Boston Pops

 

Yesterday we went to Boston. We took the train from Cambridge and walked around Boston Commons. We saw small duck statues in the Boston Park. We bought fancy cupcakes for a treat and ate them outside the Boston Public Library. We visited the library and toured the map room. The strangest map I saw was a view of the United States from Canada. To see Minnesota at the bottom of the map and Florida at the top was mind blowing. We went to the Christian Science center to view the Mapparium. This is a strange exhibit from the inside of a large globe. We walked across on a metal bridge. The acoustics in the room were so odd that whispers sounded loud and regular voices sounded like whispers. The  map is old. Many countries have changed since 1935 but it was still interesting to see it. After taking a bus toward Cambridge we got out to walk around the Harvard campus. We went home to change into our holiday clothes for the Boston Pop's holiday concert. The audience was fun to watch. Some of them were dressed very fine in sparkling gowns and sequins and furs. The conductor was very personable. A choral group sang with the orchestra and an actress read "The Night Before Christmas."

Walden Pond

Here I am at Walden Pond in Massachusetts. We walked all the way around the pond. This body of water is really big enough to be called a lake. Rainbow trout reside here so it must be a lake.

Here is where Henry David Thoreau's cabin stood on the shore of Walden pond.

After having a lunch in the picturesque town of Concord, Massachusetts we walked around the de Cordova Sculpture museum. The art objects were interesting but the wind was so cold coming across the lake we weren't able to appreciate the art as long as we would have if we weren't freezing.

 

New Bedford

 Today we visited New Bedford Whaling National Park. The children completed a handout of puzzles plus a scavenger hunt to earn their first national junior park rangers badges. Both of them repeated the words of the park ranger with their little right hands held up in the air. I was a proud Grandma. We also spent hours in the New Bedford Whaling museum. The museum has the bones of a blue whale and two right whales suspended from the ceiling. The whales were killed in boating accidents. The female right whale was ten months pregnant with another female when it was killed in a boat collision which was a sad day because right whales are endangered. Right whales are docile and live close to shore so they are the easiest to kill. Even though the blue whale was killed twenty years ago and the bones were thoroughly cleaned, oil drips daily from the whale bones. Some of the oil goes into a container near the mouth of this baleen whale but other oil drips on the slate floor. They expect oil will leak from these old bones for another 40 years. New Bedford was the epicenter for whaling 150 years ago. Oil was used for lighting and lubrication. Extending the work day beyond day light hours was a big then back then. Herman Melville stayed in New Bedford ten years before he wrote Moby Dick. Because it was a whaling port, New Bedford has a lot of cultural diversity. The whaling museum was good for adults but less interesting for kids. Although they could crawl inside a replica of a blue whale heart, most of the exhibits were hands off. Kids could go aboard a replica of a whaling ship but they weren't supposed to touch the ropes or open any doors nor go downstairs. Touring a large museum gets hard when the kids can't touch or climb on anything. This entire area is very touristy and would be fun to enjoy in the summer or on a warmer day without rain.

Fall

 Let's think about fall. Not the sudden downward movement of someone or something that has lost balance. I am thinking about the season between the end of summer and the beginning of winter. 2021 feels like the longest fall season of my life. I left my home just a week after peak fall color. I experienced peak fall colors in Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts. Now here it is nearly mid-November and Rhode Island is still pretty. Fall colors are somewhat muted by the sea but some maples and oaks are gorgeous. Yesterday we drove north for an hour and a half. Although the beech and birch trees were bare, that left more room for the oaks to show off their bronze, gold, orange and scarlet colors. The grass is still green and lush. Leaves fell as we walked through the town of Sturbridge. When I was a child I enjoyed running up and down our road trying to land each foot on a leaf. My hips hurt just thinking about all the jumping I did. I tried to catch some Massachusetts leaves in my hand as they fell. Some leaves were huge. I carried one maple leaf because it was pretty and large enough for me to wear as a hat. One lady who was watching the firing of the cannon-ball cannon with us remarked on the beauty of my leaf. Spring is my favorite season but fall is also nice. At the beach sand fleas bite my legs if I am bare legged but I prefer sand fleas over deer ticks.

Sturbridge

 Today we celebrated Veteran's Day in Sturbridge, Massachusetts. The town was designed to look like life in 1830. In this photo fife and drummers put up the flag. We saw sheep, oxen, cows, turkeys, and chicken. We rode on two wagons with Belgian horses. We visited the school, the cooper's shop, the black smith, the tin smith, the lumber mill, the grist mill, the candle maker, the banker, the general store, the drug store and the school. We spent the whole day outside enjoying the nice weather, the animals and the atmosphere. We ended staying a lot longer than we intended. Hearing the clippity clop of horse's hooves as we rode in the wagon over a covered bridge was awesome!