January Stop: Revere, MA

After the crazy holiday travel days, we settled in Revere, MA which is a hop, skip, and a jump from Boston. I loved how close we were to the city. It was a quick 5-10 minute walk to the train station where we could hop on the blue line to get into the city in 20 minutes! We went in a couple times a week, but our neighborhood was really great too. It was a nice city suburb right along the beach. Granted it was 20 degrees most days so we weren’t playing around on the beach too much. I still really enjoyed looking out over the water on my runs and drives. We had the perfect view, I wish I could describe it better, here’s my attempt.

We were at the top of a hill on a one way street that looked out over the water. The land curved along the right side creating a little peninsula with tall houses stacked high above the beach. The choppy waves crashed along the beach below the houses and businesses. When it snowed, the New England styled homes looked like they came straight out of a Christmas catalog, and the cold waters gave me stormy novel vibes. Pictures don’t do it justice of course.

Throughout the whole month, I tried taking pictures that would capture the uniqueness that I was experiencing in Boston with polarities like old and new, snow and sand, natural and artificial. Of course, cameras can’t capture the beauty of nature during the more scenic locations Connor and I have visited, so I feel like it’s not really a surprise. Here’s a few of those polarity photos where I tried though! Seeing snow on the beach was especially trippy. I’ve never seen those two things coexisting before in the way that I did in Boston.

Something else I loved about our area was the small nature preserve one mile away from our AirBNB. I started training for a half marathon this month, and it gave me the perfect place to go run.

I would jog there from our place and do a few laps before heading back.
The only tricky part was avoiding the ice and snow that persisted for almost the whole month.

It was so hard running on the snow and ice especially since this is my first time training for a running event.
It was usually between 20-30 degrees every day which makes Boston the coldest place I’ve lived in.
I had to wear three layers covering as much skin as possible just to go on the daily runs.
I loved the weather though. I love the cold and snow. It makes me feel like the world is crystalized and sparkling. Everything feels sharper. That’s not to say I don’t love the warm summer days later in the year as well. I’m just happy I love the fresh winter too because then I actually got to enjoy Boston’s winter.

The month of January felt extremely fast, and it’s probably because our first day in Boston wasn’t until January 6. At the end of the month, we had to leave a day early as well, so the actual month was about a week shorter for us than usual. Then, there’s the factor of it being the new year so my schedule took a dramatic shift with the new goals I am implementing and the old ones being accomplished. And lastly, the amount of nationwide and worldwide events in January was very significant, so it felt like the month flashed by.

For those of you who keep up with Connor and I’s adventures regularly, you will know this means that we just had to pack all of the new experiences we could into even fewer days.
We didn’t back off on packing in everything we could, if anything, we took the few weekends and ran with them.

Ideally in a perfect scenario, we would’ve had all the time we wanted to experience the new city, but we feel that about every location each month. We will never have enough time in each place to do and see everything we want.
That being said, we started off strong with going out into the city on the first Friday we were there.
We dressed up, hopped on the subway, and went to the North End to go to dinner at Neptune Oyster.
North End is the Little Italy of Boston with hundreds of restaurants, pastry shops, and windy streets. Neptune Oyster was this popular oyster bar with delicious food and an intimate space.

The place is very small and packed with people, but it gives off a fun atmosphere. We sat at the bar to enjoy oysters, our favorite, and entres. While we were there, we decided we wanted to stay out after dinner, but we weren’t sure what to do. Connor did a quick search and found an improv show happening later that evening. We love stand up comedy, but hadn’t gone to an improv show before.

We thought, why not! He booked us tickets, and to kill some time, we went to a popular pastry shop called Modern Pastry. It had a line out the door with people excited for late night cannolis. The best part was the bouncer at the door who let party goers go down into the basement where they had an underground bar below the shop. It was the quirkiest combination, a pastry shop and basement club! We grabbed some treats and went across the street to the improv show, expecting there to only be a few other audience members. All of our expectations were completely off base.

As soon as we walked in, the host looked panicked and made sure we had tickets for the show. We did and thought his reaction was odd. We continued down the stairs into the basement where the space opened up into a bar and waiting room. The few people we expected to see was a gross underestimation of the show’s attendance. The whole room was filled with people of varying ages. We got grilled at the door because the whole show was sold out! We were ushered to our seats when they opened the doors to the stage room, and got to sit around the square stage. The rest of the evening was full of laughter and hilarious skits. We had the best time, and the audience was cracking up alongside us the whole time too. For anyone going to Boston, who are 18 years or older, I would absolutely recommend the Improv Asylum if you enjoy comedy. It was such an amazing show, we would totally go again.

Saturday was technically the second weekend of the month, but it was our first one in Boston. It was the perfect start to our adventure because soft snow fell throughout the whole day. Exploring the city and seeing all of the sights felt even more special underneath the picturesque snowflakes, making the whole day feel like I was in a movie.

Especially when the first place we went to was Beacon Hill Books & Cafe. Beacon Hill is an area of Boston with boutiques, quaint coffee shops, and antique sellers. I could’ve curled up in that bookstore and read all day sitting by the window as the snow fell outside, but walking around the streets was just as magical. All of the brick houses and wreaths on the doors were adorable. It totally felt like a quaint little Christmas movie set. We walked down the famous Acorn Street as well, don’t ask me why it is famous, but apparently it is a tourist hot spot during the summer time. We thought that whole area was lovely.

We walked down the main strip which meets up with the Boston Common and Public Garden perfectly enough! I had no idea, but it was a pleasant surprise since I had also wanted to visit the beautiful parks in the city.
The snow blanketed everything and continued falling as we explored.

The Common had dogs racing about and kids sledding down little hills, neither group bothered by the nip in the air. I loved the Garden as well because all the ponds had frozen over and tons of people were out on those playing hockey or ice skating.
I have never seen anything like it before, I’ve only seen hockey and ice skating in rinks.
It was a blast just watching everyone play around on the ice. No wonder people from New England are so killer at hockey, they can just come out to the park in the winter and practice without having to pay for rink time.

This was another movie moment for me when we walked across the snow covered pedestrian bridge above all of the skaters. I loved it!

We continued walking to the Boston Public Library, but grabbed some lunch at Cafe Landwer right before. They had tons of gluten free options, so I would definitely recommend it if anyone has a gluten allergy. The library was stunning though. As soon as we walked in, my jaw dropped at the craftsmanship on the ceiling tiles and arched ceilings. There were vines, colors, and names spreading through the entry way which led my eyes to the magnificent marble staircase and massive lions. I was a little overwhelmed by the magnificence of it all, so I opted to take a right turn before climbing the stairs to go outside into the courtyard.The courtyard was so pretty with the snow falling gently onto the fountain’s statue and white earth. My favorite part was the arched columns along most of the parameter giving visitors a covered walkway around the yard. People were enjoying dates, sketching architecture, and throwing snowballs throughout the space. We enjoyed our moment outside and headed back in to go upstairs.

The yellow marble was so beautiful as I mentioned. It wasn’t just the stairs, but the lions, balcony, and columns as well. As you rose between the levels, artwork of muses and magic greeted you too. It felt very Narnia. The first room we explored was the Abbey room with depictions of Sir Galahad on his quest for the Holy Grail. The pieces were huge and so detailed. I loved the color saturation and story telling as well. The second area we went into was the quiet Bates Hall that was filled with people actively using the library to work on various projects and studies. This room is iconic with the old oak tables and green lamps filling the space, seeing it in person was super cool. The ceilings were amazingly 50 feet high and very shocking in their execution. If I lived here, I would absolutely try to come here to work as much as possible. I would love to write here. We explored the rest of the rooms which had beautiful art and people working scattered throughout.

The last show stopping area we went to was the third floor where John Singer Sargent’s master pieces are displayed. The skylit hall with vaulted ceilings shows over 600 pieces of his artwork that spanned 29 years of his career. Connor and I sat up there for awhile, soaking it all in and reading a hand out about each of the main wall sections. It was quite incredible, even the missinng mural that is forever uncompleted because of Sargent’s death.

After that incredible experience in the library, we went through Quincy Market which was bustling with the early Saturday evening crowd getting out of the growing dark and cold snow. I picked up some gluten free and dairy free cookies as a precursor to our dinner in the North End. Connor had wanted to try another place there that served gluten free pasta. Antico Forno was delicious and had a family atmosphere that we enjoyed, escaping from the cool Boston evening.

Sunday we got up and out into the city to check out Cambridge and Harvard! I made Harvard jokes the whole morning until Connor was banging his head against the wall. But come on, “I am going to Harvard” or “I went to Harvard” just always gets a laugh out of me.

We went to the popular coffee shop there, Tatte, before taking our drinks to walk around campus.
For Harvard being “Harvard” I was disappointed by the campus, but their library had pretty columns and stairs. The brick was cute, and I liked the big courtyard with lots of trees.
I’ve toured tons of other college campuses that are much prettier though. No hate to any Harvard students or alums out there!
The education is of course worth it. I liked Cambridge though, it felt like a cute college town.

We took the train to Seaport after that which was a completely different vibe. It was all brand new skyscrapers and development with not a lot of character from that small sections we saw. Not that that is bad, it was just a stark difference to where we were for the earlier part of the day. We walked around Seaport popping into shops, getting more coffee, and walking along the harbor. My favorite part was walking on the edge of Fan Pier Park which follows the harbor and gives amazing views of the city. It was unplanned, but our accidental sunset timing was perfect. The sun set on the glass skyscrapers across the water, and the sky mellowed into dusky colors. The walk in the snowy park with the pretty views led us to an even bigger surprise. I spotted a rooftop bar above a fancy hotel along the water, and wanted to go up to watch the full sunset. They let us up no problem, and the bar was pretty much empty except for a couple other couples. We grabbed drinks and went out under the heat lamps to watch the the sky line go from dusty pinks to dark shadows full of lights from windows and streets. It was such a beautiful, spontaneous end to our evening out.

As per our months’ usual courses, during the week days Connor and I both work from home and live our normal lives. We love our routines of working during the day, working out after five, enjoying a home-cooked dinner, and fitting in our hobbies before bed if there is time. Every now and then we break it up with a night out or a mid-week activity, but that is the usual weekly schedule. We also loved our AirBNB this month too. It was probably one of our nicest yet with brand new appliances, fresh remodels, plenty of supplies and snacks, and tons of space. I really loved it, it felt new and clean. The only downside was the two stories and large spaces gave Princess more anxiety than normal, but we did our best to support her and provide whatever she needed this past month. The owners also had a trash service that took our bins out on the correct days and salted our stairs and walkways for us against the ice and snow. The whole month I felt like we were receiving five-star service from the owners and helpers.

Another random thing I loved was all of the salt everywhere. I feel like a lot of people complain about the salt ruining cars, shoes, and all of that, but I just thought it was so fun! I loved how the salt keeps the roads and sidewalks safe, walking on it is super fun with all of the crunchy texture under my shoes, it looks cute pebbling all of the city surfaces, and I just loved it! It’s also kind of crazy how salt used to be such an insanely expensive resource that was used to barter for high class goods, and I got to watch truck loads of it get dumped out onto the streets. There were buckets along the sidewalks that people could use if they wanted to add more to the walk areas as well. Something Connor and I hadn’t experienced before was a declared snow emergency. In Boston, if they declare a snow emergency, you can only park in specific places so as to clear roads for emergency protocols and evacuation routes. Police drove through our neighborhood with lights and mega phones alerting all of us to move our cars. It was really interesting, and I had no idea that was a thing until this past month.

Luckily we rarely had to drive in the snowy or icy conditions. The city does an amazing job of keeping roads in great shape with plowing and salting the roads. They prepare in advance before snow even sticks to the ground. Plus, we used the subway whenever we went into the city. Before hopping onto the subway on the weekends, we would stop at the neighborhood Italian bakery on the corner to get coffee and pastries. It was a local staple for sure.

On the second weekend in Boston, we didn’t start our Saturday with this bakery stop. We got up early to drive an hour and a half to Crotched Mountain in New Hampshire. You didn’t think we would miss out on snowboarding, did you?

We were super pumped to be close to snow, even if we had heard horror stories of the East Coast snow.
Coming from the West Coast, a lot of people told us how rough the slopes were out east. The mountains are completely different with elevation and conditions.
We wanted to go regardless and had a blast!

Even though it was a holiday weekend for MLK Day that Monday, the mountain wasn’t too crowded because it started raining half way through the day. That cleared out a ton of people.
Most of the morning the slopes were filled with groups of ski schools and families, so it was nice to have the mountain to ourselves later in the day.
We hadn’t snowboarded in rain before, but it helped loosen up the icy slopes a little which gave us a better experience.

We found that we could carve better and catch less edges when the ground was a little slushier. We shredded the whole day until about an hour before sunset so we could make it down the mountain without the roads freezing up. Because even though the elevation isn’t high, the temperatures are so low that everything freezes back up quickly. We made it back down no problem, and relaxed back at home for the rest of the evening.

Sunday we went back into the city for some more tourist activities. I had never done one of the bus or trolley tours through a city before, so I wanted to try it out in Boston since it is one of the top ranked things to do there. Before I get into it, I absolutely loved it and had the best time! It wasn’t what I expected at all.

We got on in the early afternoon, and our driver was super involved. He was telling us all types of stories and pointing out tons of sights for us to check out. He played sound effects to go along with the stories, and we were all having a great time. I was excited for a lot of the stops, but I waited for the one I knew I wanted to get off at. The Cheers bar was on the route!

I grew up watching Cheers and other old TV shows with my dad, so I couldn’t believe I was going to have the chance to see the bar that inspired the show’s set. Once the trolley stopped, we hopped out and I stared at the sign with the hand pointing downstairs to Cheers. I was freaking out! We went down, and I sang the theme song as I walked through the door.

The front bar was packed and lively which was fun to see, but we went to the back and up the stairs to see the actual bar that inspired the show. I walked past a big mural of all of the characters and into the bar that had been corded off from viewers. We still got to walk in and sit on one side of the bar, but the rest was sectioned off. I was totally fan girling. I even called my dad and told him where I was which was so special. Talking to him in the bar was very full circle. I loved getting to walk around and look at everything. We got a couple things from the gift shop too. I’m so so happy I got to see it and be there in person.

Once I picked up my feet to take us back out of the bar, we hopped on the next trolley which took us through the pretty Back Bay area of Boston where the houses are tens of millions of dollars. We enjoyed more stories and history sites pointed out by our new driver before hopping off at the Boston Common. We grabbed some hot drinks to keep the cold evening at bay and started to walk the freedom trail. I was adamant that I wanted to walk the whole thing and not cut any corners. We were having such a blast walking through the city along the trail getting to see amazing things like the Old South Meeting House, Paul Revere’s house, Old North Church, the Holocaust memorial, the oldest pubs in the nation, and so much more. After lots of fun and historical sites, Connor was about to freeze outside since it had gotten completely dark. We got all the way to the bridge where TD Garden is before we had to take the subway back home so he wouldn’t lose any fingers or toes.

Not to worry though, we still had one more weekend to squeeze in as much as we could. During the first couple weeks though, I met up with an old friend from Tucson who goes to school and works in Boston now. It was a blast getting breakfast with her and going to a hot yoga class together the following week. I loved getting to catch up!

Another element we dealt with during the week days was the tricky parking situation in Boston. Our AirBNB didn’t have any parking option longer than an eight-day guest pass which wasn’t made clear in the booking details. We didn’t want to rebook with someone else, so we did something we haven’t done this whole time during our travels. We took one car. All three of us, Princess, Connor, and myself, and all of our stuff was packed into my singular car. Because you can’t condense two cars into one car, we had to leave quite a bit of stuff with Connor’s parents in South Carolina. We left his car there as well. We took only the essentials and hit the road. Of course Connor and I had done roadtrips together before, but not with Princess too. It helped Princess a ton having him there to give her attention throughout the drive. I think she really enjoyed it.

Connor and I love driving together, but on these multi-state travel days, it can get tricky because we can’t play music in the car since it adds to Princess’s anxiety. She already hates the car and gets extremely worked up, but having music on makes it worse. Connor always listens to music on his drives, while I call friends or listen to podcasts since talking doesn’t bother Princess. Connor was a trooper and listened to hours of podcasts and me yap for miles on end.

It was worth it in the end because we only had to move my car instead of two cars every day to be sneaky enough to avoid a parking ticket after the guest pass ended. We pulled it off and avoided a ticket!

Our third, and last, weekend in Boston was spent in the city on Saturday and in New Hampshire on Sunday. I was really excited to meet up with an old college friend for coffee Saturday morning because we hadn’t seen each other in so many years. I had the best time hearing all about his life. I’m happy to have gotten to catch up with him!
After that great way to start the day, Connor and I headed over to the U.S.S. Constitution, also commonly known as “Old Ironsides”.

It is the oldest commissioned naval warship still afloat in the world, and has survived through 33 engagements. It is kept in amazing condition at the active Charlestown Navy Yard with military available on board for Q&As. There is a museum as well, but Connor and I did a tour of the ship. We got to see below deck where they had rows of cannons and an even lower deck where sailors had slept. It was fascinating getting to walk through the ship and read all of the informational plaques describing what it had been like for the sailors.

We asked the officers some questions as well, such as “How many people could fit on this boat?” The answer was 400-500 people! We spent about an hour looking around at everything and I’m sure we didn’t even see it all. It was so cool, I would highly recommend.

More history awaited us at the Boston Tea Party Museum. When we arrived, they took us into a large room with pews and large podiums where they gave us identities of true members of the group that participated in the destruction of the tea in 1773.

Two historical reenactors played Samuel Adams and another tea party member as they gave our group of now Boston Tea Party members a rousing speech intending to strike the match that began the fateful night where people stormed aboard docked ships in the harbor and tossed the tea over.

Once we were all “riled up”, they led us out onto a replica of an 18th Century ship where another reenactor walked us through the rest of the events that evening. She explained how it was all accomplished, and all in three hours no less!
I was shocked to learn that they didn’t just throw crates of tea overboard, but that they actually broke into the insulate crates, scraped away at the densely packed tea leaves, and then drowned the evidence in the churning waters.
After we “threw the tea into the harbor” we were walked through the interactive museum filled with talking portraits, videos, and artifacts from the times.

The whole experience was amazing. I truly loved how educational it was while being interactive and exciting. Once we finished the tour and said goodbye to our hosts, we got to go into the tea room where they serve five different teas that were popular during those times. Three of those teas were actually types of the ones dumped into the harbor. As a tea drinker, I liked four out of the five with the fifth being a smoky black tea that Connor enjoyed. As a side note, they also had massive gluten free and dairy free chocolate chip cookies that I happily ate two of. Throwing tea into the harbor is best celebrated with cookies and tea of course.

After that, we took an Uber over to Fenway Park because I wanted to see the famous structure. We walked all the way around it, but didn’t take a tour inside. We grabbed dinner right down the road at a fun spot called Audubon. Then, we Ubered home to avoid walking around in the chilly evening.

On Sunday, I mentioned we were in New Hampshire. We went back for another snowboarding day, but we tried a new mountain called Gunstock. I have loved getting to try all types of different mountains during our travels and my life. The range is crazy from Mt. Shasta, to Tahoe, to Mt. Lemmon, to Sunrise, to Crested Butte and Monarch, to now Crotched and Gunstock. It’s been so fun seeing them all, and I have tons more to add to the list in the future.

Unfortunately, Gunstock was the worst snowboarding experience I’ve had. I loved the independent mountain feel since it isn’t owned by one of the big mountain resort monopolies, but I underestimated the difference between West Coast snow and East Coast snow.
The first time we had gone, the rain had helped. This time, the slopes were fully sheets of ice.

I’ve never boarded on something like that ever. The people who grew up shredding these types of slopes were having no issues whatsoever, it’s probably a beautiful day to them. To me, I couldn’t even keep my board under my feet. Connor and I would be going down and hit the mile long ice sheet and lose all traction under the boards and have them fly out from under us.
We tried our best to be cautious and extra aware of the slopes, but getting a handle on this type of boarding was crazy difficult.

At one point, two boarders saw me slipping and told me it was all about reading the slope and which way the wind was carrying up the mountain because it would supposedly tell me where the ice was and wasn’t. I looked at them dumbstruck because I’ve never had to read a slope so hard in my life, even in white out conditions.

All in all, we still had a blast. The experience was crazy, but I can’t complain about being on top of a beautiful mountain in the snow with my board strapped to my boots. I love being up there so much. Getting down was scary, but after I biffed it and front flipped, and Connor took a hit into an accidental back flip, we decided it was time to chill in the lodge and enjoy some food before heading back. We were both hurting pretty bad from our falls, but thankfully no serious injuries for either of us. I would love to snowboard Gunstock again with better snow conditions though, the runs were really fun in theory and I wish we could’ve enjoyed them more.

Other than all of those fun things, I started my new year’s resolutions of training for a half marathon, implementing positive affirmations, figuring out my tech situations, and more. All is going well there! I’ve been working really hard on my yoga teacher training program and my journalism articles. I wrote one piece this month, and edited two others, so hopefully I will have exciting news for everyone soon!

I was really sad leaving Boston because I loved it so much and wish we had had more time there. I also can’t stand packing up all our stuff and cars again, it’s taxing doing it twice a month basically. But we got everyone in and waved goodbye as we headed out on our four day journey to get to Arkansas. That will be a story for the next month and blog.

Thank you for following along!

December Stops: Beaufort, SC & Red Bluff, CA