The Freedom Trail

August 1, 2009 | On the second (full) day of our Boston trip, we followed the Freedom Trail to visit some of the historic sites of the city.   We started at the first stop on the trail, the Boston Common.  I purchased the Official Guidebook published by the Freedom Trail Foundation at the visitor center and we were on our way!

Interesting Fact: Boston Common is America’s oldest public park!

We had planned on going for a Swan Boats ride in Boston Common but there was a huge line so we skipped it and moved on.  Next was the Massachusetts State House, sitting on the edge of the park.  You can’t really miss this building– the golden dome on top glistened in the sun!  We couldn’t go in so we just snapped a few shots and walked on.   (I didn’t bring my wide angle lens so my shots were a little limited! Doh.) 

Interesting Fact: The land for the building was originally used as John Hancock’s cow pasture.

We moved on to the third stop, Park Street Church.  We didn’t go in this one either though I can’t remember why.

Interesting Fact: A young William Lloyd Garrison delivered his first major public Abolition speech on July 4, 1829 at this church.

Walking down Park Street, we came upon The Granary Burying Ground, where many famous historic figures are buried, such as John Hancock, Paul Revere, James Adams, and Robert Treat Paine.

Interesting Fact: The monument seen above for Paul Revere is not from the original burial.  Click here to see the small slate marker that dates from Revere’s burial (next to the one above).

Next was another church and burying ground, King’s Chapel and Burying Ground.  The burying ground was Boston proper’s only burying place for nearly 30 years.  Its residents include John Winthrop, Massachusetts’ first Governor, the family tombstone shown below.

Interesting Fact:  In 1749 when the building was too small for the congregation, the church stone structure was built around the original wood church, which was then dissembled and thrown piece by piece out the windows of the new construction.

Our next stop was the Boston Latin School, America’s oldest public school founded on April 13, 1635.  Four signers of the declaration attended Boston Latin: Benjamin Franklin, Sameul Adams, John Hancock, and Robert Treat Paine.  The school was torn down and moved in 1745.  A statue of Benjamin Franklin marks the location of the original schoolhouse.  I didn’t get very good shots of the statue but I did get some shots of the Old City Hall that sits behind the statue!

Interesting Fact: Benjamin Franklin is one of Boston Latin’s most notable high school dropouts!

Next was the Old Corner Bookstore, but it just didn’t seem as picture-worthy since it’s now a jewelry store.  It did once produce the works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ralph Waldo Emerson, to name a few!

We moved on to the Old South Meeting House, famous for the meetings that led to the Boston Tea Party.  I bought a ticket to check out the museum inside, but photography was prohibited. =(

The Old State House was the seat of British Government before the Revolution, and afterward served as the Commonwealth’s first capital building, with the office of the state’s first governor, John Hancock.   It’s now a museum, which, honestly, was not really as interesting to me.

Interesting Fact: Just outside the doors of the Old State House, the Boston Massacre unfolded in 1770, resulting in the deaths of five men and galvanizing public opposition to British authority.

It was at Faneuil Hall in 1764 that Americans first protested against the Sugar Act and the Stamp Act, setting the doctrine that would come to be known as ‘no taxation without representation.’  The building now holds shops on the first floor along with a Post Office.

At this time, Jen and I split up, as I went to the North End for lunch and continued the Freedom Trail.

The Paul Revere House was purchased by Paul Rever in 1770 with 53 pounds, 6 shillings and 8 pence with a mortage of 160 pounds.

Interesting Fact: Revere had a total of 16 children (and 2 wives)!

Inside the courtyard of the Paul Revere House was this lady playing the glass harmonica, one of Benjamin Franklin’s inventions.  I had seen her flyers around and actually saw her performing again at Cambridge the next day!

Standing in James Rego Square (Paul Revere Mall) is a statue of Paul Revere on a horse.

Just behind (or in front of?) James Rego Square was Old North Church.  On April 18, 1775, the church sexton, Robert Newman, climbed the steeple and held high two lantern as a signal from Paul Revere that the British were marching to Lexington and Cord by sea and not by land.  Sound familiar? And this ignited the American Revolution…

Next was Copp’s Hill Burying Ground, where Robert Newman was buried, best known for placing the signal lanterns in the steeple of the “Old North” Church on the eve of the Battle of Lexington and Concord.

I made my way to…and took a boat ride to the Charleston Navy Yard and walked to USS Constitution.

It was getting close to closing time so I first made my way through the USS Constitution Museum before moving on to the ship tour.   I’ve visited the USS Texas, USS Alabama, USS Arizona Memorial, USS Missouri, and USS Bowfin Submarine, so I was excited to see the USS Constitution, the oldest commissioned warship afloat in the world!

I made the final hike up to Bunker Hill Monument.  The monument is located on a hill and provides a nice view of the city!  A state of Colonial William Prescott stands in front of the monument.  The 221-foot granite obelisk marks the first major battle in the American Revolution, the Battle of Bunker Hill.

Interesting Fact: The monument is actually located on Breed Hill! The battle was fought on Breed Hill but many mistakenly thought it was Bunker Hill.  Bunker Hill is located to the north of Breed Hill.

All in all it was a long and tiring day.  It was also incredibly hot, haha.  While it was interesting to (re)learn history, I bet this would have been even more fascinating a decade or so ago when I actually learned about all this stuff in class!  Still, I feel like it was good to see the sites and appreciate the historical significance of it all.

New England Aquarium

August 31, 2009 | Jennifer preferred the aquarium over whale watching *gasp* so we went to the New England Aquarium.  Pretty cool place! Lots of penguins and there was a HUGE tank in the middle with tons of fish, turtle, sharks, etc.

Here are some of the cute penguins:

There were also jellyfish, tropical fish, seals, and seadragons!  And of course, this Giant Pacific Octopus!  I think I was lucky to get this shot since it was very dark and shortly after this shot, the octopus hid in the back.

Aquariums are fun, aren’t they??  Next time, though, I’m going whale-watching!!

Boston Duck Tour

August 31, 2009 | On our first day of the trip, Jen and I took the highly recommended Boston Duck Tour.   It’s essentially a tour bus that can go into water and become a boat!  Towards the second half of the tour, we splashed into the Charles River.  From there, I snapped some shots of some bridge.  I thought the stone (or whatever it is) looked pretty cool.

I also learned, it’s rather difficult to take really good pictures from a bus.  Plus, I forgot to bring my wide-angle lens. Arg!!   Oh well, lesson learned.

The Best Show on Earth

July 25, 2009 | I may not have had to travel very far for this, but the group we saw traveled!  I saw the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey’s for the first time (that I can remember) roughly 5 years ago in Dallas, so it’s been long enough.    We had pretty good seats (thanks to Marc!) but I learned that it is still very difficult to take pictures at a circus!  The bright, flashing lights, people running/riding/jumping all over the place…it’s tough.

I took this one before the show actually started. We were walking around enjoying the pre-show entertainment, so I didn’t have a chance to put on my wide-angle lens. So, this is actually a self-stitched photo! How’d I do? It’s not perfect, so if you look for it, you can see where it doesn’t line up exactly.

As you can see, the performers asked for some child volunteers, lined them up the middle, and juggled between them! Fun, haha.  I’d like to mention that while I enjoyed the show, holy crap, the food was expensive.   Good thing they only come once a year!

Here are the rest of the circus pictures on flickr.

The Oasis in Austin

July 19, 2009 | I can always remember Bill’s birthday because it’s exactly one week after mine.  In fact, when we were both in Austin, we often celebrated our birthdays together!  Good times.  This year, Marc,  Sean, Amanda, and I went on a overdue road trip to Austin.  This time, one of my best friends from high school, Monica, took a bus down from Dallas to Austin to meet up with us!

The morning after going out to 4th street, a small group of us went to the Oasis for some brunch.  I hadn’t been back since before the renovations (2006) and wow, it has really expanded!  There hadn’t been rain in awhile, so the lake’s water levels were low, but it was still a lovely view, especially when you compare it with the flatness of Houston!  Monica was nice enough to join me as I walked around the restaurant and snapped some shots.

I took a few shots of this statue, and while this one is a little bit 2D for me, the background worked out better than the other shots.    You see that strip of land towards the bottom left?  Usually there’s no strip of land there and it’s all water!

More photos from the Austin trip at flickr.

Kemah Boardwalk – Boat at night

What I love about DSLRs is it’s ability to take a clear photo at night and nicely illuminate the subject (with, of course, the use of a tripod).

This image has not been lomo-ized (ha, I made up a word…or did I?).   My biggest complaint about my point-and-shoot has always been about the amount of noise in my low-light photos so, this is a huge improvement!!

Kemah Boardwalk – Amusement Rides

Haha, I realized I’ve shown mostly water pictures and none of the actual boardwalk.  Soo, here’s the view we got as we were approaching the boardwalk from the parking lot.

We didn’t go on any of the Kemah Boardwalk amuseument rides– kinda pricey anyway, but there were lotta people with their kids enjoyingthe rides!  Oh yea, and there’s a wooden rollar coaster.  I’ve been on a wooden rollar coaster once.  I sat in the front with my friend Micah and I was TERRIFIED.  Haven’t been on another one since, haha.

Anyway,  as you can see, it’s very amusement park-ish and touristy.  The palm trees amuse me…like we’re in Florida or something, haha.

Lights under the dock

This is one of the first shots I took once I set up my tripod.  The colors turned out pretty cool, right?

I’m not even sure exactly where all the colorful lights are from, haha.  It was still bright outside, but I was taking a shot of the area under a raised area of the docks.  Probably another restaurant.

You see the handrail in the back?  That’s another one of the many restaurants on the boardwalk.  I hear the restaurants on the boardwalk are generally average and nothing spectacular, but I guess that’s not terribly shocking.  We eventually ate at one of these restaurants, which I’ll eventually write about on my foodblog (just moved it to wordpress!).

Kemah Boardwalk – Fishing

I have no idea who these people are but they sure looked like they were enjoying themselves!  They were fishing pretty close to the boardwalk and while they did seem to catch some fish, I enjoyed watching the fish that jumped out of the water by themselves (so did the seagulls)!

Doesn’t the water look nice?  I love the deep blue of the water!

Photojojo

I follow very many blogs but one of my favorites is Photojojo.  It has great tips, advice, and project ideas for photography, as well as some fun photography gadgets from their Photojojo store!  Check it out–

Super Secret Spy Lens ($50-55)

The Bad-Ass Bowler Camera Bag ($50)

Eye-fi Wi-fi Card

There’s more cool stuff they sell, but these 3 are the highest on my wishlist!