More than a feeling

Boston is very different to the other cities Ive been to. This became apparent as soon as I arrived and got on the subway system and saw people walking across the tracks where the trains go. It summed up a laid back approach that Id find out through the rest of the week from the subway to the breweries.

Boston has loads of buildings and memorials dedicated to revolutionaries and famous townfolk, however I feel Ive covered the historic side of the city with my last post and instead Im going to talk to you about beer. The Harpoon brewery based in the city offer a free tasting session every Thursday. They do this mostly for publicity because they just started out, and also because they make European style ales instead of American 'beer'. The session was really fun: they were making oyster beer while we were there, talking about different crazy drinks they made and gave away a lot of free samples.


While we're on the subject, Boston also has a famous bar where everybody knows your name. The show used a real bar for the exterior shots, and thats been maintained since the show - unfortunately neither that bar or the 'tribute' bar a few blocks away look like the real bar. Still, it was very exciting to see the corner from the show, if only Cliff was there...

After a few days seeing the city I decided to head out and see the New England countryside. There's loads of small towns in the area, with colourful wooden houses and each of them has a heritage trail showing you the history of the place.


Salem is famous for burning a load of witches a few hundred years ago. Unfortunately Janurary really is not the time to go - most places were closed, and there were massive snowdrifts on the pavement making it really difficuly to walk the streets without annoying traffic. The same thing happened on a daytrip to Gloucester - an old whaling town, except with added rain and me getting lost for a few hours. Im going to brush over the whole 'getting lost' thing (it was pretty funny) and conclude that the countryside up here is beautiful and well worth a visit, but make sure you come in summer.