My first time out of Europe and first time in the the old US of A. It still wasn’t very long after 9/11 so security was still a bit tight and there was a lot of focus on illegal immigrants in America. We’d heard some horror stories on the news about people being kicked out, even Irish and since we were visiting in-laws who happened to be illegal too we were given a whole cover story with fake names, addresses and phone numbers to give to immigration officers if and when asked “The purpose of your visit to America sir”. Which we were! So I was shitting a brick going through immigration at Shannon airport. Incidentally my one and only time going through there too. Nevertheless, we got through in one piece and also successfully negotiated Logan airport security in Boston but they managed to lose a Bodhran we had brought over as a present.
I’d often wondered what America would be like in real life. You see it on TV and in the movies so much but reality is usually a bit different. But it was pretty much the same! Everything was bigger, bolder, busier, weirder and scarier! Also, I thought Christmas was huge in America, again prob because of TV but it turns out it’s not really. It felt like just another day and all the shops stayed open! Another thing that was a little “different” to TV was the Cheers bar. We visited and had a meal but of course it looks nothing like the legendary 80s sit com inside. Speaking of food, American portions are HUGE as you can probably imagine and have probably seen. As I often said while there and since, if I lived in America I’d probably die of food in less than a month. We got around a fair bit, hoping on and off the T train and also visiting Harvard college, Museums, Malls, Dunkin Doughnuts and even got a cruise across Boston harbour which was cool.
This was a Christmas trip and I was hoping to see some Christmas snow for once but bizarrely, on Christmas morning, we heard that there was a light sprinkling of snow back home for the first time in years but none in Boston!? That would change soon after though because it started snowing the next day and didn’t stop! We must have had about 6ft of it at one point. More snow than I’d ever seen. Boston is one of those places that has very definable seasons. You are pretty much guaranteed snow in winter and sun in summer. The way it should be. Take note Ireland.
The coolest thing about this trip, apart from the snow though was that we’d pre-arranged a house swap with a lovely woman who lived in Stephen King country in Maine and was willing to lend us her lovely little wooden house for a week or so while she escaped the cold New England winter for a warm Californian one so she wasn’t even coming to Ireland but she did a few years later and we put her up n a Dublin hostel. House swapping is something I’ve always intended to do more of but to date this is still the only time I’ve done it. The drive to Maine in our hired car was epic. At least 4 or 5 hours and in driving snow. Along the way we took in a cool Xmas light show and the towns of Portsmouth, the naval town of Kennebunkport, Bath and Freeport in which I felt the coldest I’ve ever felt my whole life. It was about -20C with wind chill and I had just my regular Irish clothes included a flimsy coat with broken zip. How I didn’t die!
We had hoped to get a train down to New York too at some stage but half the gang got the flu, no surprise with the weather, so that was cancelled. I’d end up coming back to Boston a couple of years later, also at Christmas but this trip lives longer in the memory. Next time I’ll go to the west coast though!
