Boston's 4th of July

Happy 4th of July!

For the 4th of July, we tried to do it Bostonian style and fill the whole day with activities here in the "Birthplace of Freedom". I will admit that I took almost no pictures, so this may be a bit dry.

We packed up and rode the train into town. Up at the Coast Guard base there was a festival for military members and their families, so we walked up there will another HPSP scholarship recipient from our ward. There were fun things to do there, free food, face painting and a live band. I haven't heard country music in FOREVER and it was nice to hear some of that.

Lee, Kaela, Chris and Gretchen

The kids had the most fun playing in some dirty puddle in the parking lot.

While there the USS Constitution ("Old Ironsides") got taken out for its yearly turn around the river. Oldest commissioned warship in America. They drove right past the base and shot off their cannons in salute. It was deafening and way cool. (And the machine gun patrol boats on the side were a bit intimidating.) I would recommend that to anyone.

We toured the Coast Guard ship "Escanaba" that was docked there, but our tour guide was awful - he did a lot of "Behind that door is....but don't go in there". Other tours seemed better.

Then we walked over to the Esplanade - which normally would not have been too a long walk, but everything was blocked off and it turned out to be much longer than anticipated. The kids didn't mind as they all got a nap in then. Even early, the river was filled with every size and kind of boat imaginable. I don't think I'd like being in a kayak for 4 hours sitting and waiting.

Our plan was to stay on the Cambridge side of the river since it would be less crowded, but we were too worn out to walk all the way there. And a good thing because we found awesome seats right on the river

Kaela fell asleep right before the fireworks and woke up at the very end with the loudest bangs.

They estimate that 800,000 people attended the event along the river. Neither photo adequately describes the crowd, because the frame is only so large. To suffice, the entire four lane road was milling with people.

And then practically all of us took the subway home between 11:00pm and 1:00am. We missed several full trains and finally just pushed our way in to another. We got home a couple minutes before 1:00 and put Kaela to bed. We all slept well that night.