Sons and Daughters of Liberty

I was so excited to have the chance to explore Boston.  I've never been there but took an interest in the Boston Tea Party as a child.  I think I thought it was so brave and courageous of those people to rebel and stand up for themselves.  We had a campground about 45 minutes outside of the city, about 20 minutes from a train station, so we made 2 trips into the heart of Boston.

We decided to fork out the money for the Tea Party reenactment based on the reviews online.  Everyone raved about it!  They gave AJ a hard time for wearing red to such an event.  It went over his head, but I think the boys grasped a little bit about what they heard and saw.  They definitely enjoyed tossing "tea" into the harbor from the ship we were on.

We had to decide between Plymouth Rock, another day in Boston or going out to the Cape.  We opted for another day in Boston where we saw the beautiful botanical gardens, a historic cobble stone street and the Cheers bar.  It was uncharacteristically hot in Boston for this time of year, but it was a really fun experience that didn't disappoint.

In between our 2 Boston days we drove down to Rhode Island to tour The Breakers Mansion, a Vanderbilt property.  To our surprise the boys really enjoyed the audio-tour (they have a great family friendly one).  Baby A was more interested in seeing how many ropes she could slip past, leaving Jon and I scrambling to grab her before she did some multi-million dollar damage.  I found it ironic that we were touring a massive home that someone once lived in while we, ourselves, are living in one of the smallest homes possible.  I can't even imagine living with all that space, and all those chandeliers.

New England

I'm not entirely sure how to share about our journey through New England, except for this: I wish we had more time.  From the moment we crossed the border into New Hampshire we were met with beauty and outdoors that make you want to go exploring.  

    

     Crossing the border back into the U.S. was the typical process.  A series of simple questions made to feel intimidating through tone and choice of words from a sunglasses shielded customs agent who proceeded to make us go into our trailer to remove all of the produce, including items purchased in the U.S. a few days prior.  Once released we quickly turned east following a side road along gorgeous farm land in the greenest of rolling hills.  I imagine Ireland offers a similar experience.  Ironically, this side road is less than 50 feet from the Canadian border, which has no fence whatsoever.  On the right are Vermont farms, and to the left, sitting there in Canada, is a neighborhood of suburban style housing with backyards butting up to the border - with no fences at all!  What was the whole point of grilling me at the border if Canadians can simply walk out of their backyard to buy maple syrup across the street from the farm stand in the United States with no border enforcement at all?  

    Our first stop was a rustic campground in White Forest National Forest, on the narrow north end of New Hampshire.  Though only their for one night, we managed a short and unremarkable hike near the campsite.  Unremarkable as it was, a hike is always a great way to start the day before being on the road for hours and hours.  The end of a long day on the road brought us to Bar Harbor, Maine.  Between Acadia National Park and the actual town itself, this small island alone offered more to see and do then our 3 night stay would allow.  We enjoyed an absolutely incredible hike on Acadia's eastern shoreline, with wave crashed sheer cliffs and beautiful views throughout.  We enjoyed our first Maine lobster dinner, a short bike ride from our campground to a typical outdoor-seating only lobster pound restaurant.  We decided to bike it all home and eat there, avoiding the ever present mosquitoes.  Each of the three children tried the lobster and steamed clams.  

     

     Said AJ after one bite of the lobster, "This is good.  I like Maine lobster!" 

     "Would you like some more?"

     "No, no more."  After a single bite.  I'm not exactly sure why he said he likes it.

Following Bar Harbor we made our way to Kennebunk(port).  Beautiful Bed and Breakfasts line the road the entire way along the coast, and I understood why the slogan "Vacationland" is displayed on Maine's license plates.  It really is a wonderful place to visit, when the season is right.  I'm convinced that absent tourism, Maine would be a few small fishing towns and the rare trapper living deep in the woods.  I guess it's still that, but there are just so many B&Bs its ridiculous.  

Our final visits were to Boston and Newport, Rhode Island.  But perhaps those locations will be better shared in a separate post.  

From a Child's Mind

[When asked if the boys would like to contribute by doing their own blog post, this is what they shared]  :)

AJ: Do you remember the campground where I first started kindergarten?  It had a road over here and woods and a lake down below [it was a river] and we walked over for school and when you came to meet us we were already coming back?  There were two mule deer in the green space, but no horns.
     What about the museum of the town that we just saw?  The town last night.  I mean the other night.  [Montreal]  In the museum there were blocks, a house thing, a trigger thing that brings blocks up that look like a Skya neck thing [robot arm].  And there's very cool stuff that has train tracks that you put balls on that do loop-a-loops and turn.  But sometimes they don't make it.

LJ: We dumped the balls down and they went in a loopy loop and then we grabbed the balls again.  Just... fun in the museum.

[Anything else, guys?]

AJ: When we was going to see those big faces on the rocks [Mt. Rushmore] and we saw white tailed deer.

[LJ, what was your favorite?]

LJ: White water rafting!  Cuz we was floating.  And them big waves were fun!   AAAAHHHGGGG!!!
   

Toronto

Toronto (Destination Z)

     We’ve heard that Toronto is a great city.  But what do you do with 3 little ones and a strict no dairy, no gluten, no corn, no sweeteners (natural or artificial), and no additives diet? (We are doing Whole 30)  Normally if there aren’t kid friendly activities we would find a cool restaurant in the heart of the city to experience.  Children’s museums don’t really give you a feel for the culture and walking around looking at the architecture just isn’t of interest to our kids. So, I did a little research and found that Toronto is one of the most bike friendly cities in Canada.  Meaning they not only have well designed bike lanes, but they also have completely separate bike trails that go through the entire city!  So, we threw the bike trailer and tandem bike attachment in the truck, packed a lunch and plenty of snacks, and hit the highway.  About a 30 minute drive from our campground was the heart of Toronto.  We found $15 parking, (our only expense other than gas for the day) and got the bikes ready to go.  They have a really nice trail that lines the water with a view of both the high-rises of the city and the green space of the Toronto Islands.  They have a number of amazing parks and gardens along the trail.  We ate lunch in the Music garden while the kids played with a little girl that was their “new friend”  before hitting the bike path again towards the outskirts of town where the natural space of Leslie Spit meets the urban streets of Toronto.  The views of the CN tower from Leslie Spit were beautiful.  The kids got a kick out of seeing the electric trolley, sailboats and trains all in the same place.  The NHL Hall of Fame and a trip to the top of the CN tower were two pricey "tourist" options we passed on without regret, as our bike ride was surely high up on our list of growing memories.  

Ottawa (an unplanned destination)

     Meant to break up the drive between Toronto and Montreal, I didn’t expect to do or see much while in Ottawa.  But, with an extra day planned we decided to head downtown and see the sights.  This one would be easy.  Our campground, Wesley Clover, was about 7 km from the nearest park and ride.  We thought the kids would enjoy riding the bus into town and we enjoyed saving on both gas and downtown parking costs.  I had read about the canals that Ottawa used to route water from Lake Ontario and its intricate lock system, but to see it for myself was so cool!  Check out the video below.  The lock system, which includes over 40 locks in total are all done by manual labor.  Men work the locks all day just cranking away while boats patiently wait to be raised or lowered enough to make it into the next lock.  Oh and to our pleasant surprise Canada has the Xplorer program, very similar to our own National Parks Junior Ranger program.  The kids loved it!!  We stuck around to see 2 boats make their way through two of the locks before heading over to our parliament tour.

Fortunately, Baby A fell asleep just before the tour started.  I wasn’t sure what she was going to do during the 45-minute tour of a government building, so her nap was perfectly timed.  The boys were so well behaved and curious about everything.  Did I mention that by the time we got to the ticket office all the English tours were booked?  Yes, we got a tour in French.  Fortunately they have pamphlets that explain a lot of it, and I was able to decipher a few words here and there from the guide (with my 2 years of  high school French from 15 years ago) and the information in the booklet to make sense of the tour.  We ended the tour with an elevator ride to the top of the Peace Tower.  It gave beautiful views of the surrounding area, including the other side of the river where Quebec lays.

Montreal (Destination AA)

     Though I just mentioned we tried to avoid such destinations as Children's Museums when in a new, and very unique, city for only a day, that's just what we did in Montreal.  And surprising to us was the culture was evident in this Children's Science Center as much as it was in the city.  For example, there was an exhibit in the anatomy/biology section that automatically played a video on a monitor when someone walked by.  This video described the changes both boys and girls endure during puberty, with video evidence.  And there is AJ, staring at the screen trying to make sense of two naked bodies as we walk up behind him.  Shocked at what we saw, we quickly hurried him along to join his siblings in the "climb inside" womb, where children could experience what it was like to once be in their mothers.  There's wild stuff in French-Canada, for sure.  
     We also made our way to the entry of the Notre Dame Basilica, unfortunately 5 minutes after closing.  If we ever make it back, we'll be sure to see in person what we our told is an absolutely extraordinary interior.  
     We finished off our visit with a short bus ride to the Monument to Sir George-Étienne Cartier and its Friday evening drum circle.  This is where thousands of people gather to hear the off beat combination of a dozen or more hand rapped drums while clouding the entire park with various forms of pot smoking.  Everyone seemed to be having a good time, but it wasn't exactly a scene for the kids.  We made our way across the street to the park with a large playground and let the young ones do what they like best - play.  
     Montreal ended up being a day very much geared toward pleasing the kids.  And while we don't feel we really got to see the city beyond walking its streets for a short while, we did very much enjoy watching the smiles on the faces of our children.