After we left Boston on our recent organized guided tour of New England fall foliage we stopped…read morebriefly here before heading to Hyannis. The first shots occurred here which started the American Revolutionary War. There is a statue of Captain John Parker, leader of the Lexington militia. The flag flies 24 hours a day. Across the street from the Battle Green is Buckman Tavern and the visitor center.

A good pause for any history buff. The green is exactly that - just a patch of grass the middle of…read moretown. There is a historical marker and a statue but not much else to see. We unfortunately did not have time for the visitors center, or the surrounding historical building tour but I would recommend it if time allows.

I found Hocus Pocus Tours while seeking things to do in Salem on Yelp and TripAdvisor. Fellow…read moreYelpers' rave reviews did not disappoint! In messaging Hocus Pocus Tours with a couple questions about the tour and travel to and from Salem, the owner Susan replied immediately and suggested that I call her. This led to a one hour phone conversation where Susan was so gracious with her time, knowledge, and suggestions, not just about how to make the most of the tour, but how to appreciate a day in Salem. I can see why those who had the opportunity to take the in-person tour with Susan really enjoyed it. Covid changed the business model and Hocus Pocus now offers a self-guided tour by purchasing one of two tour apps. I opted for the $19.99 grand tour and it was well worth it. It has 37 points of interest. The app is user friendly and well designed. It provides a map of all stops, tracks where you are, and guides you to the next stop that you select on the tour. When you get to your stop, you can confirm you're at the right spot by comparing a photo of the site with what you see. Then you click on a 2-3 minute audio recording that provides a great snapshot of the significance of the site. As Susan had pointed out to me, there is much more to Salem than the historic witchcraft trials. It includes author Nathaniel Hawthorne's The House of Seven Gables, America's oldest candy company, and other interesting sites. Of everything I visited, I experienced a very deep emotional connection with the 1692 Witchcraft Memorial with 20 stones dedicated to each of the victims of the witchcraft trial. The tour includes brief descriptions of some of the victims including those written about in Arthur Miller's The Crucible. If you plan to visit Salem, I highly recommend this tour. All sites can be visited on the outside and some on the inside at no charge. Some sites, such as The House of Seven Gables, charge separate admission fees. If you want to travel to Salem and don't have a car, the ferry from Boston offers a nice, scenic, and entertaining 50 minute ride. The commuter trains run more frequently and can come in handy if the ferry schedule coming or going doesn't meet your needs. There are plenty of good places to dine at to break up the tour. We had lunch at FINZ and really enjoyed it (I'll post separately about that).

This was legit SO much fun! The name Hocus Pocus kinda throws you off because you may be thinking…read moreabout the movie, but this tour really is amazing. Start off with the tour guides, extremely friendly and beyond knowledgeable. They really know their history for Salem. The tour itself was a few hours and you walk to all of the sites in Salem with historical significance. There is so much to learn from Salem. So much history and heartbreak. It really is eye opening to hear the stories oof the witch trials and how the witch trials began and who all was wrongly persecuted. The tour guides were so nice and explained everything with such great details. This tour was definitely the highlight of our trip in Salem. I highly highly recommend Hocus Pocus Tours, I learned so much regarding Salem, the witch trials, the history behind the two, and a little bit of Hocus Pocus and Bewitched. So much fun!

As 1 of 3 of historical homes in a package deal for $15, this house is different from the others in…read morethat it tells both the story of an colonial family but also tells the story of the British. It really puts a lens on their experience, which you don't often hear. It was humbling to remember that they're people too and to imagine they didn't want this to happen either, was a very interesting perspective. The guide that shows you through this house was informative, enthusiastic, and great all in all. You start with a 5 minute video about the redcoat experience and then you're taken through the rest of the house. They tell you about the colonials that owned it, who ran out of the house to hide in the woods knowing that the redcoats would likely come back, how the redcoats broke into the house to use it as a temporary hospital or break as reinforcements met up with the original group and led them back to Boston. Such a great tour. Such a great house. Definitely worth the time!

From the owner: Built in 1735, this important tavern was taken over and used by the British Redcoat troops on their…read moreretreat back to Boston in the afternoon of April 19, 1775. Learn about the British perspective of the day's events and see where President Washington dined when he visited Lexington and this Tavern in 1789. Highlights: Relics of the Redcoats exhibit, Garden of Colonial Flowers, Museum Shop.

We visited in the off season (March) and booked a private tour because there were no public tours…read moreavailable. Our guide was Mary Hamilton. We had a walking tour of the Battle Green. My two teens were along, 6th and 8th graders and they both enjoyed the tour and learned SO much. Mary brought the battle in Lexington to life for us, explained so many interesting things about Paul Revere's ride we didn't know, and more. Having the tour made Lexington Battle Green come to life for my family and I am so thankful we booked the private tour. For us, it was worth the premium price.

I feel bad, not getting our tour guide's name, but she was a young college student with very short…read morehair and had the most charming personality and patience with our driver on his first day and he wouldn't get off his cell phone. I believe arguing with his wife. She was very informative, and yet very gracious with all the riders, and I look forward to coming back in the future and taking this tour again

Our tour guide Alissa gave a thoroughly entertaining and fact filled tour on the Freedom Trail. She…read morespoke for 2.5 hours almost nonstop with interesting stories that made history come alive. She is a winner!! Thanks Alissa!

My friend booked our tour through Get Your Guide. Sewart led us on our 2.5+ hour Freedom Trail…read moreyour. He did a fantastic job. He was witty and knowledgeable. Very engaging. I appreciated that he kept his eyes on the group to be sure everyone was moving along. I would def recommend this tour and guide. You can do the Freedom Tour on your own but this was well worth the money to have someone guide you and give you the history at the same time.

Small museum with a big heart. Our guide was knowledgeable. The museum has some Tewksbury Hospital…read morehistory and some public health history...I learned things I never knew. We took a timed, socially distanced tour - it worked! We hope to visit in the spring to take the outdoor tour next time.

The museum is fine. It's nothing fancy and oddly enough, completely inaccessible to people with…read moredisabilities, and I had to search for a staff member to answer my question about an unlabeled item. But for $5 and a half hour, if you're in the area, fine. Public health is important. Anti vaxxers would hate it but that's their problem. What I am actually sad about is the tour of the hospital grounds, led by an older white woman who seemed informed enough but whose knowledge of history and psychiatric care, etc, was easily outmatched by the children and adults in our group (because the people taking a 90 minute walking tour of a state hospital are not just curious tourists, we all had a specific interest in the history of health.) She simply did not seem to have any real sympathy or empathy for the poor souls held there against their will, and her cheerful demeanor as she led us around would probably be appropriate at another historic site, but not one where people were locked up for life for the crimes of being poor or disabled. She showed us a picture of a row of fat babies in a crib, admitted it was probably staged as most of the kids would be thinner, but didn't mention the well known fact that the majority of infant inmates there died before their first birthday and that their bodies were sold to be dissected. (http://homenewshere.com/tewksbury_town_crier/article_fade0809-5eb1-5269-a6f3-9fbfcb056845.html https://socialwelfare.library.vcu.edu/issues/tewksbury-almshouse-investigation/) To me, a disabled woman, the hospital grounds are a sacred space, a space where thousands upon thousands lived and died and suffered due to the fact that society at the time did not want to deal with them. These attitudes persist today when businesses do not want to make their stores accessible or when schools deny a disabled child needed accommodations. At the time of its opening, Tewksbury hospital was a model for the nation, and today, it has offices for Mass health, the direct model for Obamacare and one of the best public insurance programs in the nation. There is a direct link between yesterday and today, and today, our guide did not even attempt to make it. A small amount of online research makes the place come alive as it did not during the tour, because you are able to find out the actual names and stories of people - very few stories, unfortunately, but many names. This tour had no stories whatsoever, simply random facts about how at that end of that building, the more 'dangerously violent insane' were kept, and how wonderful the farm worked, and how hard people worked, (until their workshops were forced to shut down because there was a law made saying that people had to be paid. This is said as if it were a bad thing......) It is largely just the pointing out of what population was held in this building that is now used for (some program) or, in about half the case, in this building that no longer exists. (Why in heavens name is there a daycare in the building formerly used as the main asylum for mentally ill men?) It is stories that make people come alive. These people are dead, many not very long ago, and their stories are all gone with them. The tour is completely inaccessible to people with sensory disabilities. There are many sections of rotting asphalt road, many stops and starts, few near a place you can sit down, also with one exception you don't get close enough to touch the buildings and not many visual descriptions are given even with a blind person in our group. And although the museum uses up to date language - saying, for example, 'people with mental illness' as has been the standard for years - the guide doesn't bother to, because, she ever-cheerfully explains, they just said 'the insane' then, so that's what she does. It's a poor choice of language and it's a poor tour in general. I do hope that other tour guides are better than ours was. Do go down the road a bit to the cemetery and pay your respects, over 10,000 people are buried there with metal markers that peep up through the leaves. Do think about the lives they led, and the choices that were taken from them as they were locked inside those cells and crowded rooms. Do think about their death and what they mean today to you as a person who maybe benefits from the great public health system of Massachusetts.

Tony is a true treasure. He loves his neighborhood and it shows. He will take you to places that…read morework to keep the North End a real neighborhood. The food is some of the best I have ever had and they aren't small portions. Come hungry for good food and great stories of what makes the North End a special place. It's a dynamite experience from a guy who is not only a local, but I am pretty convinced he's the unofficial mayor of the neighborhood based on the number of people who said hello (and other stuff unsuitable for small children or church) to him as we walked the narrow streets. You'll even learn some new curse words. Anthony, your tour guide, doesn't hold back what he thinks.

I have a bone to pick with Politically Incorrect North End Food Tour.... It was so so good that it…read morehas ruined every other food tour for me.... Anthony has set the bar way too high. Now this tour may not be for everyone, as the title of the tour alludes to.. but if you don't mind the random swear word and aren't easily offended, you'll be like me... cracking up for 3 hours straight. And there was one thing I noticed about Anthony that he doesn't advertise, and may try to track me down for saying on here.... But beneath the gruff exterior was the sweetest guy that seemed genuinely interested in sharing his culture, stories, and amazing food with everyone! We started off at a pizza joint where we got a slice of pizza and an arancini ball. I expected the pizza to be good... and it was fantastic. But I am not a huge fan of arancini and this one had peas in it... also something I am not a huge fan.... But hey, I was on a food tour so I was going to try everything! Thank goodness I did, because this arancini was the stuff of dreams. How in the world could something be THAT much better than what high end Italian restaurants advertise? The last time I had an arancini ball was at a restaurant in Hawaii that won "best Italian food in Hawaii".... And it was only so-so. This arancini ball would make me fly 5,000 just to eat it again! Next up was a deli sub, a coffee shop, ravioli, a pastry shop and lastly an affogato (or gelato if you didn't want coffee that late in the day). Based on the food I received, before factoring in all the stories that Anthony shared, I feel the tour was really underpriced. I wish I hadn't done this the tour on my last day, I would have gone back for another round of everything we tried, as well as everything that was recommended. Heck I may have signed up for the tour again just to experience it all over again!

The party bus!!! So fun. One of the best birthday experiences I have had. You can book the bus for…read morea minimum of four hours and as many stops as you would like. our bus driver was great and incredibly helpful. He knew of extra bars to stop by that do not include covers and free shots for the birthday person. He also stopped for hotdogs at one point. it is byob and your own playlist. There is truly no experience quite like it where you can jam to music and drink, while driving around Boston. Would recommend for any occasion.

Holy shit, what a gas... As part of our social engagement…read morefor work. We were designated to go on a bus tour of the Boston scene. Not necessarily the usual Boston, the underground Boston. Mobsters and Lobsters is a mafia story laden trip that ends up at the south shore popular lobster eatery. Although Mother Nature and the traffic in downtown Boston decided yo play games with us the owner who's name actually is Tom Collins, started off with a quick quip yo get the folks settled and the first round of beverages were begun. Tom brings us around to the spectacular locations and spots where specific mobsters from the years past were doing their cunning and not so cunning work. Tom's knowledge for this thoroughly interesting topic is unmatched. His serious knowledge of the history of other significant historical places and events speckled with his dry "Bastan" humor. Made this trip extremely worthwhile. The duration was four hours long which also included a Lobster dinner at a local eatery on the south Boston harbor. I haven't laughed this hard in a long while. If you are in beantown for a spell. I highly recommend you and you motley crew join Tom for an interesting alcohol added trip back in time. I am positive your jaws and cheeks will be sore from laughing so hard. Be aware this is an "R" rated trip! But very worth it. Thanks Tom for making this a great memorable evening.

It's free and interesting. You can see how the iron works ran back in the day. Great guided tour…read more Definitely worth visiting.

Free national park. Quiet, clean, and so much knowledge here. I love how this was 1600s and then…read moresomeone restored it in the 1950s. Rangers are kind and patient.

Great tour guide. She controlled the chatty Cathy in our group asking off the wall questions with…read morekindness and d a firm redirect. The tour was a tad long because of this but the guide was knowledgeable and I learned more about Salem than just the witch stuff. It seems like you walk around town all Over but then after the tour I realized we were actually in a pretty small area and everything was actually pretty close together

To be honest, this may have been the best walking tour I've ever done. Our tour guide, Sarah Black,…read morewas extraordinary. - Smart - Funny - Clever - Clear - Answered every question - Very easy to listen to - Really good speaking voice and personality I even liked that she threw a little bit of shade on the terrible tourist traps in the city. Honestly, I thought Sarah must've been an actor or something because she was so engaging. Nope. She's a local historian. Awesome. Overall, very informative and fun. I would absolutely recommend Sarah Black and the Bewitched Tour for anyone looking for a great tour of the city of Salem.