Boston; Friday, 30 March, 2018

After a full American breakfast, I waddled out of the hotel and walked down a couple of blocks to the harbourside to pick up the hop-on-hop-off tour trolley. For some reason in Boston they didn’t want to run buses, instead they had what looked like converted trucks that were painted to look like old time trams, and didn’t hold that many people (I was glad I was doing this during an early Easter as I could imagine the trolleys must end up having quite long queues in the summer months.)

I did two full circuits of the route, one on each side, with different driver/guides and I learnt quite a bit about Boston and its history on the way round, as well as getting a good idea of the layout of the city from the circuitous and often overlapping route.

Back at the start pint for a second time I hopped off and as it was now fast approaching 3pm headed over to one of the harbour side restaurants for a very late lobster-based lunch.

After lunch I walked up through some of the historic market area of the city, through the Quincy Market and past the Faneuil Hall, which was sadly closed for renovations. I continued up to the Old State House. This was the former home of the governor and it was outside here that one of the first acts that kicked off the American War of Independence took place when, in March 1770, in confusion caused by someone shouting fire, British soldiers opened fire on Bostonians, killing a number in an act that came to be called the Boston Massacre.

Today the old state house is a museum dedicated to the story of the revolution, as well as the history of the city around that time – trying to put into context why some of the events that happened, happened.

I’d arrived in time to have a good look round the museum, but too late to join the last tour of the afternoon – but it did mean I had a lot of the museum almost to myself.

From the museum it was a short walk back to my hotel to freshen up before I headed out for dinner in the city centre and then, after a bit of a wander round the area near the current state house, back to the hotel to turn in.