US, road trip - epilogue

We had a great time during our road trip. Saw a lot of places and experienced many new things. If we had any surprises during the trip they were only positive surprises. Everything went as planned, or even better.

We could combine every thing we love into this vacation: nature, whales, history, science, sights, shopping...

We came back home really exhausted but satisfied. This was really a vacation worth going to.
I highly recommend.

Yes, the allergies bothered me a bit. With wall-to-wall carpets and air conditioning in the hotelrooms that was a thing to be expected.

US, road trip, Day # 14 - Boston

The last day. Boston. We just went to hang in Boston and decided to visit the Aquarium so we would not be in the sun the whole day. The Aquarium visit was okay and was much more educational than I had expected. I thought I knew a lot of climate change and stuff related to that, but the information that jellyfish can actually survive well also in warmer water, where fish do not survive. So we end up with having much more jellyfish in the oceans, eating up the fish eggs.

Again we headed to Quincy Market to get something to eat and watched some really great performers near the Quincy Market area.

In the late afternoon it was time to head to the Boston Logan Airport and back home.

US, road trip, Day # 13 - Cambridge/ Harvard & Boston

So it was time to head back to Boston area. Before Boston we stopped at Harvard campus. The campus area was very beautiful and perhaps also really educationally inspiring. But the parking fees in the neighbourhood are outrageous..

Then it was time for a Mall visit and some shopping and eating. We also found a grocery store that had some great organic products. In the matter of fact almost every food item in that store was organic food. Cool!

And again we headed to the hotel pool area. Someone had probably upgraded our reservation and we ended up a really cool two bedroom, two bathroom suite in the suite hotel...

US, road trip, Day # 12 - New York & Hartford

Well, when you are in New York, you have to make some shopping. First we headed to Times Square and then to some other shopping areas. It took an hour to get out from a toy store and we did not even buy anything from there..

New York was a really nice surprise (even though hot and moist, but we knew already before, that summer is not the best time to visit New York). It was less crowded that I had imagined and really clean. Even my son loved the place. In his words: "When we come back here, I want to see the Freedom Tower, when it is finished." And yes he said "when" not "if"..

In the afternoon we headed for Hartford. We thought we could hit the road before the rush hour, but did not. So the 2-hour ride took us 4 hours and we headed to the hotel. We saw only a few of Hartford but it look a lot different than the Hartford in Gilmore Girls (the tv-serie..).

US, road trip, Day # 11 - New York

It was time for serious sighseeing. We attended a guided tour that had a New Jersey pick-up from our hotel. We had to get up early though.

It was a very pleasant 5 hour ride. We stopped at Central Park, Rockefeller Center, St. Paul´s Cathethral, Greenwich Village and Ground Zero. And saw even more places during the bus drive. Famous buildings, the places where some celebrity live etc. Our tour guide Bill was really great and had some great stories of New York, New Yorkers and history. After the bus drive we got the tickets to the ferry and headed to Liberty Island to visit Lady Liberty herself. We even managed to get tickets into the statue and got to go to see the scenery up from the Statue of Liberty. The top of the statue cannot be visited anymore, but we had a huge luck of getting these tickets, since they are very hard to get.

After a long day in New York and the Liberty Island we stepped into the ferry and headed back to New Jersey. Really exhausted but many experiences richer.

US, road trip, Day # 10 - New York

And then it was time for the Big Apple. We stayed in a hotel in New Jersey Waterfront. It was a short drive with the Path train to New York. Since we arrived to New York in the early afternoon, we headed first to Empire State building and decided that the rest of the attractions we would take by a bus tour the next day. We had an hour wait until we headed to the 86th floor of the worlds 4th tallest office building. I am a bit afraid of the heights, but it wasn´t that bad at all. And the scenery was unbelievable. You could really see the Chrysler Building way better from there that you could ever imagine.

Then it was time for some shopping (had to buy a pair of those heelys, shoes with heels, that every kid seem to have for my son) and headed back to the hotel.

US, road trip, Day # 9 - Philadelphia

We left Washington DC in the morning and arrived Philadelhia by noon. We were done with the walking and since it was + 30 degrees Celsius outside and no clouds in the sky we took the tour in the old city in a horse carriage. It was nice and the driver managed to tell us a lot from the history of Philadelhia in 35 minutes. After that we still visited the Liberty Bell and walked to the oldest street of Philly that still exists, Elfreth Alley.

The pool and jacuzzi at the hotel had nice, warm water, so the rest of the evening we spent again in the water.