A Magical Autumn Trip to Boston, Massachusetts
If you are looking for a change of scenery or a relaxing weekend getaway, may I kindly suggest the lovely city of Boston, Massachusetts as your destination. I recently went for a short 3-day stay and found myself unexpectedly smitten with the city.
Boston is, at its heart, a university town steeped in American history (and yes, the tea pun was intentional). It is one of the most educated epicenters in North America, with students convalescing from around the world to attend top notch schools like Harvard, MIT, Tufts, Berklee, Emerson and Boston University.
The original home to the pilgrims, not far away from the landing point of the Mayflower at Plymouth Rock, Puritanism has laid its roots in Boston. Remnants of these dogmatic settlers are still visible today all across the city, in the form of major monuments such as the Public Library and public spaces such as the Commons. Close by are the neighbouring towns of Cambridge, of Harvard and MIT fame, and Salem, the storied home of the Witch Trials.
Our first day in New England was spent exploring Cambridge. We stayed near the Longfellow bridge to Boston, in a quiet area next to MIT. The first morning we wandered along Main Street and Massachusetts Ave, checking out the options for a delicious breakfast. While 1369 Coffee House and Craigie on Main looked promising, we ended up at an incredible bakery next to the Harvard campus called Tatte Bakery. We later learned Tatte is a local chain, with a wide fan base. It's a beautifully designed spot, with white wood panelling, large family-style shared tables and old school touches such as vintage food weights, black and white tiled floors, and clocks reminding you of all the day you have left to explore. The delicious menu is full of breakfast sandwiches and shakshuka, as well as healthier options such as muesli or quiches. However, be warned, a display of freshly baked treats sits piled high to tempt you at the counter. It had been a while since I'd had such a relaxing and languid breakfast - good conversation, good coffee, good croissants, and a gentle ease into the day. It felt very European.
After breakfast we grabbed another coffee from Crema Cafe before taking a wander around the neighbourhood, orienting ourselves and getting a sense of the hub, when we stumbled across a student-led tour in Harvard Square. It was definitely an excellent decision to join the tour. The tickets were $12 but granted you access to a wealth of fascinating stories, myths and rumours about the history of the prestigious school.
The tour took us around Harvard Yard where we learned that the building with the most expensive square footage was the guardhouse at the front gates. Maybe a meter long and a meter wide, the building cost over fifty grand per square foot by the time all was said and done because of the number of times Harvard had to submit blueprints to the town of Cambridge before it was finally approved. From Harvard Yard, we wandered over to the north end of campus towards some of the newer buildings. We saw the Science building, donated by the Polaroid family and build to resemble the classic Polaroid camera.
However, the most interesting building on campus was definitely the Harry Elkins Widener Library. Built in honour of a student who had fallen in love with books and knowledge during his time at Harvard, the story goes that Widener went on a grand European tour after graduation in pursuit of rare books to add to his collection. Find them he did, and in his excitement to get them back to the States to publicly display, he made the fated decision to take the fastest form of transportation available at the time… the Titanic. While Widener's family was very wealthy and he stayed in the first class cabins, granting him access to a lifeboat when the ship began to sink, he realized he had left his books onboard and rushed off the lifeboat to save them (very Kate Winslet of him). While Harry went down with the vessel and his books, his mother lived on to donate millions of dollars to Harvard University to build the library in his honour.
However, her donation came with three stipulations: first, the facade of the building could never be changed. Harvard has kept this promise, building underground and outwards for five stories. Second, a replica of Harry's reading room at home must be built inside the library, with no one allowed to enter except for the person delivering fresh flowers every single day. And thirdly, because Harry's mother believed he would have survived if he knew how to swim, every Harvard student was stipulated to pass a swim test before they could graduate, until it was deemed unconstitutional by the American Disabilities Act. If Harvard ever broke one of the stipulations, the library would pass from the hands of the school to the city of Cambridge. What I loved about Harvard is that you just knew that most buildings on campus had just as fascinating a story behind them, if only there was time on our tour to hear them all!
Later that afternoon, after wandering the rest of campus and hearing a great story about Conan O'Brien's shenanigans at Harvard, we wandered up through the law school campus (What? Like it's hard?) and over to the Cambridge Common. It was the most perfect sunny fall day in Cambridge and it was such a treat to get to sit, relax and enjoy it.
For lunch we tried to get into Hokkaido Santouka Ramen but it was crazy busy so ended up a little further south at Cafe Sushi. It was a lovely little modern sushi shop with fantastically fresh fish. The afternoon we spent relaxing on one of the bridges watching the big Head of the Charles rowing regatta. It all felt very New England, with everyone in their Brooks Brothers and Patagonia sweaters, walking their gorgeous Irish setters along the river. I had never watched rowing before but it was interesting to learn about the sport - I especially loved the coxswain and their hilarious voiceovers as they coached their rowers.
Later that evening, we decided to head into the city and check out Tremont Street in the South End. Tremont is a main boulevard in Boston - a reference to the history of Boston’s “trimountaine” - a hill that originally had three peaks, of which Beacon Hill is the only remaining. These days, it is a lively foodie neighbourhood with lots of great restaurants and bars. We checked out a couple spots that had been recommended to us (Barcelona Wine Bar, B&G Oysters, the Butcher Shop, and Metropolis) which were all fully booked, before landing at a great Indian restaurant called Mela. Our eyes were much larger than our stomachs that evening when we ordered the dinner for two. Truly I can’t believe we got such an absurd amount of food for $50. Samosas, three types of grilled chicken, mulligatawny soup, shrimp vindaloo, butter chicken, naan and dessert (which we had to politely decline on account of our extreme overestimation of our stomach capacities). That evening I don't even think I slept, I just went into a catatonic food coma.
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The start of day two was a slightly rainy Sunday but we decided to head into the city for breakfast at a popular Back Bay spot called the Thinking Cup. I can imagine this as my go-to spot to start the day if I lived in Boston, reading the newspaper, catching up on emails, or for breakfast meetings near work. It would be quite lovely in the summer too, with a little patio outside on the popular shopping street, Newbury. After breakfast we wandered around the Back Bay neighbourhood, stopping at Trinity Church in Copely Square before heading over towards Beacon Hill by way of the Boston Public Gardens and up towards the famous Acorn Street. Acorn Street is known as one of the most photographed streets in America, on account of its original cobblestone paved road. The Beacon Hill neighbourhood itself has a long, interesting history in Boston - originally nicknamed Mount Whoredom by British soldiers before the eponymous establishments disappeared. Today it is a beautiful area to explore, with little shops and restaurants and some of the most gorgeous colonial redbrick row houses. Tons of writers and poets were previous residents including Louisa May Alcott, Robert Frost, and Sylvia Plath.
After an afternoon spent back in Cambridge watching rowing and eating lobster rolls, we hopped back over to Boston to continue exploring some of the sights that had been closed in the morning. Boston Public Library is one of the most stunning pieces of architecture I’ve seen in North America, we even saw a spontaneous wedding in the gardens! There is an insanely ornate marble entryway and a gorgeous study hall filled with green study lamps and a cavernous, echoing ceiling. It’s also a great place to check out if you are interested in the artwork of famed honorary Bostonian, John Singer Sargent. Generally considered the leading portrait painter of the 20th century, Sargent never lived in Boston though many of his most famed patrons did and now many of his greatest works reside there too. For a free peak at some of his work, check out the ceiling frescos at the library.
From the BPL we grabbed a subway over to Little Italy to check out the tourist hotspot markets and the picturesque waterfront. First stop was Boston Public Market which hosts a ton of local artisans and food vendors. I love a good local market and found this one to be a great spot for small gifts if you had foodie friends or family. I would compare it to NYC’s Chelsea Market perhaps, in terms of wares and options. Compared to Quincy Market it definitely offers a bit more of a global selection, from ramen to pasta to Jewish cuisine. Quincy on the other hand is also a fabulous market for anyone looking for a grab and go lunch. It also caters to a few Boston specials such as clam chowder, Boston cream pie, lobster rolls and a huge variety of seafoods.
Dinner that night was at a fabulous speakeasy type restaurant called the Beehive. We shared oysters which were the best I’ve ever had, baby back ribs, bacon wrapped shrimp with a peach barbecue sauce and Vietnamese slaw, and the Beehive salad with fingerling potatoes, piquillos, olives, chickpeas and tomatoes. It was a great vibe, with my absinthe cocktail and the blues band lending themselves to a feeling of being transported back to the dry days of Prohibition America.
The last day in Boston I really wanted to check out two spots: Brattle Book Shop and the Isabella Stewart Gardiner Museum. First stop was Brattle and it did not disappoint. It’s an amazing shop where you can browse century-old books and manuscripts. It has been the conduit between rare books and book lovers since 1825 and has seen signed first editions of The Great Gatsby pass through the doors, as well as JD Salinger himself. Outside there are racks of books on sale for between $1 and $5 dollars. I would recommend you set aside at least an hour to browse this incredible shop of treasures.
Next stop on my tour, I headed over to the Fenway-Kenmore neighbourhood to check out the Isabella Stewart Gardiner Museum. The ISG is one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen and is definitely tied for first with the Musee D’Orsay for my favourite museum. Besides the aesthetic, ISG also has an awesome backstory of an unsolved arts heist in the 1990s when over $500 million dollars worth of art was stolen, including a Vermeer and a Rembrandt. However, there are still tons of amazing art to admire including multiple John Singer Sargent pieces, Titian’s The Rape of Europa, and other works by Rembrandt, Botticelli, Raphael, Michelangelo, Manet, and Degas.
Overall, I would say Boston is a fabulous destination for many different types of travellers - the sports fans, the foodie, the culture snob, or the historian. Although it is not cheap, a weekend trip is definitely affordable and you don’t need a ton of time to see all the major sights of the city. One regret is not being able to make it out to Salem, but I’d love to come back and visit again some day, perhaps in the summer when I could make a pit stop at Cape Cod as well.
