Plymouth Rock and Cape Cod (9/3/2015)

Today was a great day.  Except that we should have gotten an earlier start.  We started off leisurely, thinking it was going to be an easy day, I think we left around 9:45.  We got home at 9:30 p.m.  But, in between, we went to Plymouth Rock, toured the Mayflower, took a tour with the park ranger.  Then, we headed to Cape Cod, thinking that was a short drive.  Huh!!!  After we got to the town of Sandwich, which I think is the "elbow" of Cape Cod, we still had 60 miles to go.  But go we did, and we had a lovely two hours on this glorious beach.

In Plymouth, we first drove out to the harbor, missed to the turn for the Rock.  But there was a really cool piece of driftwood here.  Joe said, "call Eric, tell him to bring the trailer."

At Plymouth Rock, first we took a look at the rock, which is now protected both overhead and around all sides.  It is much smaller than it was originally because visitors used to get to chip away souvenir chunks.  Interestingly, the Goodyear Blimp was overhead, and it kept stalking us when we were on tour with the Park Ranger.

The Park Ranger made this history very interesting.  Here is a memorial honoring the immigrants who landed here. 

Next, we entered the Mayflower.  It seems to be a pretty small ship to carry the 102 passengers, crew and livestock for 2+ months.

 There were two "period-costume" ladies and several other guides on board to answer questions.

We left Plymouth, not getting to see all there was to see, but it was time to move on (we had 3 minutes left on the parking meter).  We stopped at a visitor center on Cape Cod and got some more brochures, had a bite to eat, then headed all the way to the end to Race Point Beach.  Very luckily, we got to use our America the Beautiful Pass for free parking (otherwise it was either $15 or $20).  So that started us out on a high note.  We carried our lawn chairs over the sand dune, along with the camera, and the binoculars.  Although we had swimsuits in the car, we didn't change (thinking we wouldn't get wet).  Wrong.  I just got the bottom of my shorts wet, but Joe got wet up to his waist, so he changed into his swimming trunks when we left to head home.  Go figure.

This part of Cape Cod is a National Seashore, with great sand dunes, and lovely beaches.

Joe went right out into the water, and I followed shortly after.  It was a bit brisk, but refreshing.

The guy beside us was gathering up his stuff, and he had this really cute puppy float -- I'm pretty sure Andrew needs one of these.  It looks just like Ace.

No seaglass, but I have another bag of rocks.  Then Joe spotted a real treasure down the beach a ways.  He saw it through his binoculars!  So off he went to retrieve it.

 It can either be his new bobber to fish with in Florida, or a shoe hanger if he finds another one to make a pair.

There were tons of minnows swimming just off the edge of the water, millions.  We watched them for a long time, and it seemed they were never-ending.  Then, as we began to think about leaving, some seals showed up to feed on these little bait fish.

Reluctantly, we finally loaded up our stuff (heavier now with my rocks) and headed to the car.  Joe stopped one more time to get a photo of the sand dunes, and framed through a break in the dunes was this picture-perfect sailboat!  He didn't even know it was there when he stopped.

We rounded the tip and drove through Provincetown, where there is another monument which can be seen all the way from Plymouth.

By now it was 6:30 and we had about 120 miles to go, so we headed back.  We did stop at one gift shop -- well, the one in the picture was closing, so we stopped at the next one.  Cute stuff.  Wish we had more time and more money.

We stopped for a bite to eat, then Joe drove us home, in the dark again.  A long day, but a very fun one.  We loved the beach here.  If we had made this trip yesterday instead of driving into Boston, we probably would have just skipped Harvard and the JFK Library and came back here a second day.  They had RVs parked right on the beach, so Joe kept trying to figure out how we could drive back here tomorrow, but our agenda says we need to move on, so that's it for Cape Cod.

Weatherwise, we had another beautiful day.  Perfect, in fact.  We are probably pushing our luck, but I hope the good weather holds through our next few days in the Big Apple!  We are meeting up with my friend Barbara Flaxman from my Oryx Press days, who now lives in Connecticut, and she is going to be our tour guide -- that is, if we can figure out how to get on the train to meet up with her.  Should be another Excellent Adventure!

Driving to Harvard (9/2/2015)

Joe took on the Boston traffic today.  We stopped for breakfast and I had picture-perfect waffles with fresh fruit -- worth a picture for the foodies out there.  Nice presentation.

We got to the Harvard campus around 11:00, thinking maybe the traffic would be better, but it wasn't.  Traffic on campus was absolutely awful -- cars, moving vans still, bicyclists, motorcyclists, and pedestrians all blocking our way.  We've never been honked at so much in one town!  And of course Joe wasn't yelling back!  And we weren't even in the wrong (usually).  Oh, I almost forgot, a little road construction thrown in from time to time, just to keep it interesting.

We almost took out a bicyclist who sneaked up behind us.  It was nerve-wracking, and we saw very little of the campus.  We chose "Harvard Square" on the GPS, but it wasn't what we expected.

Harvard Square

I was expecting maybe the Quad.  It was like a newspaper stand.  We snapped a few pictures of buildings, including the law school.  My ex-boss Mark graduated from here, but he got his law degree at Georgetown.

International Law Center

This next one was the Engineering and Applied Sciences Building.

We got a picture of one statue, but did not see anything else that we were told to look for.  There are some very old churches here in Cambridge, but there was no place to park anywhere, so we just drove by.

John Harvard Statue

Next on our agenda was Radcliff University, which used to be a "women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as a female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College."  When I was young and full of dreams, I wanted to go to Radcliff.  But I settled for Indiana State, and Radcliff eventually merged with Harvard, so all that is actually left of that campus (the rest having been incorporated into the Harvard campus) is the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, which we found, and some housing, which I'm sure we drove past.

We managed to escape unscathed, but I don't know how. We played hopscotch with another bicycle rider all through here, and Joe was about ready to run over him just on general principles.  They ride in the traffic lane but they don't obey any of the traffic signals, so you never know what they are going to do!  Anyhow, we headed back through Boston.  We passed some of the subway openings which we hadn't noticed before, and we still haven't gotten brave enough to tackle the subway.

We worked our way over to the JFK Library and Museum, more road construction here.  It is right on the Boston Harbor, very lovely building.

Our tour began with a 20-minute film about his growing-up years, and ended when he accepted the Presidential Nomination from the Democratic Party.   This Library/Museum was more film clips and videos than exhibits, with just one little area showing the funeral procession.  But it covered a lot about civil rights, some about the space program, and the Cold War. A couple of Jackie's dresses were on display.  There was also an area about Robert Kennedy and his work as the Attorney General.

Replica of Oval Office

At the end of the exhibits was a piece of the Berllin wall, which was constructed in 1961 during Kennedy's term of office.  

This Library is right on the edge of the University of Massachusetts campus, so we left here just as classes were over for the day I guess, because we were certainly back in heavy traffic.  We finally got out to our suburban area, found a place to eat an early dinner, and called it a day.  We were back at the RV by 5:00, I think our first time to get home before dark here in Boston.  We've had 3 full days here, and we were both tired.  But at least we found our campground on the first try today, no road blocks in our way.

We have had lovely weather here in Boston, and having dealt with traffic today we can certainly appreciate our pleasant ferry rides the first two days.  Tomorrow we will try the drive to Cape Cod, then we will be ready to leave here, and take on NEW YORK CITY.