing five civilians and injuring six others. This incident was heavily propagandized by leading patriots, such as Paul Revere and Samuel Adams.

We continued to walk the freedom trail after the tour had ended, its a 2.5 mile red-lined route that lead us to several historical sites in relation to the American Revolution as it started here in Boston.

The Boston Tea party was the start of the American Revolution, it was a political protest by the Sons if Liberty in Boston. On December 16th 1773 demonstrators who some were disguised as Native Americans destroyed an entire shipment of tea sent by the East India Company in defiance of the Tea Act of May 10th 1773.

The British government responded harshly (no surprise there) and it in turn, escalated into the American Revolution. The American Revolution was the political upheaval that took places between 1765 and 1783 during which colonists in the Thirteen American Colonies rejected the British monarchy and aristocracy, overthrew the authority of Great Britain, and founded the United States of America.

In July 1776 the Declaration of Independence was unanimously adopted and signed on the 4th of July. I found out an interesting fact while listening to our quirky tour guide, one of the signatures of the Declaration, John Hancock, had a very distinguished signature that the term 'John Hancock' became a synonym for signature! Now the line said in Space Jam totally makes sense!! Who says traveling doesn't educate the mind!

We walked past station 50, and got talking to one of the firefighters that was in the sitting outside. We got ourselves a picture climbing all over the fire truck! It was pretty cool talking to him and asking questions about the job!

We ended our walking tour at the Bunker Hill monument, which was the site of the first major conflict between British and Patriot forces in the American Revolution. It was this massive square column that rose up onto of the hill. You could walk up to the top, but my feet were hurting a fair bit so decided it was not going to happen!

We continued our walk to the U.S.S Constitution where we caught a boat across Boston Harbour back to the city centre. Alicia and I headed back to the hostel to start re-packing our bags. Luckily no one else came into our room as both of our bags had exploded EVERYWHERE!! We then spent the next hour trying to pack everything in!

We had the morning to kill on Sunday so we just stayed in the hostel and watched a few movies before we caught the train to the airport! I am beginning to think I live in an airport!!