Okay, okay — I know it’s July 6th, but bear with me. This Independence Day marked 13 years that I’ve been living in the United States, so I’m excited to share with all of you a little bit of Boston love for the 4th of July. To celebrate, my friend Abby and I headed into the city from Cambridge. (At this point I will quickly apologize for the terrible quality of some of these pictures — all I had was my iPhone!). The weather was beautiful (read: hot), so we decided to walk across the Longfellow Bridge (colloquially referred to as the ‘Salt and Pepper’ Bridge because of the big columns that look like giant salt and pepper shakers!). Check out our view of the city — what you can see in this picture is the quaint Beacon Hill neighborhood nestled in front of the financial district (and the stretch of trees down the waterfront is the Esplanade, where Bostonians gather every 4th of July to watch the fireworks).
Abby and I were accosted on the bridge by this funny trio of guys who insisted we weren’t dressed patriotically enough. To prove their point, they gave each of us a little flag and agreed to pose for a picture! They were definitely wearing enough red, white, and blue to make up for our stars-and-stripes-less outfits.
A popular activity for the 4th (especially when it’s so hot out!) is to enjoy the holiday hanging out on a boat on the Charles River. My pictures were taken about five hours before the scheduled fireworks and there were already a whole bunch of people on the water!
I was pretty surprised to see people swimming, since the Charles is not known to be the cleanest river (Remember those lyrics, “I love that dirty water…” – by the band “Boston” — Anyone? Anyone?). Yuck!
As many boats as there were on the river, there were even more people already lined up along the Esplanade. People tend to arrive early to ensure a good view of the fireworks, but this year it totally backfired! An unfortunately timed short thunderstorm forced the Boston Police and Firefighters to evacuate the Esplanade and also the riverbanks on the Cambridge side of the water, so all of those people lost the spots they had staked out all day… Bummer! Fortunately, the fireworks were only delayed and not canceled, so I hope most of them got to watch anyway.
Here’s a shot of the fireworks when they finally went off (not my own — I’m an old lady on the inside and was already asleep!):
Photo via The Boston Globe, credit to Yoon S. Byun/Globe Staff – http://www.bostonglobe.com
I’ll end with a shot of the funny shirt my friend Caiti was wearing for the festivities — after all, the 4th of July is all about American pride š
Happy 4th everyone! How did you all celebrate?
Cheers,
Nicole
The Daisy Chain 