(no subject)

[camwyn]

So I had a vacation week. I won't go into much detail about it, since most of it amounted to going to museums and ignoring my cell phone, but a few bits do stand out:

- I plan on going to Salem this weekend if I can, next weekend if I can't, on the earliest train possible so that I can visit the Peabody Essex Museum. The trains had electrical issues often enough this past week that I didn't really fancy my chances of getting to North Station in time for any meaningful time spent in town, and the fast ferry, while an option, still had to be reached by blue line train.

- I got to see whales. One humpback, several times; two finbacks on the way back from Stellwagen Marine Sanctuary. They were gorgeous. Tails and backs, mostly. No breaching. Doesn't matter, still saw whales. No, no pictures. Some things are only diminished by being fit into a camera frame, and anyway even if I could have used the best camera imaginable (which I don't own), by the time I spotted the whale and got the camera on target, it would have been largely done with surfacing.

- I went to Newburyport because it is the town H. P. Lovecraft based Innsmouth on in The Shadow Over Innsmouth. It is nothing at all like Mr. Lovecraft's work of the time; frankly, the Navy raid at the end of the story was the best thing ever to happen to the town, if real-world Newburyport is reflected at all in the fictional setting of the Mythos. I actually got home and started looking up real estate prices.

- I need to get a membership to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. I'm going to be in and out of that place a lot, I think.

- The Giant Ocean Tank at the New England Aquarium is back in action, although the official unveiling isn't until July. 's fine with me, I have a membership there and I'll be attending one of the evening unveiling events because the place is gorgeous.

Comments

[laudre]

I've never been to Newburyport, but knowing that it's (a) a coastal town in Massachussetts that's (b) within commuter distance of Boston and (c) picturesque and has a substantial tourism industry, I had certain expectations about real estate there. Expectations that were borne out when I looked them up (i.e. a tiny 1BR 1BA condo starts at about $115K, and an actual house is a minimum of about $400K).

[camwyn]

Yeah, I know. Thing is, I've spent all my life except for college within commuter distance of New York City, so as far as my pricing brain is concerned, that kind of thing is fairly normal- and maybe even a little bit on the lower side, compared to some of the places I've lived.

[laudre]

I did a similar search for homes here in Durham, NC. The cheapest houses (which, admittedly, would certainly require some serious work before moving in, are in rather rough neighborhoods, or have some other sort of substantial hidden cost) start at under $20,000.

(Having grown up in Fairfield County, CT, though, I know what you mean.)

[camwyn]

Mmmyeah. One of the articles I found last year when I was looking at the Boston area to live in said the top five most expensive places rent-wise were New York City, San Francisco, Westchester County, Fairfield CT, and Boston. So, New York City and two of its bedroom communities were the biggest offenders... and I can vouch for the fact that in Hoboken, where I've lived the past several years, the prices really aren't any better either for rentals or for condos, never mind outright houses. Going from that to the prices in Newburyport was a wince-of-recognition moment, not an OH GOD WHAT moment.

[silveraspen]

Sounds like a lovely vacation! Glad you enjoyed it.

[derien]

Wow, sounds like you had a great, BUSY week! :) I was wondering what was up, where you were, what you were doing, if you ever thought of DreamWidth and if you would ever return to us, someday. ;)

[camwyn]

My apologies! Just a little vacation time- I don't like mentioning vacations online until after they're over and I've come back home, for security purposes. But it's all good.

[attractivegeekery]

Not to dissuade you from becoming a Member to the MFA, but if you have a Bank of America account admission is free on the first full weekend of every month. And then you can reuse your ticket for up to ten days after that...I believe.

Also, I can get in for free and bring a guest at any time because I'm an employee/volunteer of the Museum of Science.
Should, you know, you want company.

[camwyn]

Nah, I'm not a BoA customer. The ten day thing is true, though, they told me that when I bought the ticket this past week.

And there are worse things than company, definitely, which is part of why I made sure my Aquarium membership lets me get another person in for free too.