Marlene flew into Boston a week ago. It was a non-stop flight but she was in Coral Springs FL the night before, with her brother, and had to leave at 4am to get back to Ft Myers to catch her 11am flight. So she was tired. But she was all smiles when she came through the door into the baggage area. It was her first time in Boston and we hadn’t seen each other for 3 weeks, so she was pretty energized.

I barely made it to the terminal to meet her. One of the tunnels to the airport was closed for repair and traffic was both heavy and detoured. I missed a turn to get to the terminal and ended up in the swarm of cars heading back into Boston. It was about a 15-minute mistake. But I made it.

I gave her a driving tour of Boston and Cambridge, highlighting points of interest that I didn’t think we would see otherwise. We drove past MIT and Harvard and lesser points of interest in Cambridge before heading to Worcester. We stopped for some groceries, got her settled in and had a simple home-cooked spaghetti dinner. Then to bed.

Monday, after a late wakening and breakfast, I gave her a driving tour of Worcester and environs. We had a light lunch at Friendly’s, an old-fashioned New England restaurant chain, went to an early movie then drove to Foxwoods to play the slots. I won $31, she lost about $100. I hadn’t been to Foxwoods in over 20 years. It was sparsely attended and the energy that I remembered was missing. Maybe New England has reached its gambling saturation point?

We arrived back in Worcester around 3am on Tuesday, so, not surprisingly, we slept in Tuesday morning. The car had sprung a slow leak in the right rear tire so I spent some time Tuesday afternoon arranging to get it fixed. Then we went to see my old college roommate, Roger, and his wife, Nancy. We walked to Filho’s Cucina in Groton Center for a wonderful dinner. I had a fettucine/artichoke dish that was out of this world. Marlene had a salad with roasted chicken that she liked very much. Wonderful dinner! Highly recommended. The walk was very pleasant, too. Groton is a beautiful old colonial town.

Wednesday was a BIG tourism day. We drove to the Alewife Station on the MBTA Red Line and took the subway to Boston Common. We walked the Freedom Trail, taking pictures and generally enjoying a beautiful 75-degree sunny day. The kind of day we never get in the summer in Ft Myers.

We saw most of the historic sites on the trail, then took a lunch break at Quincy Market: chinese food and clam chowder. We walked to Old Ironsides (aka USS Constitution) and toured both it and the ARC Gloria, a Columbian Navy tall ship. By that point we had logged about 7 miles of walking. But Marlene wanted to see the nearby Bunker Hill Monument, so we walked up the hill to the monument, then climbed its 294 steps to the top. It would be fair to say that we were tired but we continued on, walking to the MBTA Orange Line. We took the subway to the South End to have dinner with Marlene’s friends, John and Steve. We dined at Five Horses Tavern. Good beer but mediocre food. Then John and Steve drove us to the Red Line and we made out way back to Worcester.

A VERY full day.

Total Wednesday steps: 15,383. About 8 miles!

Thursday was more sightseeing, but less walking. We traveled to Lexington to see the Buckman Tavern and Lexington Green. But the tavern was charging $12 to enter and I judged that it was not worth the price, so we just walked the grounds then headed to Concord. There we drove the entire length of Battle Road Trail, but our main destination wat the North Bridge which is generally regarded as where the American Revolution began as it was the first time the colonists fired on the British Army, killing 3.

We had dinner at Burton’s Grill in Westford, with my old friends Barb and Bob. Wonderful dinner, wonderful social evening.