Spring Break Part 2 – Boston

We went from camping in Huntington to our yearly tax appointment and then packed our bags and Yosh and I (and our friends) headed to Boston.  I got Yosh this Boston trip as his Christmas gift this year.  It was a rough year for Yosh…losing his dad was hard.  And I knew that this was the perfect time to bring his dream trip to life! 
Yosh was raised a Boston fan.  Al was a huge fan…and it was imbedded into the Souza household. Al’s dream was to get to a game in real life…sadly it never happened.  Yosh’s dream was to bring his dad to The Garden to see a game…and sadly that didn’t happen.

When I was booking this trip I texted all of Yosh’s friends…to see if any of them would want to join us for the Boston trip and Celtics game. I thought having his buddies there would make up for his dad’s absence.  Luckily some of our best friends were able to make the trip…it was awesome.

We left LAX at 1:30pm and landed in Boston at 9:30pm Boston time.

We checked into our hotel and headed to the closest bar…looking for food with no luck…so we were satisfied with drinks!  Porters was the closes bar….and we pretended like we were regulars and that was our local.

The next day…Friday…the weather was meant to be cold, snowing BUT bearable and better than the projected Saturday weather. So we headed out for breakfast and then the Freedom Trail.  But first…we needed to find gloves! Our hands were freezing!

I was excited to find an Irish pub that served an Irish breakfast.  We had real rashers and sausage. Beans. Eggs. Fries. Toast. YUM!

The Freedom Trail is pretty darn amazing! Its an actual brick trail that leads you all around Boston. Passed through lots of the important historical sites in the city! Starts in Boston Commons, Massachusetts State House. Lots of monuments and stuff. It was beautiful 

Loved watching Yosh…his history brain going crazy!

Here are all the landmarks.

Park Street Church.

Granary Burying Ground.

Kings Chapel.

Benjamin Franklin Statue and Boston Latin School.

Starbucks stop. To warm up!

Old South Meeting House.

Site of Boston Massacre.

The snow fall was getting these Californians so excited. We were facetiming our kids so they could see snow fall in real time! haha How sad are we! haha  Also…sometimes staying on the trail was hard. We found ourselves in bakeries, wine shops, meat shops. haha

The holocaust memorial was very sad but beautiful.

 

Back on the trail…Paul Revere’s House. They wanted us to pay to go in and see it…yeah NAH we decided to NOT.

Old North Church. The place were Paul Revere put his light to signal the that the English were coming.

We then walked across the bridge…in the snow! We were almost done…and were just about needing to get back to our hotels to eat and freshen up before the basketball game.

Bunker Hill Monument.

We called it a day and headed back for the basketball game.  Our hotel was a stone’s throw away from TD Gardens. It was cool to just get to walk there.  And to see Yosh’s face was priceless.

And the reason for this trip…was Papa.  And the Celtics jacket that Yosh was wearing was also from someone very special to us.  A GREAT family friend, lost her husband a few years ago. He was from Boston and a HUGE Celtics fan.  She knew we were going to the game…and brought Yosh her husbands jacket.  Was an honor to wear Bob’s jacket.

Yosh was off and on emotional. He was so excited to be there, for an AWESOME game and kept thinking about the purpose.

As I posted on IG “I know Papa would have been his #1 pick for a date to this game but I hope he enjoyed his time here with me as much as I did!”

And Yosh thought of a very special gesture.  He brought a pictures of his dad. Wrote a special something on the back…and found the perfect place to hide it within the area.  Well almost perfect. haha He saw this picture of Larry Bird and Kareem…quickly stuck it behind the picture before security caught him.  Then realized the next picture of Larry and Magic would have been better…tried getting the picture out BUT he was there…for good!

Yosh loved getting to sneak into seats closer to the court. He loved walking around seeing TD Gardens. He was in heaven. And I know Al was with us that night…I could here his giggle and him clapping his hands and saying “Alright!”

It was  great game. Great night. 

The next day we woke up to snow. Lots of snow falling! It was so beautiful!  I felt like we were in a Christmas movie!  It was another day of wandering around Boston. Looking out the window of our restaurant and seeing the snow fall was seriously magical.   And since this trip was Yosh’s Christmas present it was only right that it snowed and felt like xmas.

We went back to finish the Freedom Trail…and took a tour on the USS Constitution. They had a pretty cool interactive museum too.

And Lt. Ward did a GREAT job with the tour  

My cute husband sneaking pictures of me…

Being in the snow was just so cool!! We were loving it.

The view from our hotel window. It was pretty cool!

So the goal for that night was to eat at the Bostonian. Shop for our kids. Then visit Cheers and do a bit of a pub crawl.

 

The Cheers bar was pretty cool. We go to see the set they used to film and Yosh was shocked how small it was in real life.  The place was pretty crowded, no seats but their music choice was awesome.  We stayed for a drink, maybe two. Bought the mugs and then headed to the next.

This is also where Yosh discovered snapchat and when your “drink gets stuck together!”

We went to a pub in Beacon Hill…and found out that Beacon Hill is like the hidden gem. The neighborhood was adorable!  If we go back I’d like to try and find a place in there to stay!  Few more pub stops…the snapchats were hilarious!

Heather started not feeling well…we put her to bed and continued our night. Haha. Met a bartender with cousins from Fontana! Yes…how weird is that!

More snapchats.

And calling it a night…

What a great trip!!! We saw so MUCH and enjoyed every second of it!  We were tired and ready to head home to our babies. But Boston..we will be back! And of course the weather was BEAUTIFUL the day we were heading home! haha BUT I have to say…the snow made the trip unique.

We had a WAAAAY cooler plane for our trip home. Our own tv’s which meant NOT reading happened…snoozing and movie’s! Yay!

And this trip would NEVER have been possible if it wasn’t for my amazing mother!! She stayed wit the kids for the 4 days we were away…taking such great care of them!!! We are blessed to have her help!  Thanks mom! ps. yeah Ella cried when Nana had to leave…she can’t get enough of her!