Boston Babymoon

Every spring Dan and I take a quick weekend trip to some city along the East Coast. Since we don't have a car or a lot of vacation time, we take a bus and spend around a day and a half to two days in the city. So far, it's worked out really well to get a quick trip at minimal cost.

In 2015 we went to Philadelphia
In 2016 we went to Washington D.C.

This year we decided to go to Boston. Dan had never been and I had gone once in high school with my family and then once a couple of years ago for a conference. We rolled this year's trip into our "babymoon" since we can't plan any extensive travel during the rest of the pregnancy. I think babymoons are supposed to be like a resort or a totally relaxing vacation. That's not really our style so we just did our own thing.

First off, we had a great time. But, we got skunked on the weather this weekend and were sort of shocked at how expensive Boston is compared to Philly and D.C. We stayed at an Airbnb in Cambridge since the hotels in the area were outrageous. And we ended up taking Ubers to get us to and from the city.

We left NYC at 9 am on Friday but didn't get to Boston until late afternoon due to heavy traffic in multiple areas and an unplanned stop to switch drivers. When we arrived we went immediately to the North End to get lunch because we were starving.

We tried Regina's pizza which was very yummy and different from NY pizza.

Then we went to Modern Pastry because I read that's where the locals go. We waited in line for a really long time to get a cream filled lobster tail and then headed to a park near the water to eat it. We got powdered sugar and cream filling everywhere but it was so yummy. We didn't go to Mike's because, although famous, they only have cannolis and Dan is not a chocolate fan and I wasn't about to eat a whole cannoli by myself.

This pet pig in the park was attracting SO much attention.

It was cold but the sun was out so we walked along the water anyways.

As a last minute decision we ended-up getting tickets for the last tour of the day at the Boston Tea Party Museum. It was a bit pricey and I wouldn't call it a "museum" but it still fun. They had actors give a tour of one of the recreated boats and explained the story of the tea party. You got to throw in a fake bushel of tea and then walk through some interactive exhibits. There was a great gift shop and a cute tea room as well. 

Afterwards we grabbed burgers and then headed to the Airbnb for the night.

On Saturday we walked the entire Freedom Trail and paid for a guided walking tour for the first part through Boston Commons, State House, Granary Burying Ground, Old State House, Site of the Boston Massacre, and others. Our tour guide was dressed as a Red Coat so he kept up his America shaming through the whole tour.

The tour ended at Faneuil Hall where we got our National Parks Passport stamps.

We picked-up an overpriced ornament for our souvenir in the area and shared a tiny overpriced (but delicious) hot buttered lobster roll for lunch at Quincy Market.

The sun never came out on Saturday and it was really chilly but the rain wasn't supposed to arrive until that evening so we made the most of it and guided ourselves through the rest of the Freedom Trail.

We paid to go inside Paul Revere's House (not worth it) and then headed to King's Chapel and then the long walk over to the USS Constitution. The Freedom Trail is only 2.5 miles long but it feels much longer because it winds around and is hilly in parts and over cobblestone streets. 2.5 miles is typically nothing for us but now that I'm pretty pregnant I get sore very fast and we had to take some sitting breaks along the way.

We explored the Navy Yard and the ships and then walked over to the Bunker Hill Memorial.

We took an Uber back into the city and got pricey tickets to the Aquarium. We didn't know how big it was so we budgeted about 3 hours to see it before an IMAX show nearby at 6 pm. We walked through the aquarium in about 45 minutes and had to kill a ton of time.

The Aquarium was cool but super crowded (probably due to how cold it was outside) and it didn't take us long to see everything we wanted to see so we stood around for an hour waiting for the IMAX show to start. The IMAX show as about the Galapagos Islands which we enjoyed (although we both fell asleep for a bit).

We grabbed dinner in the city before going back to the Airbnb and crashing early. The next morning we packed-up and got back on the bus to NYC.

We had a great time but were bummed by the weather and it seemed like we were able to do a lot more on our trips to DC and Philly without paying extra for everything. We left both Philly and DC with lists of things we didn't get to do and want to go back and visit. We didn't have a list for Boston although if we do go back we will definitely go closer to June to get better weather and have the chance to do some of the boat excursions.