My goals for today were to visit the Massachusetts State Capitol and to stop past the fraternity where I lived for four years in college. I expect this to be my last one million plus city for a while, so there was a fair amount of careful city cycling both inbound and outbound.

Route 1 or US 1, is a major road in MA and further north along the coast. The first few miles were on this road, though it wasn’t too bad as it was early and even had occasional bike lanes. This is coming up at the intersection with I-495. I always thought of two major ring roads 495 at ~25 miles and 128 at ~10 miles. These defined for me whether I was “escaping Boston” or as far as today goes, getting closer.

Soon enough, I was off US 1 and onto smaller roads. Not all as quiet as this one but all reasonable.

This was obnoxious, half a mile of grooved pavement. It is trash day.

Once I got close, I passed commuter rail in Norwood and parts of the Orange line from the T. From here were several miles of bike paths.

This sign gives more of the history of the Southwest corridor. Essentially, rather than put in a giant freeway, they built this corridor with transit (Orange Line) and also paths I was following.

Here I am getting close, streets of back bay. Since I was here a while ago, they’ve put in bike lanes.

Made it!

A slight climb on the edge of the Boston Common and at the State House. Streets of Boston were hectic to ride, though not as hectic as I recall them from 40 years ago.

From here I met up with DanO, a college friend. I had something mailed to his address to pick up and we had lunch.

Cycled past the Great Dome on MIT campus. Looks like those white awnings are being set up for graduation.

Made it to Epsilon Theta. I lived here from 1981-1985 while an undergraduate. Enjoyed my time as an undergrad. During the school year, most focused on school. However, longer summer days in New England is where I got my start bicycle touring.

I knocked on the door. Josh answered and showed me a little of the ground floor. I think we had the same dining room chairs. Nice to stop through.

After that cycled a little ways outbound so I’ll be out of the densest inner suburbs and heading north. My plan is to head towards Maine before backtracking via train to go via New Hampshire to Vermont. Mostly a way of otherwise avoiding the worst hills crossing from Maine to northern Vermont

Strava tells me a slow city day: 42.10 miles, 5:07:38 elapsed, 8.2 average, 1542 ascent and 3120 calories.