At the End of the World

Yesterday we had a great but exhausting day exploring. Our journey started at the End of the World (aka World's End) in Hingham, MA, a set of 2 peninsulas jutting out into the Massachusetts Bay, cris-crossed with carriage paths for houses that were never built.

It was perfect weather for hiking around, and we started with a scenic picnic by a tidal river (that was flowing inland very quickly while we were there). After lunch, we had a mini-adventure through the underbrush, and discovered a tidal pool filled with baby fish. Grumpus thought that they were going to die there, but Mumpus argued that they'd go back into the sea at high tide. The issue remains unresolved.

Next, we walked to the main land bridge connecting the peninsulas and had a black swan sighting (by Allie, aka Mumpus), although JR wouldn't believe it, and insisted I saw a black duck (not true). It was at this point that we noticed that no one else was looking at the black waterfowl or the rest of the nature. We also saw huge hawks (one was carrying a baby snake), and a large white egret. It was a little sad that so many people paid $5 to go to such an incredible park but were too involved with their conversations and lives to look around and see the nature. The only comment we heard about the scenery was from a guy exclaiming that "the skyline was beautiful."


The other highlight for Allie was making new discoveries about rocks in budding her career as an amateur geologist (She loves rocks, and we discovered the rocks at the world's end are both of the Puddlestone and Slate variety-- although there's a smaller chance they were Argillite.) Either way, we had fun throwing them against bigger rocks to have them break into perfectly flat pieces.

After finally making out way out of the nature, Grumpus, out of the corner of his eye, noticed a wonderful thing: FRESH MARKET (A grocery his mom goes to in the Cleve), and we made an amazing detour to this cheaper, better but equally sheeshee alternative to Whole Foods (it plays classical music over the loud speakers). Inside we had samples of: babyback ribs, fancy juice, cake, delicious vegetarian meatballs, curry chicken salad, and Easter m&m's. Those of you who know me well know that I can't resist grocery stores, and for once JR was just as happy as me to spent an hour looking at varieties of seafood, breads, sauces, produce and beer. Oh and I got the most amazing Fine Cooking Magazine of Indulgent Delicious Breakfasts--- Naomi you must see this you will love it- and I think I'll need your help making some of it. OH and I finally got a good recipe to make Masala Chai using the spices we got in India last summer

Finally, we stopped at a Borders going out of business and got half a dozen great books. These included: 2 books on rocks for Mumpus, a book on the history of Medford, (our current home-town, founded in 1630), Shackleton's book describing his last Antarctic Expedition (to inspire us as adventurers), Barbarians at the Gate and Winner-Take-All Politics (both obviously bought by Grumpus).

Tonight the adventure continues with a seder for the Boston diplomatic corps (our first seder in years) .....