Visit from my cousin Joanna!

My fabulous cousin from Sacramento/Berkley was gracious enough to make some time for me during her all out NYC visit. Yay! I hadn't seen her since before Grammy passed away last year and before that.....I think maybe 10'ish or so years?

Anyway, I've always loved Joanna, duh she's family, but she is the perkiest and most loveable person on the Earth! It seems as though nothing can get this girl down. So.....with everything that has been going on it was soooooooooooooooooooo nice to have her around. During our short 5 hour visit I learned that quality definitely overrides quantity because they were a swell 5 hours.

We hopped on one of the trolley tours and just rode around the city. We got off around where I work on Beacon Hill, the Christian Science Center (that's where the really nifty Mapparium is located), and.......somewhere else I'm sure but I can't remember. Our first guide was pretty awesome, he was young and had a lot of fun "factoids" to share about the great city that is Boston. Unfortunately, we hopped off to walk around Beacon Hill and then hopped back on to have an older gentleman who forgot to make a few of the stops. Needless to say we had to get off at a stop that was in like Egypt or something and had to walk all the way back to get to the Mapparium.

The Mapparium is something I didn't even know about until my out of town cousin, Joanna, mentioned, "What I really want to see while I'm in Boston is this big globe, map museum." My reaction, "Em....what? We don't have that here." During the old man tour guide session he drove past the Christian Science Center and spoke of this..."Mapparium," that was coming up, so Joanna and I look at our handy dandy guide book to see that it's Joanna's "globe, map" that she wanted to see. So we were waiting patiently for the guide to pull over but he decided to just keep on driving. That's when we ended up in Egypt and had to walk back to see the Mapparium.

Anysnooze-it's something that everyone should experience when they're in Boston. Unfortunately, I couldn't take photos of the actual thing but I did get some photos the building that it was located.

Here's the website to read more info: http://www.marybakereddylibrary.org/exhibits/mapparium.jhtml

The acoustics inside were pretty fantastic. As soon as you walk in you can hear everyone's whispers in surround sound. Pretty fun, ay?

After the Mapparium we pretty much had to finish the rest of the trolley tour so that Joanna could make her bus back to NYC to party in the fab city. I was sad to say goodbye but the time we had together was pretty spectacular. She's invited back anytime.

Below are some photos:

Inside the Mary Baker Eddy Building (where the Mapparium is located)

A lovely door.
Joanna.
Up above.

Joanna at the General (T) Hooker entrance at the State House.
My office building.
Climing a tree in the Public Garden.
Us on the trolley.
Us at the Christian Science Center (Reflecting Pool behind us).