Boston: The Experience
After spending a few days in Boston - and more importantly, spending a few minutes at home resting after the long ride back - it’s time to write about the trip! Overall it was an excellent experience… it was nice to see a few of my friends that are living out in Boston, and it was also nice to bring a few of my friends out there with me to experience First Night!
Night 0: The Trip Out
Oh man… not going to lie, leaving at midnight to drive over night was trippy. Geoff prefers to drive at night, so I was alright with letting him. The trip out was going well… until part of 90 was closed. My new Garmin GPS scored major bonus points with me right then. As we were being forced off the thruway, all I had to do was press the ‘detour’ button, and it calculated the route to the next exit. Sweet.
Getting in around 6am was actually not as much fun as I would have liked. We were able to find a Dunkin’ Donuts to grab a breakfast… of course, the first person we met when we got out of the car was a beggar. Heh, I guess you can’t win them all. After eating we headed back to the hotel - but check in wouldn’t be until about noon. A dilemma.
When we got to the hotel, I walked in and asked the first person (mistake) that was working when the earliest I would be able to check in would be. The person responded try around noon. So, I walked back to the car and chatted with the guys - and they reminded me that I didn’t ask the more important question - could we at least park there? So, I went back in, and talked to an actual desk person. She immediately gave me the room keys, and checked me in… at about 7:30 am. Thank god too, I was freakin’ tired.
Day 1: The Sam Adams Brewery Tour
We all took a quick nap until about 11am, after resting we were ready to tackle our first destination. The Sam Adams Brewery Tour. Now, I have been on several brewery tours now… and I will admit that this was one of the least personal (read: big) tours I’ve ever had. However, this tour was also one of the best I have ever been on. I believe the key thought here is free swag. We got the standard tour (which, almost every brewery spews the same “this is how we make beer” speech), but the Sam Adams tour did something really nice. When we got ready for the tastings, they gave us free 4oz. glasses. Yes, actual glass.
Now, the better part of the tour was the free beer (I suppose that is the better part of any brewery tour). The tasting room is set up similar to a normal bar. It has a few tables spread around, and a tap towards the front of the room. The tour groups are big enough that the way they serve is to pour several pitchers and pass them around (this worked to our advantage). Normally a group is able to taste 4 beers. However, we had a keg snafu that allowed us to only have 3. Yet, I was still happy. We stood in a position that when the pitchers were being passed along, we were standing at the end of 2 pitchers’ paths. This was a good thing, as the pitchers were still about 1/4 full when they reached the three of us, and nobody ever wanted more!
The 3 beers that we were able to sample was the standard Boston Lager, the Winter Ale, and the Double Bock. Lets just say, we had much more then the 4oz. tasting of all of them… especially the Double Bock. In all the tour was great. Our guide was charismatic and funny. At the end of the tour I asked him how he got the job. He responded “I put my resume on monster“. Damn.
Night 1: Getting our Drink on
We spent far too long looking for a bar. The real problem was that we were exploring the city trying to find somewhere to go - but no place really looked the appetizing to us. Eventually we ended up going Big City and checking out the bar there. It was a place that Jay took me last time I was in Boston. Overall it was a hit with Brian, but since they don’t serve liquor there, Geoff was a little disappointed. We spent a few hours there and caught most of the Patriots’ 16th win. Good for them, at least, that’s what I made it look like while I was there - secretly I was hoping they would lose.
On a crazy note, I ran into my friend Jesse from Pool Club. I had turned around from the bar and thought I recognized him, I immediately called Zack to find out if he knew where Jesse was co-oping. Of course he had no idea, but eventually I said screw it and just yelled his name out to see if he turned around. He did, and we chatted for a while. Small world eh?
Day 2: Visiting the Friends
I was fortunate enough to be able to catch up with a few of my friends in Boston (although, I did miss meeting up with several, maybe next time!). I split off from Brian and Geoff to get a chance to visit with Morgan for lunch. We went to a little place called the Rattlesnake. Overall the food was alright, but nothing special. It was nice to catch up with her, as always, and I had a blast.
After lunch we caught the new National Treasure movie. The movie was alright, and it was great to hang out with her more, but that really screwed up my plans for later that night (I didn’t think it would). It turns out that Jay was waiting for me to call him to give the all clear to meet up with us (Brian, Geoff and I) that evening. The problem is, I took that to mean he would leave his place (in Boston) to meet up with us. What it really meant was when I called he would catch the commuter rail in to Boston (from his parents) to catch up with us later. When I did finally get in touch with him, it was far too late for him to get a train easily. So, it was time for the Garmin to save the day again!
We got dinner at a place in his home town. I don’t recall the exact name, but it was a slightly upscale grill. The food was pretty decent, and it was great to see Jay and Des (Jay’s girlfriend) again. We all chatted for a while until the weather started to get bad, so we headed back to the city. When we got back we spent the night just relaxing in the hotel.
Day 3: Best Dinner Ever
Boston has a fairly impressive New Years Eve event called First Night. We spent most of the day wandering around downtown Boston looking at ice sculptures and seeing street events. Nothing of huge remark really… however… dinner was nice.
FiRE + iCE has to be one of the coolest restaurants I have ever been to. Jay and Morgan both recommended it, so we had to give it a try. We arrived right after dinner started, so we were able to avoid most of the crowd. Now, to sum up what this place is like, is difficult. They describe themselves as “an improvisational grill”. This is accurate. It is essentially a central hibachi grill. Located around the middle of the room, the is various ‘bars’ where you can grab your ingredients. You get the pieces of whatever meal you want, and bring it to the center grill, where the chefs cook it up. They have everything from chicken, to seafood, the hamburger meat. They also had pretty much every kind of vegetable I would ever want. It was awesome.
The experience at FiRE + iCE was amazing. The chefs were not quite as showman-esque as the hibachi grills that I have visited here, but they didn’t need to be! They had personality, and interacted with all the patrons. In addition they had semi-loud music playing in the background. Normally at its level I would think of it as a bad thing, but it just added to the ambiance of the restaurant. This was definatly a dinner I will not soon forget.
Night 3: New Years Eve
This was my first New Years in a different city. This was the first New Years where I was also out on the town. Overall it was nothing seriously remarkable. I enjoyed seeing two very well done fireworks displays. The night was a little high tension, especially after Brian and Geoff got into an argument trying to figure out what we should do that night. Overall, the night was nice. Fireworks won out over heavy drinking, and I am okay with that. I enjoyed meeting a couple girls that made the night at least a little bit more enjoyable. I will never meet either of them again, because I never got any contact info - but they hung out with us when we went to see the fireworks. Overall the New Years went well and although I wonder if I should have just hosted another party here, it was nice to do something I have never done before.
Day 4: The Drive Home
The worst part about Boston is that it is so damn long a drive. The worst part of that is that when there is a winter storm advisory, it is a pain in the ass trying to get back. We got about half way out of Massachusetts until we hit the storm. The roads were poorly prepared or maintained, and we were never able to get over about 40mph until we reached New York. It was amazing though, once we hit New York, the roads were in great condition, and the weather started to break. The closer we got to Rochester, the weather got worse, but the roads remained good. So, we were able to make it back in a little over 7 hours.
In all, a memorable trip. I think I still need a few days to digest everything, but I had fun.