I’ll be honest— the night before I thought we were completely done with Boston; we’d seen the Boston Common, two of its most prestigious universities (Harvard and MIT, both of which are globally renowned), and the frighteningly vast skyline that towered over the New England coast. Turns out that before we left to head to Montreal, there was one more stop in Boston that we would travel to first. And this place would be one of the most memorable visits of the entire trip.
And that was only the beginning of everything we’d see on this day. Today was the day the “Canada” part of “CANEDA” would jump into play; we’d finally be crossing over the American border to Canada! Firstly, though, we had a super long five-hour journey through the two states of New Hampshire and Vermont towards the Canadian Border and to the city of Montreal, where we would be in exactly one night. This was going to be one of the longest and most fun days of my life. For the past few days, everyone in our family had been looking around for different landmarks and places to visit during our road trip to the city of Montreal, and we’d come up with quite a few places. A lot of people like to slander that there isn’t much to do in New Hampshire and Vermont. While it’s true that you won’t find any crazy cities like Boston, New York, or Montreal, it can’t be concluded that New Hampshire and Vermont are boring states. They definitely have quite a lot packed into them, and I was about to see that for myself.
And finally, after driving for hours through New England, we would end our journey that night in the city of Montreal, Canada, marking the first day of over a week that we would spend in the country. There was a lot to look forward to, from vast enclosures of exotic wildlife to huge, memorable skylines with buildings that reached the clouds. But first would come New England, the countryside of which was very interesting to gaze at outside of the car window.
I woke up late in the morning at our hotel in Boston, and once again, the really terrible views offered by our hotel. But it wouldn’t be terrible views for long, because after breakfast and packing up all our things in the morning, it was time to start one of the best one-day road trips that America has to offer. As we started to drive through the suburbs outside of Boston, I decided to make one last suggestion for a place we could visit inside the city before we left to go to Canada. And this was a place associated with one of the most important things that Boston is known for: History.
Many famous battles of the American Revolution took place in the general Boston area; most notably, there were the Battles of Lexington and Concord in 1775 (considered the first battles of the war) and the Battle of Bunker Hill, which was also fought in 1775. The Battle of Bunker Hill was fought in a part of the city called Charlestown. Today, a large monument (often referred to as an obelisk) stands dedicated to the battle. It’s sort of like a Boston equivalent of the Washington Monument in DC. And while it’s nowhere near as epic and grand as the one you’ll find in DC, the historical context of the battle intrigued me, and I thought it was worth checking out. My parents were initially a bit skeptical of visiting since we’d already left at eleven o’clock and Montreal was a six-hour drive away. Their attitudes changed when I pointed out that the Bunker Hill Obelisk wasn’t too out of the way from the route we planned to take, and they agreed to take a stop in Charlestown to get a quick look at the monument.
Everyone agreed afterwards that taking a quick detour to Charlestown was probably one of the best decisions we’d ever made while on a trip, and it was for good reason.
Before we even arrived at the obelisk, we could already see that coming here was a good decision. As soon as we pulled off the highway and into Charlestown, we quickly saw something very unique about this place.
The entire town surrounding the obelisk (Charlestown) had one of the most unique vibes to it that I’d ever seen in a town; it was the most traditional thing I’d seen in the trip so far. Every single road in the area was surrounded by red brick buildings with an architecture that looked like it could’ve been from the Puritan Era. The cars felt to me almost like they didn’t even really belong there, like instead of modern roads there should just be a bunch of dirt paths and people riding on horse wagons to get around. It was even more interesting, in my opinion, than our quick visit to Harvard just the day before. And historic Boston is a patriotic American city; I quickly realized that the American part of Patriotic Boston was very much alive and well. Just about everywhere you went in Charlestown, American flags were hanging from homes and street lamps and flowers with the colors red, white, and blue. There was a lot of pride in identity in Charlestown; not only in American identity, in fact, but also in New Englander identity. I saw the New Englander Flag (which looks really good, I encourage you to look it up and set it as your wallpaper) hanging from the roofs of several of the houses in Charlestown.
But obviously, the largest attraction was the Bunker Hill obelisk itself. Okay, granted, it wasn’t nearly as tall or as epic as the Washington Monument, but it was impressively big. I didn’t realize how huge it was going to be until I actually visited the monument myself. This is one of those things out there that you won’t believe until you see; this whole town area is definitely worth a visit. Surrounding the main obelisk was a small, grassy park with some decent natural features. Locals were walking their dogs around the park and town, as if it were a daily routine, soaking in the views just like I was. The pictures I took in just this one hour ended up being some of my favorite in the entire trip:
Casey and I continued to take picture after picture as we ran around the park. My parents continued walking around, reading some of the history on the signs and statues surrounding the obelisk which included some pretty legendary figures from the revolution; the most famous of which was a guy named Prescott. He’s the guy who led the US Army during the Battle of Bunker Hill. Once I had finished taking this whole gallery my parents decided that they wanted some coffee before we started the journey up to Canada and gathered everyone else; we began walking down the street through Charlestown, where I continued to take pictures of the traditional-looking streets as we headed to a local Starbucks. There, my grandparents and Casey were able to take some time to catch their breath and use their phones (that one just applied to Casey, who had spent most of his downtime trying to beat Theory of Everything 2 on Geometry Dash. At the time I’m writing this, he just beat Deadlocked for the first time. He’s getting pretty good.)
My dad and I, meanwhile, went back to our rental car, which we left up at the Obelisk. This gave me another good look at Charlestown’s unique old-time vibe, in which I was less focused on pictures and just enjoying the one-of-a-kind scene.
But with our final destination in Boston finally explored, it was time to begin our road trip up to Canada. I think you can guess the grade I’m gonna give Charlestown:
Rating for Experience #12, Charlestown, A
Charlestown was definitely one of my favorite experiences of the entire trip; while it wasn’t the tallest or weirdest building I’d ever seen in my travels, it definitely had a vibe to it that you won’t find anywhere else. You can really see the pride in a New Englander identity just by walking around here; strolling through Charlestown feels a lot like time-traveling to Boston just before the Revolution. If you ever visit Boston, a trip to Charlestown is a definite must.
But that’s only the first stop; we were still in Boston now, but it was now time to begin driving North. By the end of that day, we would be in Montreal, Canada, one of the largest metropolises in America. At around midday, we all left Charleston and headed up on the highway, away from the first city of the trip, Boston, and towards the next.
But it wasn’t just going to be a long, monotonous five-hour drive. That wasn’t going to be interesting at all. Several stops were waiting for us along the way, and it wouldn’t be long before we were out of the car again, taking pictures of the scenery around us. I already had several plans for places to check out on the way to Boston, the first of which was up in New Hampshire. The countryside for the first hour of the drive wasn’t the most interesting thing I’d seen in my life; there was lots of green vegetation and some small towns, but it wasn’t as interesting as it was in Japan; it was just the boring green forest for miles. We passed by dozens of towns throughout Massachusetts and Southern New Hampshire; Andover, Windham, and, unfortunately, there was one named Derry. (and we’re in New England right now, geez!)
But the next real stop of the trip, as it turned out, would be Concord, the state capital of New Hampshire. When we pulled in, we realized it was a pretty small city; it doesn’t even have 100,000 people, it’s not the skyscraper insanity that was Boston or (soon to be) Montreal. But it did have some significant structures; as soon as we pulled off the highway, I could already see the start of a golden dome just a few miles away.
That was our next stop; to get to Canada, we’d have to drive through the state capitals of both Vermont and New Hampshire, and I wasn’t gonna let the opportunity to explore the two states go to waste completely. The state capital buildings for both cities were exactly on the way to Montreal, which meant we’d visit two state capital buildings today. The New Hampshire state capital had a pretty large and grand building; the golden dome was absolutely magnificent, and the architecture was kind of reminiscent of something old in Europe; for all I knew, the picture of this place could’ve just been some fancy government building on the continent of Europe. The only things on the outside of the building that would’ve actually given you a hint that this place was American were the American flag and the statue of Daniel Webster at the front of the building.
Something else that also seemed weird was that the capital building, supposedly the government building for thousands of people, seemed pretty eerily empty. Surely there would’ve been huge crowds walking around in the park outside the government building, right? Hundreds of people are going about their daily business, just like in the Boston Common or at Charlestown. Well, it was quite surprising to find that there were a pretty small number of people walking around at the front of the government building when we visited. Other than a couple of people walking their dogs through the park, the streets were remarkably quiet; it was almost as if the city were partially abandoned.
And the place didn’t just have that one capital building, either. As my mom walked around the building to try and check out the surrounding part of the city, we realized that there were actually several more, maybe five or six large and important buildings, each with their own vast architecture. There was a state treasury, a state library, an auditorium… Concord might not have too many people, but it was certainly an impressive city.
We drove around the city of Concord a little more, surveying the streets. Charlestown was a little historic district in the middle of a vast metropolis, and Concord was similar. It was also a little historic town, but instead it was in the middle of a seemingly endless New England forest. That’s definitely something that made it stand out from the city of Charlestown.
And for that reason, this place’s rating is:
Rating for Experience #13, Concord City Tour, A
We decided to get lunch while we were in Concord, and my parents ended up picking an Asian, Thai place while they were in Concord (read the Thailand Trip on my blog if you haven’t, Phuket and Bangkok!) The place we chose is called Asian Thai Kitchen; I ended up ordering this dish. Here’s the rest of the menu if you want to try.
Eating Asian food in the middle of a city that screamed “rural New England” to me was a pretty weird experience, but it was definitely good. In a way, the city definitely felt a lot like it was a return to Asia. The place was decorated with plants, pictures of Hindu gods, and was full of all of the native seasoning that I would enjoy as an Asian. I’ve always thought of New England as a place mostly populated by white people and having minimal Asians. Concord, as it turns out, has a growing Asian population that currently comprises around 4% of the population. This really showed the global diversity of the world; this is not the first place that comes to mind when I think about Asian food outside of Asia, but there was a Thai place here anyway.
While the food itself was pretty tasty, there was nothing about it that made me scream “exceptional” compared to the other restaurants. The most memorable thing about it, I’d say, is that this place even exists at all, especially somewhere rural in the Northeast US.
Rating for Experience #14, Asian Thai Kitchen, B-
With our two-hour stop in Concord, New Hampshire, coming to a close, everyone agreed we really needed to start driving North immediately. Montreal was still four hours away, and it was already almost 3 p.m (we sort of lost track of time). We’d promised our relative waiting for us in Ottawa that we would arrive sooner, at around 4 or 5, but a promise like that was looking less and less plausible, especially when Casey and I kept on asking to stop to admire some building every half hour. We decided to keep driving from Concord and not take any stops for a while, which I ended up being okay with because there wasn’t too much else in New Hampshire that I really wanted to see.
The New England countryside came and went. The city of Concord passed behind us, and we were once again in the rural area, which constantly felt more and more like the wilderness. For some time, things got really, really quiet. Everyone in the car did their own thing for a while. My dad drove us through town after town, and my mom continued to check things on her phone, occasionally commenting on how we were way behind schedule and were supposed to be in Montreal in just a couple of hours. I spammed pictures of the lush, green forest outside, marveling at the color of the place. This was much, much better than the crappy bush mountains that I always had to deal with when traveling through the countryside of Southern California. Casey continued to focus on Geometry Dash, furiously tapping the screen with a focus that he only reserved for video games. My grandparents, who had asked to be in the back, spent part of their time looking at the scenery and the other part of the time taking naps. I was honestly pretty impressed with how much they could sleep for so many hours, especially when there was the excitement of travel all around us to get to.
I definitely had my share of sleep on the car journey. About twenty minutes after we left Concord, I dozed off for about half an hour. When I came to a bit later, I expected we’d probably be in Vermont by now, but upon checking the map, I realized that we were still in New Hampshire. We were passing by a city called Lebanon and were pretty close to the border between Vermont and New Hampshire. The mountains surrounding the highway that we were driving on had gotten much more vast.
We soon approached a pretty large river, which immediately prompted me to take this amazing picture.
And when we reached the other side, I took this:
And that’s it. After about two hours of driving from Boston, we had finally arrived in the wonderful and very green state of Vermont. At this point, I was pretty sure I’d seen the last of New Hampshire and that the next two hours ahead of us were full of green mountains (Vermont is known as the Green Mountain State) and eventually, the few stops we’d make in Vermont that I was looking forward to. But that wouldn’t be the end of New Hampshire for our trip… at least not yet.