DAY TWENTY EIGHT & TWENTY NINE: Boston via New York
Today we had a much needed sleep in before catching a train back to New York where we spend the day and one more night before travelling on to Boston.
We decided to stay at a different hotel this time so that we wouldnt have to travel to and from the train station (Penn Station) and chose Hotel Pennsylvania which is directly opposite Penn Station (and also Madison Square Garden). The website for the hotel is lovely, its a historic hotel with a great history and we were very excited to stay there. We even upgraded to a club penn room which gave us a room on a higher floor and access to the club lounge.
I learnt an extremely valuable lesson that I will never forget from this experience; NEVER EVER book a hotel without checking Tripadvisor first! I made this mistake earlier on in our trip at Sedona, although I didnt really have a choice then as we booked the hotel there at the last minute. Hotel Penn we had booked from home, so I really didnt have an excuse. I think I was just won over by the location and the website (and the lobby is also very deceptive, it wasnt until we left the ground floor that the nightmare began)
This is the hotel from HELL! Words just cant explain how bad it was. The room was absolutely filthy rust and hair in the bathroom, filthy carpet, dirty and torn furniture, grubby walls and doors. Luckily the bed itself was clean and there was no sign of bed bugs (which is an epidemic in New York). We asked to see another room in case it was a one off, but the second room we looked at was even worse. I just could not believe we paid $280 for this room!
We decided that since it was only one night, the bed itself was okay, as we could walk to the train station early the next morning, and that we had already paid for the room that we would just suck it up and stay but if we had to spend a minute longer in there I would definitely have found another place. I dont regret doing this because I think the stress of having to move, trying to get our money back etc. would really have ruined the whole day for me and I really wanted to just enjoy my last day in NYC. In the end we avoided the hotel like the plague and used it purely to sleep in.
I took some photos of our room and send written complaints to the hotel both while we were there, and once we arrived home. I never heard anything back. Ive since deleted the photos as Im trying to block the experience from my memory, but if anyone is interested, or thinks Im exaggerating, check out their reviews on tripadvisor -
http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Hotel...sylvania_New_York-New_York_City_New_York.html
Once we had dropped off our luggage and I recovered from my mini break down we stopped for coffee and red velvet cake to revive our spirits. I cant really remember exactly how we spent the afternoon, but it was very pleasant and relaxing and involved revisiting our favourite New York sights. We definitely went to Central Park and did a bit of shopping, then went back to Times Square followed by Dallas BBQ for dinner to enjoy their delicious ribs one last time.
We woke up very early the next morning to catch a train to Boston. I was very excited to get out of Hotel Penn and for once didnt mind the early wake-up (although I have to admit the continental breakfast which was included with our stay was acceptable)
Unfortunately I have to admit neither of us really enjoyed our time in Boston. I think this was purely due to the weather as it was absolutely freezing. In fact writing this now we didnt really even get to do or see much in Boston at all and it was probably a bit of a wasted trip! It was a very similar experience to Montreal, and I think we would enjoy both cities much more in warmer weather. Our taxi driver from the train station told us that they were expecting one of the coldest nights on record the day we arrived, I dont know if that eventuated, but it certainly felt like it!
The other problem was that a lot of our time in Boston was wasted looking for another suitcase, which we needed to transport our luggage back to the west coast. Our shopping on the east coast had made us substantially heavier than when wed flown to Montreal. We had managed on the trains because we handled our own luggage, but we knew that the suitcases would be overweight for a flight. Boston has a lot of beautiful shops, but not many selling cheap luggage (which was all we were after as we already had our lovely big suitcases from home). Eventually we found what we were looking for in Macys, but we wasted a lot of time trying to buy the suitcase that would have been better spent sightseeing.
After we checked in at our hotel we set out on foot. There was a great Borders bookshop in the city centre (which has now unfortunately closed) and we got some great discounts here. We had some tasty hot sandwiches for lunch nearby. After that we explored some more; including Boston Common, the frog pond (which was an ice skating rink) and Cheers. I had big plans to walk the Freedom Trail but our hunt for luggage meant we spent most of the rest of the afternoon shopping instead. The cold was increasingly difficult to tolerate as night approached and we were driven back to the warmth of our hotel pretty early. We barely have any photos from Boston (possibly both due to being a bit sick of the camera by the end of our trip and also due to not having the greatest time) but here are a few:
Cheers
Our absolute favourite thing about Boston was our hotel, The Langham. It was the polar opposite of Hotel Penn and we just loved it.
Our room was gorgeous with a super comfortable bed; there was a really nice fitness centre and a great restaurant which we had dinner at, due to being too scared of the cold to venture elsewhere. This dinner was one of the rare chances we got to dress up and wear the more formal clothes wed bought with us too. The restaurant had the most amazing chandelier and a really great atmosphere, more like a lounge really, very dimly lit with couches and a big bar. Our meal was delicious and we were also very excited to make friends over dinner!
A couple sitting nearby us overheard DBF telling our waiter he had never drunk Budweiser before, and were completely shocked by this and just had to ask us about it. Then they realised we were Australian and one of them had done a work exchange program here a few years ago, and in Perth too. So we had a great time chatting with them and exchanged contact details. They live in Charleston, which we are hoping to visit on our next trip, so we might even catch up with them again then.
Id had tentative plans to possibly head out to Harvard the next morning, but we were feeling very lazy and enjoyed a luxurious sleep in, and using the facilities in the hotel some more, instead. We headed straight to the airport after checking out as we had an afternoon flight from Boston back to LA.
Our flight was uneventful and we arrived at LAX in the evening, picked up our rental car and then drove to our hotel in Anaheim, the Candy Cane Inn. This is a lovely hotel and was a great base for Disney Land.
At this stage I had no idea how much we were going to enjoy Disney Land and we were still hoping wed made the right decision to even go there in the first place and not return to Vegas instead. Little did we realise our lives were literally about to change; who would have known wed end up planning a Disney wedding only a year later?!
Next Up: Our perfect day at The Happiest Place on Earth (and the last full day of our trip!)
but I am determined to get this finished one way or another!) I really hope you enjoy DC as much as we did, I wasn't excited in advance either but had a great time there!
