Friday Boston, Museum of Fine Arts

This morning was a bit of a disappointment. I found a place to try for my morning coffee and croissant that I had read about – about 10min walk away. The coffee was nice but the croissant had not been baked this morning. I came back to my apartment for more clothes and then went by the T – subway ( mostly below ground) to East Cambridge on the other side of the river. I had read about a river cruise company that was starting this weekend and then daily from the following weekend. I went to book. Trouble is, it is not starting till the following weekend. I should have picked up on the website that the dates for this weekend were incorrect by 1 day – probably last year. My next place to visit was the Museum of Fine Arts. It is on the T line that I had taken but there was a broken train on that line near the Museum so I had to walk further than I wanted to another line and then walk further than I wanted to the museum.

The museum has far too many interesting things to see in 1 day. It has an enlightened policy of allowing a second visit for free within 10days of the first. Once again, I concentrated on the 4 floors of American stuff . Some of the furniture and textiles took my fancy. Paul Revere , who rode off into the night to warn his mates of the impending British attack, was a silversmith and some of his work was on display, along with an interesting portrait of him by the American painter John Singleton Copley. Another painting I liked was ‘The (4) Daughters of Edward Darley Boit’ by John Singer Sargent.

I had a nice lunch in a large open room with 3 floors of space above us with a good view of this green palm tree 3 floors tall – except it was an amazing Chuhuly creation of green glass.

I looked at some interesting jewelry and , by accident, wandered into a room full of musical instruments. I had to take notes for today’s trivia. There is a thing called a ‘marine trumpet’. It is a long thin wooden box tapering to the top – about as tall as me, with a single string. It produces high harmonic notes by lightly touching the string and bowing the string close to the upper end of the neck. It produces a sound like a muted trumpet. Look it up if you don’t believe me.

I caught the T back and walked through what is called the Public Garden – bit boring name - next to the Boston Common. Boston Common , 19ha, was bought by the city from one of the first settlers in 1634 and used as a pasture, military drill ground, and gallows site. The Public Garden , 10 ha, was designed in 1869 and is more formal. The Ne end of the Boston Common is about 50m from where I am staying.. There is a pond, some statues of important people and a sculpture of Mother Duck and her ducklings in the Public Garden.

Then I thought it was afternoon tea time . I went to a different place to the morning’s stale croissant, and this time got some slightly stale ‘crème brule’ cake. A bit like a light vanilla flavoured cheesecake. I expressed surprise at the format – and was told that they do things differently in America. After that I gave up and decided my emergency rations of ryvita, cheese and tomato would be good for dinner.