On the road: CT and Boston

By a stroke of luck and friendship, we had a spontaneous change of plans the next day to drive down to Connecticut to spend the night with one of my old friends, Christy, from college. After spending the larger part of the day trip-planning, thrift-shopping, and errand-running around Rhode Island, we finally made it to small-town Connecticut by evening for dinner at an Irish pub. 

In some ways, I felt just like old times -- Christy and I had met as roommates when we both studied abroad in London, and had spent a week traveling through Ireland. And now here we were almost 4 years later, eating fish and chips and bangers and mash again, only stateside this time. After dinner, we drove back to her house and spent the evening catching up, geeking out over such topics as movie soundtracks, BBC shows, photography, and travel, and then settled in for a comfortable night in her guest bedroom.

The next day, we had brunch at a little diner in a neighboring town, and then Christy took us to Clyde's Cider Mill, the oldest cider mill in the area. There we checked out the historic buildings, bought a bottle of spiced apple wine from the shop for later, and continued on our way.

The real Mystic Pizza, from the movie

Before heading back, we also took a stop in Mystic, CT, where the movie Mystic Pizza was based. Mystic was adorable and touristy, but had a nice little bookstore that we wandered around in for a while.

After that, it was time to part ways, and we left Christy to press north again, this time to the big city of Boston, MA.

Less than 2 hours from CT, we made it to Boston by evening and found our accommodations, a room we rented from Airbnb for $28 for the night (way cheaper than any motel in the area). Finding it was quite the adventure -- little did we know that Boston has many of the same street names on completely different sides of town! Eventually we found the flat though, and followed our host up about 6 flights of outdoor stairs to the very tippy top apartment of a sort of row house.

Our host was high as a kite, but extremely happy and hospitable, and after he showed us around we never saw him again. It was just as well though, because after settling in, we were off once more into the city downtown area to meet a couple of my friends. Parking was the worst I've seen in my life -- every single parallel space was under some sort of residential permit, and everything else was metered or timed. It took us over 40 minutes to find a space, and put us both in a terrible mood.

As soon as I saw my longtime friend Jeremy, however, the world seemed a better place again and all was well. We had dinner at Tibetan restaurant and then, despite it being quite freezing outside, we walked a few blocks down to meet with my other friend from college, Fabio, for ice cream. It was a nice, low-key, and enjoyable night catching up with old pals.

Deep in the canyon of Downtown Boston

The next day, we packed up and departed our Airbnb home, and ventured into downtown Boston to check out some places my friends had recommended. Once again, parking was absolute hell, and after wasting the better part of an hour driving around, we caved in and spent $16 for a parking garage.

Once we were able to get out and walk around though, it was almost worth the big bucks. We wandered the indoor markets that served food from around the world, explored a massive comic shop that spanned two floors, drank coffee as we wove our way through a labyrinth, walked around the Boston Aquarium, and strolled the harbor at sunset. 

After a delicious dinner at a local burger joint, we found our way to our next couch surfing home, a couple who lived right near downtown in a tiny but beautiful little apartment. They were watching The Amazing Race when we arrived, which seemed rather apropos with all our traveling, and I immediately knew they'd be fun to hang out with.

We spent the evening watching TV, sharing our apple spice wine from Connecticut, and swapping travel stories, before we all turned in for bed. They provided us with a queen sized inflatable mattress that literally took up their entire living room.

Before we left the next day, we signed a little couch surfing guest book they had left for us. It was full of little notes from people they'd hosted, and I couldn't help but think what a wonderful world community we enjoy as travelers. Even though we have our rough days of paying through the nose for parking, or getting frustrated when we get lost, or feeling insecure when we have to trust strangers, all of this pales in comparison to the rewards we gain through new perspectives and experiences. I felt incredibly lucky.