Clam Chowdah

Hello all,

Kim and I are back from an interesting, yet very fun trip to Boston and Cape Cod! I would first like to say that our visit was quite nice and the people are quite nice, but the roads are absolutely horrible in Boston. Our driving experience was probably the worst I have ever imagined and our next trip out there will involve only public transportation. Many brilliant people came out of the New England area; however, I do not believe any of them were city planners or road developers. In addition to the terrible roads of Boston, our GPS decided that we were still in Texas and near Madisonville, approximately the same spot that we turned it off following our last trip to Louisiana.

Our trip started with a walking tour of the Freedom Trail, where we were able to visit the cemetery where Sam Adams, Paul Reverre, and John Hancock lay. We followed that tour with a visit to the Paul Reverre house and a lunch date in Little Italy for some authentic (and very good, I might add) Italian food. Kim has a very special place in her heart for anything Italian, so this meal was a special treat for her. Following our historic/Italian tour, it was time to get on the "T" for a trip to Fenway Park. The train was so crowded, that I actually had to wedge my body on the front stairs of the first car and we could not have arrived at Fenway soon enough.

Arriving at Fenway was simply awesome! As many of you know, I love baseball, and this was one historic stadium I have always wanted to visit. Lucky for us, we were able to purchase two tickets to the game and this game was against the bitter rival Yankees (a team that I have always strongly disliked). I have never really cared for the Red Sox either, but I am much more of a fan now after this experience. Basically, we approached the stadium and they scanned our tickets out on the street. The Red Sox Nation is so into baseball, multiple blocks are shut down for the game. Countless t-shirt, beer, and food stops were on these city blocks and the fans were already cheering for the Sox. Their accents were fun as the letter "R" is removed from most words and is even more emphasized when they are cheering for the Sox. We stayed on the streets for a short while and then ventured to our right field bleacher seats because I wanted to see the field. The beers were expensive, but I did not see a person in the bleacher seats with an empty cup the entire game. The passion for the Red Sox lies worlds ahead of many other teams, including my Astros. Fenway is a getaway for many folks and they splurge when witnessing a game. We were able to see David Ortiz, who Kim coined the nickname, "The Big Papa", hit a high flying homerun over the famous Green Monster. Please google David Ortiz and you will find his real nickname. Besides the dreary and rainy sky, our Fenway experience was fantastic.

The following day, we toured Harvard, a most beautiful campus, and then made our way towards the Cape. I was slightly overwhelmed with the amount of people in the Cape, but it was such a pleasant place to be. We stayed at a nice little condo in Mashpee, but visited Falmouth and Hyannis as well. We enjoyed a nice seafood dinner on the water after touring some of the most ridiculousy sized houses. We attended a fun little wedding on the beach, which was quite meaningful, and flat out crazy at the same time. As much as it hurts me to say, people in the north can out-party us Texas folks.

In conclusion, our northeasterly excursion was quite memorable and I sure hope that we can go back again in the future.

More to come.....

Patrick