Boston Vacation Day 6 - A stove boy

On this vacation day, we were in New Bedford, MA to go to the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park (bet you didn't know we had one of those) and the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Alas, this was also the day that vacation fatigue set in on young Calvin. I guess five days of historical/educational vacation was about all he was going to absorb. And so he was a pickle for our entire tour of New Bedford.


We started out driving over to the Park office. A nice lady on the street told us that if we parked in this one parking structure, since it was a furlough day, we wouldn't have to pay for parking. So a bonus there. At the park office,  we picked up Jr. Ranger books and set off trying to find the various information required. We also watched a video on the role New Bedford played in the whaling trade and the economic impact whaling had on the region and the country. They soft-peddled the actual whaling part, probably due to the current endangered status of most whale species. I bought a copy of Moby-Dick, which, if you're really interested in the grisly side of whaling, is happy to describe it in gross detail.

Struggling through the latest Jr Ranger booklet

One of the Jr. Ranger activities was a scavenger hunt, which caused us to stroll around the historic district of New Bedford, looking at all the cool old buildings. We found the Seamen's Bethel, where the whalers looked for redemption between voyages, and down at the old fish market we learned about how a fish market works - a wild side of the economy that most probably don't think about until it shows up as "Market Price" on the menu at their local seafood restaurant.

The most excited he's even been to see a church.

We also stopped by the Whaling Museum. Calvin was having none of it at this point, so I worked on cajoling him through the museum while Sweetie and Hobbes learned a bit about whaling and whales. They had great displays at the museum - whale skeletons, a 1/2 scale replica of a whaling ship, the whaling boats that were lowered from the ship to actually chase the whales, rooms full of items made from baleen and whale bone. They also had cases depicting the advancement of harpoon and lance technology. What's the difference between a harpoon and a lance, you say? Well, the harpoon was used like a fishhook - you set it in the whale to attach it to your boat so it couldn't get away. Then, when the whale became tired or ran out of air and had to surface, you rowed up to it and stuck it with lances until it was dead. Sounds barbaric, but really it's kind of the way we kill everything, no?

The day was finally saved for Calvin by us allowing him to purchase Humpy. See the bright smile on his face?

Calvin, having found peace through consumption.

From here we drove down to Cape Cod. We stopped by Woods Hole, so Sweetie could visit the offices of SEA (the Sea Education Association) for whom she has done some teaching, and so I could visit a colleague at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI). That evening we stayed with my cousin's in-laws at their 'weekend house' in , who had very graciously offered to host us. The Things were really excited because they had a hot tub and cable TV. After a dip in the tub we had a lovely dinner, and then our hosts and I went back to WHOI for the Friday Evening lecture. The speaker was part of a celebration of 20 years of the Microbial Ecology summer course taught at WHOI, so they had a special speaker Roberto Kolter. He gave a charming lecture about microbes and how they can affect the atmosphere.

Next Time: A little Sturm, a little Drang, some lobster, bicycles and whales.