New England Vacation – Boston, Day 3

“Today is a new day, right, Dad?”

That is what I always tell Kai after he has had a bad day, usually because of some incident at school. This time he wanted confirmation after our angry exchange the night before.

Yes, Kai, today is a new day. Let’s make it a good one.

We had the cannoli we had bought for our dessert the night before.

They lived up to their hype.

And with that, the anger from yesterday was put behind us.

We started out our sightseeing with a Duck tour, practically a must for tourists in Boston. We got to see a lot more of the city than we would have otherwise.

Kai raised his hand when the driver asked if any kids wanted a turn at driving.

No, he did not drive us into the bridge.

And so we were off to a good start to the new day.

Next we went to the Museum of Science. As with the aquarium, this was not in my original plans for Boston, but Kai said he wanted to go.

They had a special exhibit on the making of the Pixar movies.

Kai wanted to get hands on with all of the exhibits.

There were times when he hovered over others who were on a particular exhibit and we had to redirect him to another one that was open, but he really enjoyed his time at the museum.

It was mid afternoon by the time he finally had his fill of the museum. I think my wife would have been happy to go back to the hotel at that point, but she and Kai indulged my wishes to go to the Public Garden and ride a swan boat.

We also saw the Make Way for Ducklings statues that honor the children’s story set in the Public Garden. My wife and I have fond memories of the book, but Kai didn’t remember even though we read it countless times when he was young.

We finally took a break back at the hotel.

And then we headed out for dinner. We were a little tired of seafood so we cancelled our reservation at Legal Seafood and instead went to Chinatown. We went to the most popular spot, where we had to wait about a half hour for a table. Kai was fine waiting as he had more time on the iPhone.

And the food was worth the wait.

For dessert, we found a Japanese pastry shop called Beard Papa’s. Their cream puffs are much lighter than the cannoli we had from Mike’s, but very good as well, in a very different way.

It was a good day.

But Kai is looking forward to leaving Boston tomorrow. Too much walking here. Too many people (though that may be true where we are headed as well). And a swimming pool awaits us at our next stop.