Wonderland!

There is some wonderful coastal scenery in New England. There are miles of long sandy beaches, small coves, secluded harbours, rugged cliffs further north, lighthouses galore, and of course plenty of the freshest seafood around to go with it. So when the weather turned warm, the second thing that we did (the first being build a barbecue) was pack the towels, don the swimming trunks and head for the surf. The idea was to do it on the cheap, as hiring a car is the best part of a hundred bucks, and in addition ever since she arrived in Boston Em had been keen to head for the stop at the end of the blue line, adjacent to Revere Beach: Wonderland.

Wonderland. The name conjures up images of an old-style fairground with ferris wheels, carousels, candy floss trolleys, and shops packed with sweets - you can see why the idea would appeal to Em, who is to all intents and purposes a big six year old. So off we set with merry hearts: green line to Government Centre, blue line to Wonderland.

Wonderland. It should have rung a bell or two when we realised that we hadn't read about Wonderland and Revere Beach in our travel guides. We should have realised that it was on the end of the blue line. We did realise when we got off and almost tripped over an old sofa that was lying half in a ditch. We realised when we saw the pink concrete, outlandishly shaped tower block eyesores that were clearly the inspiration for the 2012 Olympics logo. We realised when the wind blew sand over the empty road and clattered a shutter against its window. When we saw the graffiti on the uninviting toilet block by the beach. When we avoided the rusty nails and glass lying amongst the rest of the litter on the beach. When the air roared as another jet liner took off from the nearby airport. When we realised the sea was black.

Well, we'd made the journey there so we were going to have a walk on the beach. There were actually quite a few people on there, but curiously none seemed to be speaking English. I don't know whether they, like us, were tourists or whether they lived there. We walked about a mile up the beach and then back along the adjacent road, past the blacked out rides with da beats blaring from within. We couldn't find anywhere that looked half decent to eat so we ended up plumping for a Dunkin' Donuts' ("America runs on dunkin'!") doughnut. This was probably the best experience of the day - and that should put it into some context if you've ever been in a Dunkin'.

Wonderland. With no need to hang around we headed back to the T. It's a shame that it wasn't particularly pleasant, but it turns out that there are public transport methods of getting to the more distant (and much more pleasant) beaches that I'm use we'll find time to make use of this summer. When we got back and told people that we'd been to Revere Beach the expression was usually one of shock, and the exclamation was either "And you've still got all your teeth?" or "Urrgh! Needles in the sand!" And so, boys and girls, the moral of the story is never judge T line station environs by the station name. Except Boston University Central, which is pretty much Central to Boston University.