Tuesday, November 1, 2011

New England Vacation Day 1

About two weeks ago we finally made our long anticipated fall trip we had been planning since last year to visit Jake's Aunt Sally who lives in Boston, Massachusetts. We had an amazing trip, such a great trip that really rejuvenated both of us and was so good getting to spend some good time with family. These next few posts will be ALL about our vacation, there will be lots of pictures, if you go through picture overload blame it on me haha! But trust the pictures DO NOT even do it justice with how much fun we had, how much we got to see, and especially how completely GORGEOUS everything is up there!

So Jake & I left Katy Monday late afternoon when he got off work and headed to Abilene to drop Emmitt off since my parents were so great to watch him for the week and a half we were going to be gone. And I was so thankful we got a special treat in Tuesday morning we left to drive to Dallas for to catch our plane at the airport. Before we got on the road to Dallas we were able to surprise my sweet three Trammell girls at their school that morning and LOVED every little moment of it even though we only got to hang out with them for about 30 minutes before having to leave! We caught our flight in Dallas Tuesday about lunch time and flew all day between all the changing flights we had to do, but trust me it was ALL worth it once we got to Boston! We got to Boston about 8:30 that night and were SO HAPPY to finally be there after all the traveling, planning, and everything that went in to this trip! As soon as Aunt Sally picked us up from the airport we headed to get a late bite to eat at a local place called Ninety-Nine, very home like, cozy, warm, and the food was great! We headed back to her apartment after dinner and dessert and got all set up there and then just had a cup of coffee and hung up talking and such.

The next day was our first day in Boston so we spent the day in downtown Boston. We ate at Jake's favorite restaurant in the Boston Prudential Shopping building, P.F. Changs and also did some browsing and shopping there. We walked all around downtown and went into the Prudential Gardens and took some pictures and were just taking everything in. Our first day in Boston was definitely so memorable and fun, we did the Boston duck boat tours through all of downtown and in the Charles River. We loved the duck boat tour, we got to see SO much, alot of which we wouldn't have gotten to see if we hadn't done it and loved how it drove all through Boston downtown seeing everything and giving you all the historical info on everything, but also drove the duck boat into the Charles River which was so cool! After we were done with the duck boat tour we did alot of walking just looking at stuff by ourselves through the Boston Public Gardens and just all the neat downtown sidewalks and looking at all the buildings and such. We took SO many pictures but I would say city life and downtown areas are one of my very favorite subjects to take pictures of so we loved it!



The historical cemeteries in downtown Boston, very beautiful! Although these are all along the sides of the busy downtown streets of Boston, they still seem so sacred and special, I thought the fencng was so gorgeous!




LOVED this tall, mirrored, glass building in downtown Boston, but I have no idea what building this was or what reason it was there for at all, I just loved the look and design of it!



Here is a picture of Emerson College in downtown Boston




Now this was a great looking fire department, I loved the building structure of everything in downtown Boston. I'm not sure where I got the obsession but I love to see all the different fire and police departments in the various cities we visit, they are all so different and unique, I just love it!


Here is a picture of one of the entrances of The Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers...very fancy!


 When you step outside the Boston Prudential Shoppping Mall they the beautiful Prudential Gardens with these great cobblestone sidewalks and these gorgeous black fountains and it all looks out onto the downtown buildings!




Here is the Boston Public Gardens sign as you enter the gardens...best public garden I have ever been to for sure!



Another Public Gardens sign as you enter, this one hung on the beautiful black iron fencing that goes all around the entire garden.




Here is the pond in the Public Garden area that has ducks and swans swimming it. I love how this picture has the gorgeous trees behind it, but also the tall downtown buildings of Boston.


While on the Charles River here is the bridge we went under and part of the Boston skyline in the background.



Another great brick building structure, the buildings in this downtown area are phenomenal, I just loved them all!




This is a brick tower that is in the Charles River, I thought it was so cool, the detailed design that is in the bricks, very unique!


In my opinion perfect picture of downtown Boston with the TD Garden, Zakim Bridge, tall buildings, and some traffic...love this picture!



Such great detail on this building if you look closely.


 Another great skyline picture of Boston, with the Charles River, beautiful trees, and all the downtown buildings in the background.




Another thing I LOVE is street signs, old or new. This was in the North End of Boston where historically all of the mob activity happened and still does to a certain degree. The North End is also where majority of the Italian immigrants or Italian-American families live today in Boston and where there are the greatest Italian restaurants in the city. Literally as we drove through the North End in our duck boat while we were on the tour you could smell the Italian, pizza, pasta, olive oil, cheese, and anything else you can dream of. If you really know me you know I was DROOLING!!!



The old churches in Boston are so undescribeable, just SO BEAUTIFUL! I love churches that are physically beautiful as far as the building. The brick and windows on this one are so amazing to me.


 I thought this building was so cool, how the top of it has this old clock with the eagle at the very top watching everything.




A closer picture of the brick tower that is in the Charles River that has such cool detail.




Another one of my favorite pictures from our day in downtown Boston, I just love how you get the mix of brick buildings, lights, people, traffic lights, and beautiful landscaping...pretty much sums up downtown Boston to me!


You can tell in this picture how it is starting to get dark because all the lights are really starting to show and the buildings are start to have that night reflecting look on them.



LOVED the shape of this building




GREAT downtown Boston picture, this might be a framer for my traveling collection.


 LOVE this red brick building with the cute little windows and this great old, black street light pole.




LOVE this picture also, great mixture of things...I LOVE THE CITY!


This was in the Boston Public Gardens, they have this row of copper ducks, they are so cool. It was the cutest thing ever to see all the little kids playing and having their picture taken on them. They also have a copper tortis and hare, but we didn't walk over to see them, so I don't have a picture of those.



This is a picture of what the duck boats that we did our tour on look like when they go in the Charles River, it is very cool!



 I love this picture of the Fairmount Copley Hotel in downtown Boston, I love how old it looks with all the gold, red, and just how old the building looks. There are many, many famous people historically who have stayed in this hotel through the years, many United States Presidents. I love the lanterns on either sign on the red sign.




This was a cool fish statue that was also in the Boston Public Gardens.





Here is a picture looking far away across the pond in the Boston Public Gardens, you can see the little bridge across the way, it was very cute!



Another great downtown shot, great sign for a parking garage in downtown Boston.



 The beautiful gate entrance to the Boston Public Gardens, I thought it kinda looked like you were entering some sort of mansion like place.




 A close up picture of the Grand Lodge of Masons In Massachusetts...very cool building.





One of the most special, sacred, cool places in downtown Boston we saw in my opinion at least. This is the Holocaust Memorial in downtown Boston, there are five of these tall, glass towers all framed in silver to represent all the people who lost their lives in the Holocaust.




This was down by the Port of Boston area in downtown, picture of the Independent Wharf building.






This was in our duck boat getting ready to leave on our tour, Aunt Sally & I.





LOVE LOVE this picture, I thought this bridge and light pole was so cool and just love all the beautiful trees and buildings in the background and Jake just happened to be standing there like that haha I actually didn't even notice that until I started to edit the pictures.



Here is Loews Theatre in the Theatre District area of downtown Boston,





Yes, I was OBSESSED with all of the brownstone apartment like places they had all over downtown Boston.





LOVE this picture also, I love seeing beautiful ivy growing on brick buildings like this, I think this red brick with pretty green ivy looks so cool!




I just thought this particular building or church had such a great steeple that I just had to take a picture of it.





I just loved the mirrored buildings that were all over the place, love how you can see the reflection of everything on the other side of the street.




Here is a picture of the New England School of Law building



LOVE this one, I think it is a really cool picture from the view it was taken and the clouds make it look great in the background. Not to mention how awesome of a church building this is, cannot imagine how old this building is!





Here is another view of it




Fancy Omni Parker House in downtwon Boston



Here is a picture of the many, many Dunkin Donuts that exist ALL over Boston and all the states we visited. In the south we have Starbucks on every block, well in New England they do Dunkin Donuts.




Here is the front pretty view and entrance of the Boston Park Plaza Hotel




While on the duck boats they showed us the Charles River Sailboat school where kids can come and learn how to sail for free, I thought it was so neat!




pretty orange roses in the Boston Public Gardens






LOVE this pink rose in the Boston Public Gardens




Here is the Samuel Adams statue in downtown Boston with the Samuel Adams museum/building behind it.




The only Starbucks Coffee I saw in downtown Boston with the gold teapot.




LOVE this picture of downtown Boston street sign on this cool light pole.



Seeing that Boston is all Irish and such I thought this was a cool pub, Sullivan's Pub.






The swans in the pond in the Boston Public Gardens, we were lucky we got to see them because when it starts to get real cold they get taken out and don't come back to the gardens to swim in the pond until spring time.


Tall, tall building as night approaches in downtown Boston






Best picture I could get of TD Garden but there it is




This has been nicknamed "The Dolphin" because of how it has gotten its shape through all the years, this was while we were on the duck boat on the Charles River.




A bar in downtown called the Red Hat that we thought was cool.





"Welcome to Massachusetts" sign, we took a state sign in every state, except never found one when we drove into Vermont.


The famous Zakim Bridge in Boston, such a awesome bridge, just the whole design and structure of this bridge is really amazing if you think about it!



Stay tuned for Day 2 about our Maine Adventures!! :)

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