A Cannoli Tour and an Audience with Sam Adams

Lydia is a genius and came up with an awesome cannoli crawl in Boston's little Italy: the North End.

The rideshare situation continued to be a bummer.

It's pretty clear when you are entering the North End because all the buildings get old and awesome.

We began our carbohydrate fiesta at Modern Pastry Shop.

There was a lot of pistachio going on with this one.

Mike's Pastry had a real deal line going on. I think we got luck at the previous place because we passed by later and it was crowded. It must be cannoli o'clock. Lydia and I have been taking Italian lessons on and off, and thought we were very cool knowing that cannoli is the plural and so were ordering a cannolo at the counter.

I believe this was lemon. I seem to have failed and not written the flavors down. Now I have to go back and taste them all over again!

Bova's Bakery was off the main strip and so was much quieter. I had a nice long conversation with the guy behind the counter.

This guy was cappuccino flavored. The North End is the oldest part of the city. People have lived here since the 1630s. 

I now had enough sugar in my blood to make rock candy so we walked it off on the famed Freedom Trail. Wikipedia: "The Freedom Trail is a 2.5-mile-long (4.0 km) path through Boston, Massachusetts, that passes by 16 locations significant to the history of the United States." Boom. We started the trail not at the beginning or the end but wherever the hell we wanted: the Old North Church where Paul Revere warned that the British were coming. I think it was just the closest place to our last cannolo. Anyway you follow follow follow the red brick road and learn stuff along the way.

The video game Fallout 4 came out in 2015 and is set in a post-apocalyptic Boston. Having never been to Boston this formed a large part of my mental image of the city. Well there was also a post-apocalyptic Freedom Trail so it was funny to think about how similar the virtual one was to the one I was now strolling along in real life. In the game there were a lot of mutants to kill and dead bodies to loot so luckily this was a lot more calm.

Pew pew pew

Copp's Hill Burying Ground is a historic cemetery full of historically dead people. A nearby sign said "Before 1830, burying ground sextons or keepers were often found to have sold burial plots and tombs multiple times. Bereaved families were horrified to find their loved one's bones tossed onto the ground to make way for a higher paying customer!"

John Marston was a Boston Tea Party participant.

Follow follow follow follow

"In 1852, Boston took a major technological step forward. It became the first city in the world to use the telegraph as part of a municipal fire alarm warning system. Fire alarm boxes, placed on street corners, promised to electronically send alert messages to officials far quicker than the old method of, well, yelling. Boston paved the way for towns and cities across America to begin using the fire alarm boxes, putting the Hub at the forefront of innovation.

Now, 162 years later, Boston still relies on 3,462 telegraph-based alarms to alert the fire department. In an age of cell phones and satellites, the telegraph lives on in these red relics."

The Massachusetts State House

Visiting the Granary Burying Ground was really like gaining exclusive access to the hottest club for dead revolutionaries. This one is Sam Adams.

Paul Revere

I just thought this one looked cool with the grim reapers hanging out with the hourglass. John Hancock is around here somewhere as are nine Massachusetts governors, three signers of the Declaration of Independence, and the victims of the Boston Massacre.

The obelisk there in the center reads "Franklin" and is home to Benjamin's parents and other family members. The man himself was born in Boston but buried in Philadelphia.

Lydia was particularly excited about having a Sam Adams beer across the street from Sam Adams' grave, and who could say no to this face?

Samuel Adams pretty much owns this town it seems.

Union Oyster House opened to diners in 1826 and is the oldest continuously operating restaurant in the nation. 

Lobstah

There was a cool oyster bar area where a guy was standing and murdering sea creatures at a pace that made me wonder what they had ever done to him.

I got real touristy with it at this place which I think was to be expected. Clam chowdahed it.

I don't think that this is what I had intended to get but their menu was abridged due to covid. So when it doubt, eat a lobster roll, I say.

I just spent $6.50 on Boston baked beans.