Boston - August 2024

 Day 5, continued

After dropping off the rental car at the airport, we Ubered to Boston Marriott Copley Place. We dropped off our bags and Ubered to the North End to try Regina Pizza. The line was long, even kind of late, but we didn’t wait too long. The pizza was absolutely delicious. I wish we would have gotten it again!

Line at Regina Pizza

Yummy pizza

After dinner we decided to try Modern Pastry for a cannoli. There was actually no line after dinner. Here you can “build your own” cannoli. We picked one with vanilla custard and chocolate chips. It was delicious! The kids got some cookies and they were also quite good.

We headed back to the hotel and went to bed after a full day.

Day 6

There was a Starbuck’s in the hotel and we had that for breakfast.

I had booked a 9:30am Duck tour and got a small discount for booking a tour before 10am. We picked the Prudential spot and it was directly across from our hotel, so it was very convenient. We met my husband’s friend and daughter and they did the tour with us. They live close by in Rhode Island. The tour was fun and somewhat informative. My husband’s friend said the guide missed a few spots - like didn’t tell us when we passed Cheers bar. She also misinformed us about the Swan boats and said they were boats for 2. The Swan boats actually hold many people and only the driver pedals.

Old South Church

New State House

Massachusetts State House

Will driving the Duck boat

See the Citgo sign (triangle) - that’s near Fenway

Hope driving the Duck Boat

Old State House - Boston Massacre

Hope got a Duck hat after

After the tour, we took the T to Union Oyster House for lunch. This is the oldest restaurant in the country. There is a booth upstairs that was supposedly Kennedy’s favorite booth. There are plaques with all the famous people that have eaten there. There were so many! The food was good and it was right on the Freedom Trail.

The T

Riding T

America’s Oldest Restaurant

Kennedy Booth

New England Clam Chowder

We then walked the Freedom Trail for a bit and visited Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall. There were some street entertainers. We picked up some Junior Ranger booklets, but didn’t end up doing them. We got some ice cream. We then walked to Paul Revere’s house. We saw a tour guide dressed up in Revolutionary times costume.

Faneuil Hall

Quincy Market

Inside Faneuil Hall - Nat Parks of Boston

Street performer

Paul Revere House

We then Ubered to the Swan Boats at Boston Public Garden. I read Make Way for Ducklings as a kid and so did my kids, so really wanted to visit this. It was a nice, relaxing little ride. We then walked around to find the Make Way for Ducklings statues.

Swan boat ride

Swan Boats

Make Way for Ducklings statue

We Ubered back to the hotel after this and I didn’t realize we were right by the Cheers bar and Beacon Hill. We could have easily visited this today also. Oh well, we hit it another day.

The kids swam in the indoor pool and we got ready for dinner. We had dinner reservations at Trattoria Il Panino in the North End again. My lasagna was delicious. There was no kids menu here. They let me order my son a plain chicken cutlet breaded, like for the chicken Parmesan and only charged for a cutlet instead of the $30 full meal. My daughter likes pasta. The food was good and it looked like many celebrities have eaten here.

Celebs at the restaurant

Lasagna

Pasta dishes come out in pans

After dinner it started to rain a little. We decided to try Mike’s Pastry to compare to Modern. This is the place most widely known I believe. There was a long line, but it moved pretty quickly. The cannoli was good. I didn’t see that you could customize it. But they had tons of different varieties. I think we got a chocolate mousse cannoli. The kids got some cookies (Modern cookies were better I think - less cakey) and we got a slice of Boston crème pie to share. It was good.

The cannoli varieties are on the wall

We then Ubered back to hotel. We watched the Olympics like every night.

Day 7

Our hotel came with a $25 credit at the restaurant there per day and if you don’t use it, you lose it. So I decided to get a coffee to go. The coffee was terrible and I ended up throwing it away and we got Starbucks. 

We had 10:15am reservations at the Boston Tea Party Museum. It was a fun way to learn some history. Every gets to throw tea overboard - that was fun! 

We then Ubered to Fenway as we had a 1pm Fenway tour booked. We were a little early, so checked out the Bleacher Bar. I didn’t think we had enough time for lunch yet, so just had some drinks and checked it out. You can see into Centerfield at Fenway from here. Apparently it used to be the opponents batting cages - it was very cool!

View of Centerfield at Fenway from Bleacher Bar

Inside Bleacher Bar

Bleacher Bar entrance

We then headed to the Team Store for our 1pm Fenway Park Tour. We had backpacks with all our rain gear, so we had to pay to have them checked down the street at a Beer Store.

The tour was cool. There were a ton of fans on the tour. The guide had a microphone so it was easy to hear. We heard a lot of history about Fenway and got to sit on the Green Monster and walk around the park. We did not go on the field. We saw where they grow vegetables at the park. We did go to a little Fenway museum at the end.

Meeting point for tour in Team Store

Inside team store

Welcome to Fenway Park

Our tour guide

Sitting on Green Monster

Growing vegetables

Boston skyline from Fenway

Wade Boggs stuff at Museum

We then went to Bleacher Bar for a late lunch. The service was slow and the food was just okay, but it was a great atmosphere. They were starting to do batting practice for the game, so it was really cool to see from here.

Bleacher Bar view

We then headed back to the Team Store to buy some souvenirs. My husband’s friend was able to get us VIP tours pregame so we went to Ford Clubhouse to meet. This was an amazing tour that got us onto the field for batting practice. The Red Sox were playing the Astros and they were the ones batting. My kids were able to get Jose Altuve’s autograph!

Jose Altuve

We were also able to go on the Green Monster for batting practice. It was cool to see how hard the balls are hit up there. We went near where the suites are. We also walked by a restaurant for high level season ticket holders. We saw lots of different parts of the stadium not seen on the other tour.

Our VIP tour guide and his World Series ring

Fun pregame activities

We then headed to our seats. We had great seats behind 1st base dugout where the Red Sox sit. Both kids were able to get a baseball! Unfortunately the Red Sox lost and it rained some. But we had fun. We took the T back and it was jam packed and super hot. We were all super sweaty and wet from the rain and all showered before going to bed.

Altuve - runner at 1st

Tanner Houck pitching

Jarren Duran

Alex Bregman - runner on 1st

Alex Cora

Day 8

We were supposed to leave on a late plane tonight, but my husband per usual decided to extend the trip. We added another night at the hotel and I cancelled our flights (I had booked JetBlue with points and got the points back). We had to book Delta connecting through Atlanta since it was so last minute.

His friend got us free tickets to the game this afternoon so we planned to go to Fenway again.

We Ubered to Cheers bar and had lunch there. Lunch was fine, it was typical bar type food. The downstairs is what it was based on and upstairs had a gift shop and a replica bar.

We then walked to see Acorn street. This was a cute, famous street in Boston. It still has the cobblestones. We walked around Beacon Hill area a little and the Ubered to Fenway.

Acorn Street

Chestnut Street

We arrived at Fenway early and walked around a bit. We headed to the Team Store for more swag. I bought a membership to Red Sox Nation. It was only $22 and you were able to go into the game 2hrs early vs 90 min early and bring one adult and kids. You also got a $10 credit at the team store. You are supposed to be able to go on the Green Monster, but it was closed today for a private party. We were a little disappointed, but it was fun for the kids to just be in the centerfield stands trying to catch Homeruns during batting practice. The players and coaches threw a lot of the outfield hit balls to people. Both my kids got balls again so that was a highlight. We also saw Kutter Crawford throwing bullpen and he gave both my kids an autograph.

Kutter Crawford

Kutter Crawford

We then walked around a bit and stopped at Pesky Pole to sign it. We then walked around Jersey street that they close off 3 hours before the game. It’s cool because you can walk around this street as a ticket holder only and can shop and see Big League Brian - the guy on stilts. There’s a band playing and lots of food vendors. It’s a great atmosphere and one we missed on the 1st game because of the VIP tour which was also amazing.

Signing Pesky Pole

Signing Pesky Pole

Band playing on Jersey Street

Big League Brian

We then headed to our seats which were on the 3rd base side this time. It was cool to have a different view. It was pretty hot at first, but it became shady. It was a 4:15 game. The Red Sox lost again, but we still had fun. After all, we are really Rays fans.

Getting autographs after the game

Rafael Devers

Jarren Duran of the Red Sox was signing autographs after the game, but we couldn’t get to their dugout fast enough. I could tell my son was disappointed so I asked a security guy where they came out after the game. It was very close to the exit we were walking out of, so we decided to wait since we had no plans.

We saw several players come out and my son was able to get a few autographs including Connor Wong and Cam Booser. A lady told us that Jarren Duran often comes out and stays to sign everyone’s things, so we waited. She was right. He eventually came out and appeared to sign for every single person. Both my kids got autographs and my son took a photo with him. He was very nice! Unfortunately, he was suspended 2 games after the following game for using a derogatory slur.

Brennan Bernardino

Cam Booser

Cam Booser

Kenley Jansen

Alex Cora

Jarren Duran

Got our autographs

Jarren Duran - MVP of All Star Game

We headed back to the hotel and packed to head home. We had a very early flight the next day. The kids swam one last time in the indoor pool. Our second leg of the flight we couldn’t get seats together. I could get 2 seats together and then 2 middle seats. So the kids sat together and without an adult for the 1st time. We got home Sunday and 1st day of school was Monday, so we soaked up every minute of summer!

Sitting together without an adult