Visit Boston

The Freedom Trail links sixteen sites over 4 kilometres, from Boston Common to Bunker Hill: a red-brick line set into the pavement acts as a guide, and the full walk takes a good half-day. Along the way, Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market form a lively covered market, and the North End, Italian since the late 19th century, lines up trattorias and pastry shops. The Old North Church, from which the 1775 signal was given, can be visited for a few dollars. The area is fully walkable and well served by the green and orange metro lines.

These two residential districts line up 19th-century brick and brownstone houses. On Beacon Hill, Acorn Street and its uneven cobbles are among the most photographed in the United States, and the street lamps still run on gas. Back Bay, reclaimed from marshland and laid out on a grid, carries the Boston Public Library (free guided tour in the early afternoon), Copley Square and the shops of Newbury Street. The Public Garden, the country's first public botanical garden, puts its Swan Boats on the water from April to September.

The harbour, long turned away from the city, is now a continuous walkway. The New England Aquarium and its central cylindrical tank take about two hours to visit; whale-watching cruises leave from Long Wharf from April to October and last around three and a half hours. On the Seaport side, a district built in ten years, the Institute of Contemporary Art juts out on stilts above the water. In summer, ferries serve the Boston Harbor Islands from Long Wharf, with a fort, a lighthouse and trails.

Across the Charles, Cambridge is reached in about twenty minutes on the red metro line. Harvard, founded in 1636, offers free student-led campus tours by reservation, and three museums including the Harvard Art Museums reworked by Renzo Piano. A kilometre south, MIT opens its buildings by Alvar Aalto, Eero Saarinen and Frank Gehry, and its museum devoted to robotics and artificial intelligence. Kendall Square, around it, concentrates labs and breweries.

Boston is a good base without a car. Salem, tied to the 1692 witch trials, is 35 minutes by commuter rail from North Station; the town is swamped all through October. Concord and Lexington, where the War of Independence began, are reached by train then bus. For the coast, Cape Cod needs a car or a bus from South Station, about two hours. Boston pairs well with Chicago to compare two large American cities with opposite moods, one Atlantic and colonial, the other inland and vertical, both reached from the United States.