From the shore to the mountains

Back home again after a flying overnight trip down to the North Shore suburbs of Boston.

En route down I made a side trip to Concord NH. Sitting at a stop light, I landed behind a Honda Civic hybrid. The license plate says it for itself, but if you can't read it, it says: BYEOPEC.


I've been in Vermont long enough to forget about rush hour traffic on Route 128... oh joy, so I got caught in that. Then getting to Marblehead from 128 means noodling around on 114 with locals wanting to get home and not wanting to be stuck behind a lost Vermonter. I got to the church on time and think the presentation went well.

But, heck, it's not that part that is interesting; it's the photos, right? This morning my hosts very kindly took me on a short driving tour of old Marblehead. There are loads of gorgeous 17th and 18th-century houses all nestled together on narrow winding streets.


It being a harbour, there are no beaches per se, just lots of rocks.


Walking around we noticed some snowdrops blooming up against a wall. It will be a month before I see them up here but it was hopeful to see this sign that spring is coming along.


This is looking across the water to Marblehead Neck. Apparently the painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware actually was painted here and every year they have a re-enactment of that crossing.


There's a whole colony of lobster shanties near the old fort. This one has a cool roof.


Lobster pots and their anchors are always so colourful. If you look closely, you probably can see some barnacles.


We wandered around in an old cemetery nearby. Click on this one for an enlargement; you can fairly well read the epitath.


Here's an overall view of this old cemetery. This a little pond in it where they have miniature sailboat races in the summer.

It's a nice place but, wow, densely inhabited — the population is 25000.

Meanwhile, back up in the snow belt, the mess out there is just settling and looking ugly. We either need a new coat of snow or it needs to start melting. We're going to get a variety pack of weather tomorrow into Saturday which won't help. No matter, I have plenty of work to do.