How to hike through the streets of Boston (2024)

The B-Side

Plus: 🏎️ Seaport speeding starts now

By Gia Orsino, The B-Side and Emily Schario, The B-Side

April 22, 2024

It’s Monday, Boston.

🌎 It’s also Earth Day!Boston.comrounded up some of the best celebrations happening around the city this week, from park cleanups, to festivals, to free movie screenings.Check them all out here.

👀What’s on tap today:

• Grab coffee with Mayor Michelle Wu
• F1 in the Seaport
• A bracelet you’ll never take off

Up first…

EARTH DAY

Boston’s urban jungle

Image: John Tlumacki/Globe Staff. Illustration by Gia Orsino.

Looking to celebrate Earth Day outdoors?How about a hike in Boston? No, we’re not kidding.

Enter: Urban hiking, an easy and accessible way to enjoy a city’s green spaces, and go on a legit hike within city limits. We live in one of thebest places in the U.S.to do it, after all.

Here’s what to know:

🥾Urban hiking is the lovechild between a backcountry hike and a walk through the city.Like the former, a good urban hike requires commitment to a plan: namely, a route, a destination and proper preparation, according to Miles Howard, author, trail builder, and creator of Boston’sWalking City Trail, a 27-mile urban hiking trail connecting 17 Boston neighborhoods. But unlike backcountry, an urban hike route can be anywhere, whether that’s from your stoop to a local park, the Emerald Necklace, or the Harborwalk.

🏙️Plus, the urban landscape allows for more flexibility and accessibility.In urban hiking, taking the T or bus back home, ducking into a corner store for some water, or stopping for a quick bite are all fair play, which can make it more beginner- and time-friendly than traditional hiking.

🌳Bostonis more outdoorsy than you’d think.Boston has a “long but undertold history” in hiking, rock climbing, and trailmaking, according to Darren Josey, founder and CEO ofFirst Seed Sown, a marketing firm specializing in equitable outdoor recreation. And it’s often easier to take advantage of than you’d think (we are “America’s Walking City,” after all). Boston has an abundance of greenspace, trails, and walkways, and, as Howard puts it, part of the fun of urban hiking is finding ways to connect them.

🧠The experience has a lot to do with your mindset.Hiking purists may turn their noses up at the thought of urban hiking, but according to Howard, a small shift in thinking is often all you need to experience the true adventure city hiking has to offer. “There’s a sense of surprise and incredulity that people experience when they realize what sort of rustic spaces can be cultivated and preserved in a city,” he said. The surprisingly serene Sherrin Woods in the middle of Hyde Park, or often overlooked rock formations in residential Mission Hill that can be used for climbing are just two examples.

🎒If you want to take an urban hike …Start “with a green space or a territory in the city that’s familiar to you and then [think], where could I go beyond that?” Howard said. If you’re stuck, try a chunk of theWalking City TrailorEmerald Necklace. And prepare for itlike you would any other hike, particularly keeping the weather in mind.

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CITY

Quick & dirty headlines

Image: Barry Chin/Globe Staff

🏆It’s time to get rowdy at TD Garden.In honor of playoffs season, Canal Street is once again turning into theBoston Playoff Hub, a.k.a. a car-free pedestrian zone outside of TD Garden where fans can gather before, during, and after the games. On game days, the street will shut down at noon and stay closed until an hour after the game ends. And speaking of playoffs, things are off to a solid start for the B’s and C’s, with the Bruins crushing the Maple Leaves 5-1, and the Celtics with a comfortable 114-94 victory against the Heat.

💅Boston’s parking meters are about to glow up.Over the next two years, the city is going to replace the vast majority of its current5,600 parking meterscity-wide and with newer, more modern kiosks. The kiosks will serve multiple spaces at once and accept multiple forms of payment (including tap-to-pay and pay-by-text). At the end of the upgrade, some old-school meters (1,000 or fewer) will still be found on smaller city streets, but even they’ll get new meter heads. And, before you ask, no, there is no planned increase in parking rates alongside these changes (for now, anyway).

☕ Starting today, anyone can grab a coffee with Mayor Michelle Wu.No, seriously.Mayor Wu’s2024 “Coffee Hour” serieskicks off today, where any Bostonian can stop by their local park, grab some coffee and Munchkins (courtesy of Dunkin’), and chat with the Mayor or city officials about their neighborhood’s open spaces and public areas. The events are kicking off in West Roxbury, butthey’re scheduledfor multiple times a week across different neighborhoods through late June.

🏎️ You’re officially allowed to start speeding in the Seaport …in an arcade. The U.S.’ first everF1 Arcadeopens today in the Seaport, and it’s stocked with 69 full motion driving simulators where you can get your Lewis Hamilton on. But unlike Hamilton, in between laps, you’ll also have the option to hang out with friends, take in the waterfront views, and order from a full bar and menu. If you’re interested,we’d book soon, since prime-time slots are already mostly full through the end of the month.

THINGS TO DO

Weekday checklist

⚽ Watch a comfort movie at The Coolidge.They’ll be playing the iconic “She’s the Man” starring Amanda Bynes as part of their“Shakespeare Reimagined” series. The event kicks off tonight with a pre-show talk from BAGLY and ends with a Q&A session.

📚 Stay up past your bedtime in the name of love.Porter Square Books is throwing aspecial midnight release partytonight for Emily Henry’s newest romance novel, “Funny Story.” There will be trivia, raffles, and book speed dating!

☕ Add a DIY touch to your morning coffee.And by that, we mean, make your own coffee mug out of clay. That’s on the agenda at Long Live Roxbury on Tuesday intheir mug-making pottery class.

❓ Test your knowledge of Black culture and history.That’s exactly what’s going down at Sam Adams Brewery in JP for their“Hella Black Trivia” eventon Wednesday night.

💐Stop and smell the MFA.Spring is in session at the museum this weekend, as 45 artworks will be transformed into beautiful interpretive floral arrangements for their“Art in Bloom” exhibit.

ONE LAST THING

A bracelet you’ll never take off

Image courtesy of The Gilded Oyster

Do us a favor: Look down at your wrist. Are you wearing aCape Cod bracelet?Have you been wearing it for awhile? Like, non-stop since a random vacation you took when you were sixteen? If so, you’re not alone.

This weekend, Shelby Anton, a TikToker from Ohio, went viralfor a videotalking about her now nine-year old Cape Cod bracelet, which she originally received as a sixteenth birthday gift, that she hasn’t taken off to this day. “Do I just wear this for the rest of my life? At what point do I take this off? Do I wear it on my wedding day?” she wondered.

And, considering the video now has almost 6 million views, many,many people can relate. Whether their bracelet reminds them of a favorite memory, they like the look of it, or they literally just can’t manage to get it off withoutbending the metal, decades-old Cape Cod bracelets are now officially IN.

— Written by Gia Orsino and Emily Schario

💎Thanks for reading!That also goes for the rusty Alex and Ani bracelets in some deep corner of your room. Yeah, we know.

💜Special shoutout to today’s sponsor,Meet Boston, for supporting local journalism and helping local employers and job seekers connect in a more authentic way.

🚰The results are in:48% of readers say they have an emotional support water bottle, and thanks to themanyof you wrote in to tell us about them. One reader said: “My water bottle goes everywhere with me, but I rarely drink from it. It’s just there to make me feel safe.”

💃Keep up with us@BostonBSideonIG,TikTok, andTwitter. Send comments and suggestions to[emailprotected]or[emailprotected].