Boston is known for a lot of things. It’s known for being a central part of early American History. It’s known for having some of the most legendary university names known to man. It’s known for historical architecture, food and drink, and walkable streets.
Over the next two days, I’d discover why Boston was known for all of these things and more; it’s one of the most legendary city names in America, and it has that kind of title for good reason. Today we’d get to see all of the attractions that Boston was known for, including the colleges, the Boston Common, and the city’s harbor. We only had one full day in the city, but I think we did a pretty good job at making it count.
My action-packed day in Boston started with me waking up and having breakfast outside of my hotel to the same, mediocre view of Boston’s suburbs.
After a pretty quiet breakfast, it was time to really start exploring Boston. At first I thought we’d travel through the city by car since we already had a rental, but it turned out that’s not what we were going to do. It turned out that just across our hotel was actually a local bus stop that served the area, and we could simply hop on that bus, pay a few dollars, and we’d be in Harvard ten minutes later.
The local bus stop was just across the road from our hotel, so we waited there. In the meantime, I took a few more pictures of the surrounding buildings.
There was a really unique Colonial Architecture in the suburbs that I don’t come across as often living in California; in particular, I noticed the houses look way more symmetrical than the ones that come across in my neighborhood. It definitely shows some diversity in America; we often think of the suburban US as just one monotonous thing that’s all the same, but as someone who’s seen both sides of the US and their suburbs, I can definitely say that they are far from the same thing.
The wait for the bus was pretty short; it wasn’t more than twenty minutes. And the payment for the bus was also relatively smooth. It had this really interesting design of its interior, where it was divided into a front and back side; the front half of the bus was elevated a few feet lower than the top half, and there was a small staircase connecting the two sides.
The bus ride lasted about fifteen minutes or so. Now, the main part of it that really would stick in my head was the fact that we got to see all the ins and outs of a new city. I’d never been to New England before, let alone the city of Boston, so the vibes of this place were all completely unfamiliar to me. But it was really interesting to see this place; once again, the Cambridge suburbs and their unique style that I would never get a taste of when I was in California…
One of the best views, probably the best view of that whole trip across Cambridge, was the several seconds where our bus drove on a bridge directly over the Charles River.
About ten minutes later, we arrived. And oh boy, this town really had this super unique style… this unique vibe to it that I’d never really seen anywhere else.
But we weren’t in Harvard, not just yet, anyway.
There was still quite a bit for us to see before we reached Harvard. It turns out we were actually landed inside of this really nice area just outside of the Harvard campus itself, which was just a short walk away. As we walked down the street towards the Harvard campus, I began to notice Harvard’s signature architecture slowly coming into play; most things here were made of bricks. There were bricks on the ground, bricks that made up the buildings, just about everywhere that could be made up by bricks. Despite the really old-timey feel, I could still clearly see that sort of hybrid-style cross between the old, colonial Boston and the modern metropolis building we know today.
The streets looked very modern and well-paved. Just like any other American city, there were street lights, speed limit signs, these modern, white looking buses, garages and of course, crowded streets filled with cars. It was very interesting to be able to see this sort of blend between our own world and that of the past; after walking towards Harvard for another ten minutes, that was definitely the vibe I was picking up from this place.
Once we entered the real campus, the scene changed from half-Harvard into full-Harvard. All of the city streets and honking cars disappeared, leaving only a maze of walkable pathways to get through the campus. I also could see that there was a lot more vegetation on the campus; everywhere I looked, if it wasn’t old, red-brick buildings, it was usually made up of trees. I was pretty eager to explore more of the campus and see more of these red-brick buildings. I ended up losing sight of my parents a few times because I kept running off; the campus was huge and filled with many unique buildings. The entire campus was just a whole bunch of walkways between these patches of green grass (way greener than California where I’m from), trees that reached almost as high as the buildings, and a lot of old-timey-looking but incredibly massive facilities. These are probably some of the best things I’ve ever put on my camera roll.
Not sure what I was thinking at the time, but I also got this really random timelapse of the crowds at Harvard, mostly tourists coming to admire all of the red-brick buildings like I had. We spent a lot of time just wandering around the campus, surveying each building after another, only stopping occasionally to take a few quick water breaks.
The last thing we saw on our glorious tour of Harvard a quick look at the front gate of the campus as well as the streets surrounding it; the “wall” that made up the surroundings of the campus definitely established a kind of contrast between the outside modern world and the more old inside of Harvard. I would definitely say overall that the campus scene was one of the most interesting I’d ever encountered in my life, probably the most interesting design for a campus simply due to the old architecture. I’m not completely used to living in a place styled like this, but it certainly seemed like something that would be fun. (College apps for me are in a year. See you soon.)
Rating for Experience #6, Harvard University, A-
And why stop at Harvard when we were on the topic of college tours? Not too far away was the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, better known as MIT. Only a short metro ride away, Casey and I soon found ourselves headed towards Boston’s other very important university, also expecting to see some really interesting architecture, and a unique vibe that was similar to Harvard’s.
When we emerged from the Metro Station, there was no denying that there really was a very different and unique vibe. The entire place was definitely unique in the sense that it had a lot of very irregular-looking buildings. They all looked definitely modern; no surprise there, given that the place’s name had the word technology in it, but it wasn’t just some cool skyscrapers. They were literally shaped irregularly; some of the buildings looked like giant boxes of metal stacked on top of other. Interesting pieces of artwork were scattered throughout the campus.
Anyways, at this point my grandma was starting to get a little tired after about an hour of having to walk around Boston, so she decided to take a seat and admire the view with her sister while me, Casey, my dad, and my mom continued to look around the campus, finding some very odd pieces of art:
So what is my rating for MIT? And more importantly, did I like exploring the place more than Harvard? Well, I’d say both of the campuses did a very good job of creating this unique kind of style in their buildings that they kept very consistent. In general, they were both very memorable and had several key points and views that are quite difficult to forget.
In general, both campuses did an extremely good job at establishing their own vibe, so I guess in terms of rating here, it comes down to my own opinion (Feel free to comment which campus’s vibe you liked more).
Overall, I’d have to give this a…
Rating for Experience #7, MIT, B+
To all the MIT fans reading: this is just my own opinion on things, and I certainly liked the architecture of MIT, but the historical aspect of Harvard just really blew me away, especially when it came to seeing it in person.
So what’s next on our tour of Boston? Well, we decided that the next place we needed to visit was Boston Common, and oh boy. I had really underestimated this one. I was expecting something decently sized, but I never realized how incredibly massive this thing would be in person.
Getting there was a trip on a subway that took us partway across Boston, all the way to where the Common was.
As we traveled, I also got some decent views of the Charles River. As we pulled into the subway station, I found this really interesting mosaic on the walls that gave me some interesting discoveries that I had never even considered beforehand.
So, a nice revelation about Boston: it’s the home of America’s first-ever subway, which opened in 1897 and helped transport people across the city of Boston. Previous to this, the only subway that I can recall ever going on up to this point was the Tokyo Metro. They were definitely both good experiences: the Tokyo Metro and Boston Metro were both extremely clean, in my opinion. The Tokyo Metro was definitely a lot larger and more complex, but the Boston one certainly wasn’t lagging behind it; many parts of the city, from Cambridge to Chinatown, all had their own stops within the Metro. In a way, this kind of felt like being in Tokyo all over again.
Well, now to take a look at the actual Boston Common itself. The first thing I learned as soon as I emerged from that stop on the metro line: don’t underestimate how incredibly huge the Boston Common is. I mean, I thought it was going to be pretty big, but it was way larger than I had imagined. It was just green grass (which again, is much greener than California) and trees for as far as the eye could see.
And it wasn’t all just Boston’s greenery either. There was a very clear contrast between the green of the park and the skyscrapers that I’d already seen in Boston beforehand. And on top of all that, the Boston Common still had far more to offer than just a couple trees and a large patch of grass. Every few hundred steps on the path, you’d run into something interesting within the park; there were vendors of people selling food and other souvenirs to visitors. There were intricately designed water fountains filled with coins. There were strange pieces of 3-Dimensional artwork. There was a large pool of water that was filled with children playing in it.
We spent the next hour just exploring all of the different monuments that this park had to offer. Each one of these could be an attraction on their own, and this Boston Common Park had all of them in one place. As we sped from one monument to the next, I snapped as many pictures as my phone would allow. Here’s some of the ones that I managed to catch on camera.
By the time we had finished exploring Boston Common, it was already 1 in the afternoon. My grandma and her sister, who had both run out of energy a while ago, suggested that now was a good time for us to start looking for a restaurant to get lunch at. Most of our family was very eager to head to Chinatown for lunch, since it was only a ten minute walk away. After some deliberation, it was concluded that we should head to a Ramen place 15 minutes away, called Tora Ramen.
In the meantime, here are my final thoughts on the Boston Common: The place was definitely one of the best parks in America for good reason. The nice paths and views with the surrounding city made it already a great park to begin with, but adding a little pool, plenty of places to sit and have a picnic, and the several architectural masterpieces definitely brought it to a very high level.
Rating for Experience #8, Boston Common, A
We walked through the city of Boston again through the Chinatown area and it was only at this time that it started to occur to me how old-timey the city of Boston really did feel. When I first came, all I saw were large skyscrapers and was associating it more with the skyscrapers of New York than a colonial Boston City. It took me a second glance to realize that the older architecture I was expecting really was present.
There actually were a lot of older brick buildings in the area; some buildings looked modern, but many actually looked really old as well. And upcoming in part 3, we’d see some even more old and colonial-style communities in the Boston area that really came to my mind whenever I thought of Boston.
As for the ramen that we had for lunch, well, it was pretty good. The portions that we were given had decent size and a very rich taste. As for the restaurant itself, it wasn’t too spacious, but we ended up taking these seats which gave our family perfect view of one of Boston’s many city streets, allowing us to watch crowds of Boston residents cross the street and go about their daily business as we devoured our ramen bowls. While the ramen didn’t 100% stand out in my mind, the experience of watching the crowds certainly did.
Rating for Experience #9, Tora Ramen, B+
After lunch, however, our exploration of Boston had to come to a brief pause. While I had gotten all of my work out of the way over the summer, Casey still had a Cyber Meeting at school that he needed to attend in a few hours. I did ask to see if I could get a chance at walking around the area near our hotel, but ultimately was turned down by my parents. Honestly, it wasn’t too big of a disappointment since we were kind of in a suburb with nothing interesting.
Let’s flash forward a bit to the night time, where we continued our exploration of Boston:
A few hours later, we were heading out of our hotel back to the center of Boston to get some dinner. Boston’s center had plenty of food options and my parents had been looking for the past several hours to see if they could find any potential resteraunts for later, but the New Englander Resteraunts that they wanted to visit the most were all either closed or required reservations in advance that we did not have time for. During the twenty minute drive to Boston’s city center, we continued to search for an option, and we ended up choosing to walk to a place called “Provisions” to try out their food, which had a vast array of choices for New Englander Cuisine.
We entered a parking lot a short distance from the Provisions Resteraunt and began to walk along the wharf; there was a crystal clear view of the city’s piers, the yachts, and the airport across the river. I also took some pictures of the towering skyscrapers, which glowed eloquently now that the night had fallen. The pictures that I got from this photography spree would be some of the best on the whole trip.
Well, just having all those amazing views and keeping the city bright even after night had fallen certainly earned this place a very high rating; while I don’t think I can give it a rating that would be completely groundbreaking, it definitely deserves a high score.
Rating for Experience #10, North End, A-
And then was the actual restaurant, which was called Provisions. The place had a very luxurious style and was very dimly lit, as well as a very good variety for food selection. To anyone who’s reading this with plans to travel to Boston, this is the restaurant’s menu at the time of our visit:
There were so many options, each as appealing as the last. Even Casey, who usually has nothing on his mind for anything other than fried chicken was eagerly looking through the menu, trying to decide what he wanted to sample. In the end, we chose to get a sandwich with shrimp inside of it, which is called shrimp rolls. On top of that, we got a side of fries and a lot of lettuce, as well as a side of clam chowder.
I initially wasn’t going to give this thing too high of a score, but the whole trip definitely gave me a great taste into New Englander Cuisine. The food itself was really good; there were very new but great flavors that exploded across my mouth every time I bit into the shrimp roll. And for that reason, I’m giving this a…
Rating for Experience #11, Provisions, A
And with that, our only full day in Boston had come to an end. Our next day would include a bit more exploring across Boston, but we’d start driving up to Canada.