Peckish Travels

Bob and I decided to go a bit further afield today and drive about an hour southeast of Needham to visit Plymouth, Massachusetts, home of the first Pilgrim settlement. Part of our journey to Plymouth took us on state highway 3, where we were surprised to see signage indicating that driving in the breakdown lane is permitted during certain times of the day, morning rush hour times going towards Boston and evening rush hour times coming out of the city.

But onto Plymouth. Plymouth was the site of the colony formed in 1620 by the Pilgrims, English settlers who came to the US on the Mayflower. The community was named Plymouth by John Smith after a city in Southwest England. Among other things, Plymouth was the site of the first Thanksgiving feast. It is currently the county seat of Plymouth County, Massachusetts, and has a current population of about 61,000. The US town was historically spelled Plimouth, and there were a number of businesses that we saw that used that spelling.

We found free 2-hour parking on Main Street and walked from there down to the harbor before coming back up to explore Main Street.

Yesterday, Bob and I were reunited in Needham, Massachusetts, just in time for dinner after Bob flew from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to Chicago and then onto Boston Logan Airport. His plane in was a bit late, so he caught an Uber for the approximately 40 minute ride from the airport, as he would have had to have waited about an hour to catch the next train from the South Station.

Prior to his arrival yesterday early evening, I walked onto the nearby Babson College to watch a kid’s performance of the musical “Beetlejuice.” I had seen signs up in the neighborhood and thought it would be a good thing to support. I think it was the culmination of a summer camp. It was cute. The sound wasn’t great, and I’m not sure I saw any future Meryl Streeps or Robert De Niros, but it was an entertaining 75 minutes, and we clapped for every song.

Today, we did a shop at Trader Joe’s, as Bob is cooking tonight (an onion and kale pizza with mozzarella and anchovies!). Yesterday, he had to settle for me warming up a Spanish omelette with some Spanish cheeses and bread.

Then, we drove about 10 minutes to the community of South Natick for a short walkabout.

In reading about the history of Natick, Wikipedia states that it was founded in 1651 by John Eliot, a Puritan missionary born in England, who received a commission and funds from England’s Long Parliament (from 1640-1660) to settle Massachusetts Indians, called Praying Indians, on land deeded from the settlement at Dedham (another nearby community).

Natick was the first of Eliot’s network of praying towns, which were self-governing under Indians but combined both Indian and Puritan culture and practices. These communities were created by the colonial government in a ring around Boston as a defensive strategy.

The degradation of the stones make them difficult to read.

The homeowners had the cleaning service coming today, so I decided to let them clean in peace and take myself out of the house for a few hours. I opted to walk to Wellesley College to see a bit of the campus.

Zeus stayed home and monitored the cleaning efforts (spoiler— they did good work!), but earlier today he assumed what appeared to me to be a cat-like pose.

Wellesley College is a private women’s liberal arts college in nearby Wellesley. It was founded in 1870 as a female seminary. It is a member of the Seven Sisters Colleges, an unofficial grouping of current and former women’s colleges in the northeastern United States. It offers 60 majors spanning the liberal arts. I first became aware of it when I ran the Boston Marathon, as they always have a vocal group of supporters along the route.

It was a 2.3 mile walk onto campus from the house. I was able to take the same off-road path that I did the last time I walked to Wellesley (town), but I got to stay on it for longer.

I didn’t know anything about the campus, but it struck me as a very peaceful setting. It is protective of its staff, faculty, and students, with buildings requiring that you scan your ID for entry.

After my walk around campus, I walked down Central Avenue in Wellesley to the library, where I finished reading “The Boston Globe” that I had purchased this morning (my treat on non-running days). On the way back to the house, I exchanged books at a free little library. When I returned to the house, it was spic and span and the lawn people had been here as well.

Today was a Plan B day. I thought I was going to see some gardens in Wellesley, but they were having a sunflower event, where for $22 you could see their field of sunflowers (which I did on the drive in) and also be able to pick some. I decided maybe I’d wait to visit until after the event. Another item on my to do list was Houghton’s Pond Recreation Area, so I headed there instead.

Houghton’s Pond is located on the outskirts of Milton, MA, which is southeast of Needham and almost directly south of Boston. It is an awesome park for swimming, canoeing, hiking, mountain biking, and horse back riding. There were lots of folks out enjoying the park — mostly near the water.

I had a good, if rock abundant, 1.5 hour hike, mostly shaded. I have to say that if I were to be here longer and do more hiking, I might invest in a bug hat that I have seen a few people with. It has netting over your face to keep the bugs out. There just always seems to be a couple of midges or some tiny type of gnat type bug that follow you through your hike.

I have a list of local sites that are recommended to visit in the Needham area. I decided I would visit Echo Bridge today, but in looking at its location and reading some online information, I learned that it was connected to another site on my list — Hemlock Gorge. I didn’t realize I’d get falls too, so even better.

Echo Bridge was the bridge painted by a local artist that I had posted in my blog about the Wellesley Library.

Echo Bridge (per Wikipedia) is a historic masonry bridge spanning the Charles River (what else in these parts?) between Needham and Newton Upper Falls. At the time of its construction in 1876-77, it was the second longest masonry bridge in the country. The bridge was named for how your voice echoes when you talk underneath the bridge. It is 500’ long and consists of a series of 7 arches. At its highest point, it is 70’ above the river.

Hemlock Gorge is a 23 acre natural area along the banks of the Charles River. It is filled with Hemlock trees.

Once I crossed the bridge back to the Needham side, I decided to follow the Upper Falls Trail loop.

Boston has declared a heat emergency through Wednesday of this week. Apparently this occurs when the heat index exceeds 95 for two consecutive days. I don’t know if Needham falls into that or not, but it is to be in the 90s here for a few days. It made for a good day for a morning, mostly shaded hike in Cutler Park.

Cutler Park is a 600 acre park that protects the largest freshwater marsh on the middle Charles River. It has hills formed by glaciers and Kendrick Pond. It seems to be a popular park, as there were a number of hikers and runners out, especially on the shorter trail around Kendrick Pond. One of the trails through Cutler Park is the Blue Heron Trail, which is 6.9 miles long and runs through both Cutler Park and Millennium Park in Needham.

I had to refer back to the map below on my phone while I hiked to ensure I was where I thought I was. There were some blue blazes on trees, but they were not very frequent. Also,the map has some numbers noted along the route that would have been super helpful for way marking. I only saw two during my hike (#40 — which was very helpful in determining where exactly I was and #34).

I only did the trail around Kendrick Pond and then down and over to Powell’s Island before looping back up towards the parking area near Kendrick Pond.

While the house that we are caring for is in Needham, we are very close to the town of Wellesley, Massachusetts. I run into Wellesley on my runs, and Babson College, which is the campus where we walk Zeus, is officially in Wellesley. The town currently has a population of about 30,000, making it just a bit smaller than Needham, and Wikipedia tells me it was part of Needham (and known as West Needham) until 1881.

I decided to check out Wellesley town center and Whole Foods today. The initial walk to the town hall was 1.8 miles. It is another lovely day here. It has been sunny (with some occasional cloudiness due to Canadian wildfires) and highs in the 80s F and high 50s and low 60s for morning runs. I’m loving it.

The walk started off on Great Plains Avenue, the main road that runs by the house, but then turned off onto a path that took me into some neighborhoods in Wellesley before getting to the town center.

One of the first structures that I saw in Wellesley town center was the Town Hall, which sits up on a small hill.

Near the front of the town Hall were stones honoring famous former residents.

The library had displays of artwork by local artists.

So, first full day on my own with Zeus. All good so far on the dog front. Zeus bonded with me right away, and we had a good walk this morning.

I had decided yesterday that for my first outing without Bob I would walk to the Charles River Peninsula (CRP). Per the CRP website, the peninsula plays an important role in protecting the beauty and environmental value of the Upper Charles River corridor. The peninsula rises to a 20-acre open field where the Charles River makes a nearly 180 degree turn. The Charles River is 80 miles long and flows northeast from Hopkinson to Boston.

Now, if Bob were here, he would have thoroughly researched the route to get there to determine length, walkability, etc. I put Charles River Peninsula into Apple Maps last night, saw that it was 2.1 miles, or an estimated 65 minute walk, and decided that I’d do it. I did note this morning that it was basically a 3 street route with 2 turns — easy peasy. I just needed to turn right onto Great Plain Avenue, then onto Central, and then straight until a left past Fisher Ave near the peninsula.

I headed off about 10 this morning with a backpack and a bottle of water. I had been walking for about 25 minutes, was on Central Avenue, when I decided maybe I’d just confirm how things were going by looking at Apple Maps. I hadn’t hit Go on the app to have it instruct me on the route, as it seemed so easy.

Imagine my surprise when the map showed that it was still going to take me an hour and six minutes to get to the peninsula! This was because I had failed to note which way I was to turn on Central Avenue, and I had turned in the direction Bob and I have gone for other walks.

The only upside to this is it allows me to share some photos from a previous walk when we really did need to go in this direction.

I was near Volante Farms on Central Avenue today when I discovered my wrong turn. I headed back to where Central crosses Great Plains and then continued across in the correct direction.

So, Apple Maps walking route, which continued on Central Avenue even after the sidewalks disappeared, brought me to the Walker School property. This is not where I wanted to be, but the map seemed to indicate I had arrived at the peninsula.

I Googled the website for the peninsula and read the driving instructions for getting there. I just needed to go back to Central Avenue and walk back one street to Fisher Avenue and that would bring me to the peninsula.

The Pecks have split up — for a little over a week while Bob heads to Iowa City, Iowa, to care for Murphy while our nephew and niece have a summer holiday. Bob, ever the resourceful traveler, researched the travel options to Boston’s Logan airport and found that our housesit is very close to two commuter rail stops.

He picked the Needham Heights station, from which the train departs at five past the hour and would take him all the way (about 40 minutes on the train) to Boston’s South Station, from which he could catch a bus that would take him another 15 minutes to the airport.

I saw him off at 1:05 pm, and he is currently at the airport awaiting a late afternoon flight.

Zeus and I will be holding down the fort in Needham. After Bob left, I walked past the Olin College of Engineering across the street from the house to Babson College, a top school for business and best college for entrepreneurship.

One of my main reasons for exploring the campus a bit was because of a large globe that Bob had seen on one of his walks with Zeus. The globe is located behind a statue of Roger Babson, for whom the college is named.

I have included photos of two of the markers, but some highlights from the school’s history include:

The college started as the Babson Institute in 1919 with 27 students focusing on practical business training. The college ceased normal operations during WWII and became a US Navy Supply Corps School, training more than 2,000 reserve officers. The class of 1948 was the first to receive a BS degree in business administration and study liberal arts as well. The first MBA degrees were awarded in 1953. In the 1960s, the school became coed and was renamed Babson College. In the 1970s the college started the first Center for Entrepreneurial Studies. The school has had 4 national championships in Division III sports — 3 in soccer and 1 in ice hockey.

Needham is a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, and has a population of about 32,000. It was officially incorporated in 1711. It is named after the town of Needham Market in Suffolk, England, which we’ve also visited!

Bob and I are exploring the area a bit before he leaves on Thursday to fly to Iowa to care for our nephew’s dog for about 9 days while our nephew and his wife are on vacation.

Yesterday, after a run, Zeus’ morning walk, and a grocery fill-up at Trader Joe’s, Bob and I walked 1.4 miles to the Needham Free Public Library. On the way, we passed an impressive athletic complex near Rosemary Lake.

Today, we walked about 40 minutes down Great Plain Avenue, which the house we are caring for is right off of, to explore the small town center of Needham.