WiFi obtained 8.45am at Dunkin Donuts! The blog has been posted yaay! (1936 Road map – see story below )

It’s a great experience to pass through a great city on a bicycle. So many stresses that you associate with a visit like this just disappear – traffic jams, parking, routes, all the car-stress in fact. That was precisely how I felt today exploring Boston. (It’s a very picture-heavy blog, unsurprisingly. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.)

• Today’s Distance (miles): 48
• Time in saddle: 4h 20
• Max/min temp – in sun (°c): 45°/21°
• Climbing (feet) :690
• Calories used: 3,800
• Today’s 2nd Breakfast: Sandpipers Cafe, Ocean Blvd, Jenness Beach
• Cafe time: 3h 44

(During the morning I was still on the hunt for a paper road map. NOWHERE sells them any more. A woman in a gas station said, when I asked if they had road maps, ‘Say, a what?’ I repeated it. ‘’But for WHAT?’ She asked. ‘For having a map!! I said, running out of ways to explain myself. She looked really annoyed. ‘Uh-uh, don’t have ‘em. Bye now,’ she said..more on the map hunt later in today’s post…)

Beth and I had a lovely breakfast together – she prepared bacon and eggs and toast with great coffee – and we chatted, mostly about what life had been like for her during lockdown, and how it’s changed how her life is now. Like a lot of people, Beth said that it was a chance to re-evaluate her priorities. I was already in a great mood having woken to find that I had (temporarily at least a) dodged the weather system I mentioned being concerned about yesterday. Beth had a cycling trip coming up that also looked less rain-threatened, so we shared a merry mood, and I even got the uke out for bit of Steely Dan by mutual choice. She then went to work and I let myself out with my fully loaded bike panniers now stuffed with freshly-laundered clothes. So nice. Thank you, Beth.

Today was BOSTON day! I’ve looked forward to it for quite some time as it’s probably one the very few major US cities that I never played a concert in.

After following the Main Street I turned off onto a smooth-surfaced, flower-lined bike path for several miles heading south.

As I reached the very end of this lovely stretch I got the chance to post a picture just for Susie., who loves a violent colour clash – I’m only sorry not to have included some brilliant orange.

I quickly got to the bike-friendly bridge I’d researched, which went past the HQ of Converse the shoe manufacturer.

I met up with this cool dude, riding a rental bike but about to cycle north to where I came from yesterday, the stunning New Hampshire coast. He was one of four random people or groups of people that came right to me today and asked for a photo, or, twice, a video. ‘Just talk to me about your trip!’ one guy said. ‘Well,….’

I told him to look out for places like this one on the A1A:

As soon as I hit the city proper I felt a burst of energy, the way you do arriving somewhere really special. I had such a great time nipping (yes, even fully loaded I have been known to ‘nip’) along the many bike paths. If you see an interesting street, you just take it. If it turns out to be one-way, you just wheel yourself along the sidewalk.

I was using a very un-urgent shopping need to make myself explore Boston in a very unstructured way. I knew I wanted a road map. No shop sold them, I now knew, so I got the names of two secondhand bookshops a mile or two apart. I spent time in both but the first one said ‘Try Brattle Book Shop, that’s your best bet’. Best of all was just making up the route there and seeing what happened. The bike routes were absolutely wonderful, wide and really safe. Thank you, Boston. Here comes a photo-burst (I love using the ‘Gallery’ feature for these when I have good Wi-Fi, but it’s very slow on a day like today! So it’s lots of regular pics instead)

I did actually get to the bookshop, and it was well worth the journey. There was a plaque outside with a story that made me think of Meg Ryan’s bookshop in ‘You’ve Got Mail’

When I asked about maps, the man at the counter showed me a plastic crate full of old, miscellaneous maps and told me they were all $1. I tipped them all out on a handy wooden desk and found exactly what I needed: The Shell Road Map of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island. Printed in 1936. Also one of Florida possibly from an old National Geographic. Then the most unexpected find came right at the bottom of the pile. The one and only non-US or Canadian map was a tourist’s guide map to ‘The REAL London, Islington’. This happens to be the part of London where I grew up, and the map included the location of the house we lived in, which felt very serendipitous.

After about 3 hours of exploring Boston i decided to press on. Following more bike routes most of the way I headed out of the city to the southeast through an area called Dorchester. I managed to get a photo of my Dorset flag at a familiar intersection.

Finally arriving at Wompatuck State Park I was told by the very friendly guy at the desk that I couldn’t be allowed in as I hadn’t booked in advance. The camp was by far the most massive and deserted I have yet come across, and this poor guy was having to tell me that the rules were quite strict. Seeing my frustration he went out on a limb and booked me in anyway. I told him to tell his boss that the rule was absurd for turn-ups like me when they were empty, and to say I was on a charity bike ride if that made any difference. I thought it might help get him off the hook. A quick shower at the ‘Bath House’, followed by a cooking-free supper of cold pizza, Fritos and just-about-cold beer..and then an early night.

GREAT OLD SIGNS:

SIGNS THAT ARE FUNNY AND INCLUDE UKES: