At the end of August, I travelled to Cambridge, MA for the IEEE-NCA 2012 conference, where I was presenting a paper on our LooCI middleware. After the conference, we took a short holiday to Boston and New York.
Cambridge was nice. We stayed at the Hotel Marlowe near MIT overlooking the Charles River. Some of the food and drink highlights included lunch at Legal Seafood and Brunch at the Cambridge Brewing Company, a prize-winning brew pub in Kendall square. The food was good and the beer was great. The best beer was their 'summer barleywine', which had a gentle whisky-like taste.
Caren Tastes Samples of the CBC Beers
The hotel also had free Kayak rental, so we hired a couple of kayaks to cruise the Charles River. Here's a few shots.
Ready to Go!
Across the River to the Boston Skyline
Rail Bridge Linking Boston to Cambridge
After the conference, we went into Boston itself, following the historic 'Freedom Trail', which covers Bostons revolutionary history. Here are a few shots:
The Old State House, Site of the Boston Massacre
Historic Quincy Market is now a Food Court
Refuelling with a Cookie Sandwich at Boston Market
The Bunker Hill Memorial
On Sunday night, it was the feast of St. Anthony, which means a big party in Boston's North End. We had a great dinner at a famous family-run restaurant called Giacomo's. The restaurant doesn't accept reservations and because of the feast there was an hour long queue on the street, but by dumb luck Caren and I were the only party of two, so when a couple of seats came up overlooking the kitchen, we walked straight in.
Police Band on Parade
The Boston Skyline at Night
Our Seats Overlooking Giacomo's Kitchen
From Boston, we travelled by Amtrak along the New England coast to Larchmont, NY where we spent a lovely few days with Julie, Tucker and Lucy. They were wonderful hosts. Lucy had grown so much since our last visit:
Lucy Eating Strawberries and Cheese -- Yum!
Our last three days were spent in New York City. Where we spent our time walking the city, eating, drinking and relaxing. Here are the photos:
Views from the Highline Park, a Nice Place for a Stroll
View of Midtown from the Rooftop Pool of the Holiday Inn
On our first night in New York, we went to a taping of the Colbert Report, which was great fun and then had a few drinks at the relaxing Sky Terrace of the Hudson Hotel.
Queueing at the Colbert Studio
Caren with her Ticket for Colbert
Cocktails on lawn chairs at the Sky Terrace
View from the Sky Terrace
We had a lot of great food in Manhattan, but two meals stand out above the rest: breakfast at Les Halles and lunch at David Chang's Momofuku
First morning: breakfast at Anthony Bourain's old restaurant Les Halles. It was great!
Best lunch: ginger scallion noodles at MomoFuku -- good noodles, great buns.
On our last day, we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge, had pizza at Grimaldi's famous pizza restaurant and attended the Friday night beer tasting in Brooklyn Brewery.
Walking the Brooklyn Bridge
We had great pizza at Grimaldi's - the white building under the bridge.
The Brooklyn Brewery in Williamsberg
Beer Tasting: try the BAM and the Sorachi Ace!
It was a great trip, Boston was very friendly and I don't think I will ever get tired of New York. Now I have to get back to the gym to work of all that nice food and drink.
