Has anyone flipped you off yet? That's pretty common behavior on that side of the state, too. I learned how to drive out that way, but I've lived in the western part of the state for more than 20 years now and I hate driving out there! Good luck. I hope you have a blast!
I don't think we got flipped off, I think my sister flipped one person off on the highway though on the way to the airport, but that may have been in New Hampshire.
Thank you. We both enjoyed the trip and had lots of fun.
I hate Massachusetts drivers!!! And I can say that cause my dad's entire family if from Mass!!! Honestly I hope they open the casinos up there so they will stop driving here!
So how long are ya'll there for?? You know Boston is only 2 hours from me...
I hope you enjoy your trip!! Can't wait to hear more.
We did enjoy it. We had so much to do and I know we didnt' get to see everything there is to see out there.
Sorry you had such a rough flight out. Welcome to the North Shore!
Glad you're having fun so far. Did you get Gibraltars? You wouldn't be saying they were good, if so, you'd be saying you broke a tooth, so you must have tried something else.
No, sweetie, we drive correctly here - it's the rest of the country that doesn't know how to drive.
Yes, the Boston drivers live up to their reputation. My Dad always used to say if you can learn to drive here, you can drive anywhere. My husband drives a bus in the city every day - he deserves a medal!
I can't wait to hear what else you do! Have tons of fun!
It was a store called Ye Olde Pepper Candy Companie or something like that. It is directly across the the road from the Seven Gables parking lot. The creme filled candies I got were really good. If people from MA were to drive the way they do where I live or in Detroit they would be in several accidents and possibly killed. We couldn't believe how they would just move into the intersections to turn expecting that the traffic on the street with the right of way would stop for them. And it was shocking that traffic did in fact stop for these people.
Welcome to MA - we're so glad you're both here. Hoping you have a most magical time. Did you get to go in the hidden rooms at the House of Seven Gables? Took my students a few times, and they always loved those secret places.
Happy touring and shopping. Looking forward to hearing about your travels. Caroline
Yep, we did go up the one secret staircase, which was freaky. I'm such a klutz I thought I was going to twist something for sure. Either there or on the one staircase where the first step is bigger than the rest. I don't think I would have survived long back in those days, especially having to wear long skirts. I would most certainly have trip and fallen down the stairs to my death!
hope you are having a great time! yup, those massachusetts drivers! almost as bad as the rhode island drivers!!!!!
I don't think we saw many RI drivers. But the MA were almost as bad as NJ, though I think the NJ tour bus we saw in PA back in 2006 is still the winner for worst driver ever.
LOL!
Well, Yzerbear no one drives as good as us Midwest drivers!
Have a great time and can't wait to hear more about it when you return!!!
Stay safe!
I was happy to be back in Detroit where the driving is crazy, but its a familar kind of crazy!
Just a word of warning, A direction signale is a challege for others to keep you from changing lanes. It does get worse the closer you get to Boston.
I look at it this way, We pay soo much money in taxes and tolls to fix our roadways and the more money we put in, the worse the road gets. Makes for angry bitter people. Have you seen the Big Dig?
Enjoy your trip.
Pam
We never had any problems changing lanes. The only real problems were on the highway when the cars in the right wouldn't move over to allow the merging traffic to get on. I was taught that if there is traffic trying to merge, you move over a lane to give them room to merge. I don't think we saw one car move over to allow the merging traffic to get on.
Hope you're having fun! I thought CA drivers were bad ... then I moved to MA and now I miss them!
If you make it in to Boston/Cambridge let me know.
We made it to Boston, but we didn't get to Cambridge.
On Tuesday we drove to Concord. We went to the battleground there. The show at the visitor center was really cool. When we watched it, there was a tour bus full of British people, which made for some interesting jokes. They need to put in more monuments or something, because walking the trails was kind of boring after a while. We ended up skipping a few of the stops and just went to the North Bridge. We wanted to see Ralph Waldo Emerson's house, but it was closed.
We did get some pictures of it from the outside though. We also stopped by Sleepy Hollow Cemetery where we saw Emerson's, Henry David Thoreau, Louisa May Alcott, and Nathaniel Hawthorne's graves. We told Thoreau what we thought of
Walden.
We had lunch at the cafe at the North Bridge visitor center. It was OK. Strange set up though. I think this was the night we had dinner at Unos. I love Chicago style pizza. YUM! Though I like Gino's from Chicago better.
On Wednesday we went back to Salem and went to the Pirate Museum, Witch History Museum, and Witch Dungeon Museum. I enjoyed all three. Our tour guide for the Pirate one was really funny. I liked that I could take pictures inside.
We ate at Boston Hot Dogs in Salem. They were good, but I think I like Koegels better. This is a MI brand of hot dog. The buns were interesting. Ordering the hot dogs was a bit intimidating, with all the signs telling you how to order. I think we had Quiznos for dinner.
On Thursday we drove up to York, ME. We went to a few of the historical buildings. Quite a few of them were closed or needed appointments, so we just skipped them. We did go to the Old Gaol where I again thought I was going to twist my ankle on those stairs. After that we drove up 1A along the coast. We had lunch at a restaurant called the Lobster Cove. My sister got lobster. She said it was OK and shrimp is better. After that we continued driving along the coast. We finally found a spot where you could get down to the beach. We then went and frolicked in the ocean.
That was fun. It was cold, but after a while I didn't even notice. We hadn't planned on playing in the ocean so we didnt' take a towel or anything with us. My sister had her
Crocs on and I wished I had some instead of my tennis shoes and socks. It was awesome. We were surprised to find people surfing there. We drove along some more to the lighthouse, which is the hip place for all the elderly people to go.
We got a bunch of pictures. I was hoping to get something there for our one brother who loves lighthouses, but the gift shop was closed. After that we headed back to MA. I forgot to get the directions back to MA. I remembered most of the steps, but missed the one fork. We ended up going a ways out of our way, but we eventually got back. Since I had gotten us "lost" I had to buy my sister an ice cream desert from Friendly's. We both got Friendzs. We then went to AC Moores in Danvers, but wasn't impressed. They didn't have much Cricut stuff. It was kind of pillaged. We did find a couple of cute stickers we hadn't seen before so it wasn't a total waste of time. A little while later after freshening up and changing we went to Salem for the Happening Halloween parade. It was OK. We only stayed for a little while. We wanted to leave before traffic got too bad. We had dinner at Applebees, where our waitress didn't even give us silverware.
She was gone most of the time. We heard her comment once about how she just wanted to hurry up and leave. It seemed she was more concerned with that than her customers. She didn't get a good tip!
On Friday we drove to Salem to use the Commuter rail to Boston. The parking lot was confusing. Then we couldn't figure out where you get the tickets from. We finally found someone who told us that you just get them on the train. Once on the train saw behind these two girls who talked like the people on the "The Hills" and spent the entire ride gossiping about people. It was quite irritating. After that we managed to find the Metro and took that to Park to start the Freedom Trail. The Robert Shaw memorial for the 54th MA regiment was really cool. Though the sun was in a bad spot to get a good shot of it. It was really hot on Friday. The walk along the Freedom Trail was miserable in that heat. The sites were really cool, I just wish the temp had been cooler. We ate lunch at Cheers at Fanieul (sp?) Hall. We walked over to the bridge to see the USS Constitution, but didn't go see the Bunker Hill Memorial up close. We did a few shots of it from a distance. We took the water shuttle back. The ferry that came didn't look very sea worthy to me, I thought for sure we were going to sink.
We made it though I don't know how.
After that we made it back to the station to catch the commuter rail back to Salem. We were happy to find the rental car still in the parking lot. After that we did some last minute shopping before going back to Danvers. We had to pack so we ordered Dominos, which is never my favorite, but it was on our hotel keys. It was OK. It was something to eat while we packed.
On Saturday we got up at 8:00 and went to breakfast at IHOP again since we don't have many around where we live. The Pumpkin pancakes are so good. It was quite busy on Saturday. I used up all the change I had for the tip so I wouldn't have to worry about it at the airport. We then went back to the hotel and watched American Gladiators on ESPN Classic. I remember watching it as a child, and we don't have ESPN Classic at home, so we watched that until 11:00 when we had to check out. Since it was suppose to be an hour drive up to Manchester, we decided to go find the Witch Trial memorial in Danvers. After that we went to
Best Buy to kill some more time. It was noon then so we decided to just start heading up to Manchester and maybe have enough time to grab lunch on the way. We had to be at the airport by 2:00. It took nearly 2 hours to get to Manchester. We were averaging 20 MPH on the highway. There was no construction, no accidents, nothing to warrant such a traffic jam. I've been in worse traffic on I-75 heading "Up North" during the summer that moved faster. It was very irriating. We ended up stopping at McDonalds and had to eat quickly so that we could get the rental car back on time. Getting through security was easy. We were the only two people. The one TSA officer was impressed how fast we went through. We're used to going through Detroit Metro where you have to be fast. After that we sat by the gate and waited for the plane to arrive. And we prayed we got a pilot who knew how to take off!
There were no problems with take off out of Manchester other than we had to sit on the runway for about 10 minutes because of lots of traffic in Detroit.
It was a good flight back. I love looking out the window and seeing the clouds below. There were some cool cloud mounds. Our brother was waiting at baggage claim for us. He then bought us dinner from KFC and had a bottle of Pepsi in his fridge waiting for us. He's such a nice brother.
On Sunday we drove home from our brother's house. We got stuck in traffic on I-75 just south of Grand Blanc. They had to close the entire northbound section due to an accident. We were routed onto Dixie Hwy, which sort of freaked my sister out because she thought we were lost, but I knew where we were. After that it was a smooth ride home. It was nice to sleep in our own beds last night. I couldn't wait to see my furkids. They had missed us and were being so sweet yesterday.
I will have to post the pictures soon. I haven't even really sorted out all the good ones yet.
