Boston, Massachusetts

The charming capital of Massachusetts charms visitors with its rich history and smooth big city life. No other American city can look back on a tradition as long as Boston. And yet the home of Harvard University, the renowned MIT and the world-famous Boston Symphony Orchestra is a modern metropolis. In recent years, it has also become the new “Hollywood of the East Coast”. Numerous films have been and continue to be filmed here and throughout Massachusetts.

Boston, the city of contrasts
, offers old and new, tradition and progress in a fruitful symbiosis. Time-honored Beacon Hill on one side, trendy South End on the other. Modern skyscrapers here, historic terraced houses there. Here the expansive greenery of Boston Common, there the hustle and bustle on and in the modern harbor. Many corners are reminiscent of European metropolises, but Boston is also a typical American city – and an ethnic patchwork quilt. It ranges from the Italian North End to Chinatown and Irish Charlestown to Afro-American Roxbury.
Downtown is experiencing a revival, with many Bostonians moving back from the suburbs to areas like South End or South Boston. The famous Freedom Trail guides visitors as a red line on the sidewalks through the high-rise downtown to the historic sites of the freedom struggle.

Location and size
According to travelationary, Boston is located in the northeast of the United States on the North American east coast in Massachusetts Bay and is spread over an area of ​​232 km².

Population
Approximately 617,000 people live in Boston and around 4.5 million in the greater metropolitan area.

Arriving
by plane
Boston Logan International Airport (BOS) is located 4 miles northeast of Boston.

Climate
Boston’s weather is very changeable and has historically produced snow in October and a mini-heatwave in February. Summers (June to August) are typically very hot and humid. Sunglasses, hats and sunscreen are highly recommended in hot weather. In the spring, the warm sea breezes are soothing, but in the winter they can be strong and bitterly cold. Winters (November to February) can be very wet. During this time you should dress warmly and not go out without an umbrella. The best times to visit are late spring and early fall (with the spectacular fall colors of New England’s ‘Indian Summer’). Then the temperatures are warm and not too hot.

VUSA tips for Boston visitors

The Freedom Trail
The “Freedom Trail” runs as a red line across the city’s pavement. The 5 km historical route runs through the center and points to points related to the struggle for independence.

Starting from the central city park, the Boston Common and the unmissable Massachusetts State House with its gilded dome, past old cemeteries and churches, such as Park Street Church with the Granary Burying Ground, the oldest cemetery in the city.

Several public buildings in Boston date from the resistance period against the British Crown. On December 16, 1773, around 7,000 people demonstrated in the Old South Meeting House against the mother country’s new tax on tea. They then gathered for the legendary Boston Tea Party on the harbor. In front of the Old State House, five demonstrating citizens were shot dead by British soldiers on March 5, 1770, and on July 18, 1776, the enthusiastic crowd cheered at the reading of the “Declaration of Independence”.

Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall
The “cradles of liberty” built in 1742 are only a stone’s throw away. Many town meetings were held on the upper floor during the War of Independence, while shops and food stands have always been located on the ground floor. The neighboring Quincy Market has been around since the 18th century. Meeting point and shopping center with many pubs and bars. Continuing on the Freedom Trail leads to the North End, the city’s oldest neighborhood. First Irish, then Jewish, it is now mostly Italian, especially Hanover Street.

The star attraction in Little Italy
is the Paul Revere House, which was home to the nation’s first hero. The silversmith Paul Revere (1735 – 1818) once warned the insurgents of the approaching British after receiving a signal from the nearby Old North Church. The cafés with excellent espresso are also definitely worth a break.

Measures such as moving the freeway underground from downtown have given the “Grand Old Lady” Boston a facelift. Now you can stroll along the leafy Rose Kennedy Greenway with small open-air stages, benches and fountains to visit the nearby New England Aquarium or the newly renovated Boston Tea Party Ship & Museum .

Can it be more modern?
Then let yourself be surprised by the Institute of Contemporary Art , which is remarkable both in terms of architecture and content , and enjoy the view of the harbor and modern skyline from the Boston Harborwalk, from which a building in the form of a seagoing sailing ship stands out. Time-honoured and dignified, conservative and a bit cocky (traits associated with the bourgeois White Anglo-Saxon Protestant of British descent) – that’s what Boston is known to many.

How tolerant people are, however, is shown by the example of same-sex partnerships: after California, Massachusetts is the second American state that allows homosexual couples from all states to marry.
A stroll through the South End, once a poor neighborhood but now chic and hip, also corrects the old image. After the decay of the district was averted, the historic houses shine more and more in their old glory and a number of unusual shops and restaurants have settled here.

South End has a multicultural flair
that can be felt when strolling around Worcester or Union Park Square. Most restaurants and shops are located between Tremont Street, which is also known as “Restaurant Row”, Shawmut and Washington Avenue. It offers a completely different picture of Boston: young, fresh and carefree, innovative and creative.
Boston owes it to the universities of Harvard and MIT in the neighboring city of Cambridge and museums such as the world-famous Boston Museum of Fine Art or the unique Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum that it has also gained a worldwide reputation as a cultural center. Harvard ‘s venerable campuswith its ivy-covered buildings in neighboring Cambridge takes you back to the 19th century, even though modern student life pulsates in the area with a wide range of pubs, bars and shops.

You have to see that too

Boston Red Sox
Another place in Boston you shouldn’t miss is Fenway Park, which opened in 1912. The oldest baseball stadium in the world is home to the Red Sox , the popular traditional team that has all of New England at its feet. Even if tickets are hard to come by, at least see Fenway Park and the Green Monster in one tour.

South End
Lots of unusual shops, a colorful spectrum of pubs and interesting architecture.

Boston Maritime
Explore the Boston Harbor Islands NP, take a Boston Harbor Cruise or Whale Watch Tour from the New England Aquarium.

Beacon Hill
The Black Heritage Trail follows in the footsteps of African Americans through the city’s oldest district. With Museum of African-American History.