Travels in my head: Massachusetts

So, I had this great idea to write about places I have travelled, starting with States in the US.

An idea so good, I did something very similar a year ago, and I forgot about.

Bugger.

So, shall we abandon this rehash now, or plough on regardless?

Yes, we shall plough on.

Massachusetts: The Baked Bean State (!).

Well, partly true.

Boston is known as Beantown as they have a really good recipe for tinned beans: Boston Beans.

But not to be confused with Boston Beans, a kind of candy.

Thus, ordering Boston Beans online from the UK can be tricky.

Massachusetts can be split into two parts: Boston and everywhere else.

I have been to both parts, so can vouch this is true. And Boston is now very nice as it is finished.

Finished in that The Big Dig has been completed, under budget and on time, I believe.

First time driving south out of Boston was very much like driving through a building site, which had stopped working due to running out of money. But its done now, and Boston is serence and peaceful once again.

I have visited Boston several times, with Jools and I staying there for a few nights in a very posh place indeed. I'm sure I wrote about it at the time.

Otherwise I have stayed in Rockport and on Cape Cod.

Rockport is very nice, even better now ias it is no longer "dry". I almost failed to notice being able to order a beer with lunch in the town when we went back a few years ago.

I had to book a last minute stay somewhere as plans had fallen through, so ended up in Rockport, at a nice motel, with fourposter beds and good pizza deliveries, I was to find out.

I drove up from Boston and arrived, checked in and went out for dinner. It was October, the post-season in baseball, and the Red Sox and Yankees were playing, and those in the bullpens were hitting each other.

This I remember, as after walking down the hill to the harbour, under boughs of golden leaves, with sweet woodsmoke in the air, I saw the warm lights of a chowder house on the pier, so I went in.

People from the kitchen rushed out shoting. I don't usually have that effect on people, but no, it was the fighting in the bullpen that had caused much excitement.

It seems that football (soccer) isn't the only sport that raises great passions from its players and fans.

I was to learn that the Red Sox and Yankees (the Evil Empire (BOO)) wre playing for the right to play more games, and the Yankees were doing very well as usual. As it happens, the Red Sox hadn't read the script, and came back from 3 games down to draw 3-3, meaning the series went to a seventh and deciding game, which I would still be in the US for, and if I wanted to watch at a bar and drink actual beer, I would have to go to another town, as Rockport was dry.

Fisherwives in the 19th century were so fed up with their husbands drinking the money from their voyages after landing the catch, they got all the bars closed down.

Seems fair.

Anyway, I had to get a taxi to take me to the next town, Gloucester, which I don't know how the locals pronounce it, but probably not Gloster like it should be. Unless it is.

Anyway, I said to the taxi driver, take me to the best sports bar in Gloucester, I think there was just one. So for an evening I yelled and high fived until the Yankees won after all.

But for those few days, Boston and surrounds had been fabulous places to be in as the Red Sox won game after game. People even painted their cars with the phrase "cowboy up", which I have no idea what it meant, but will Google it now.

Apparently it was a film:

"Two brothers, One is a bull rider, the other a rodeo bullfighter/stock contractor, clash over the love of barrel racer Celia Jones, while each comes into their own in their respective field in the rodeo world."

Who knew?

Anyway, other than to see the Red Sox lose, people go to Boston and Massachusetts in the Fall (autumn) to peeop at leaves.

On trees.

And as a photographer, I was happy to do this.

Not only that, driving around I once found myself on route 128, by the power line. But there wasn't a Stop n Shop, so I couldn't stop at the Stop n Shop. But it was the rigt area, as Jonathon Richman indeed came from Boston before he was a Roadrunning pop star.

So, back to Cowboy Up, one of the players sang Born in the USA whilst playing, or something. There was a video to watch explaining it all, but that's over 8 (eight) whole minutes long, so I didn't watch.

Another time, I stayed a week in Chatham on Cape Cod.

In December.

I mean, how cold can it be?

Answer: very cold.

I was going to spend Christmas in New Hamphire, so had some vacation to take, so thought a week on the Cape would be great. It was.

But did I mention it was cold?

I had layers of clothes, but layers for an English winter, not a New England one.

There was one time I walked from the motel to the only place to eat, a 15 minute walk, and I had to have two coffees and some soup before I could feel my face.

Thing is, the weather was cloudless and sunny, during the day, but at night with clear skies, the coldness of outser space came down and smothered Cape Cod.

It was cold on another level.

I did go to Provincetown on the end of The Cape, and it is a wonderful wooden fishing village now full of arty types, and is supposed to be the gay capital of the State. Not sure if that was true then or now, but was a nice place.

What I do remember is that at the end of the Cape, the land end, there is, or was, a large roundabout.

A roundal.

Just to confuse locals and other visiting Americans.

It was fun in winter, I can only imagine the crashes in summer.

Anyway, Cape Cod in winter has lots of spaces on the beach and rooms in motels, but few places to eat are open and you should take your big coat.

Boston is nice, it has a line to follow round its places of interest, The Freedom Trail, and well worth walking it, meaning you don't get lost.

Which is nice.

You can visit the shipyard, Paul Revere's House, an old cemetary, the pier, Little Italy, Charlestown, Bunker Hill and Boston Common where the Cheers bar is. And yet isn't.

I went in once and was served by a very rude barman.

I didn't tip as a result.

You don't have to go now.

And I think its moved from there now.

Or something.

Anyway, you should go there.

Drink some coffee.

Pick some cranberries.

Eat beans.

Boston Beans, of course.