Massachusetts The transformation is nearly complete: normal clothes have been shed, the laptop is no longer needed, and I appear in my glorious bright red waterproof jacket with a blue and black rucksack sprouting from my shoulders. Lo, the backpacker flies via Washington to Boston. I don´t think it really counts as backpacking, though, if you´re kipping at your second-cousin-twice-removed´s place in Manchester-by-the-Sea. It was wonderful to see Ailsa, as always, and we spent our time nattering away over meals, her three-legged Puerto Rican miniature poodle and a broken-down car. The latter was on the road to the pretty town of Newburyport to visit an old friend of Ailsa´s whose mum used to work with Great Aunt Mary. I spent a bit of time in snowy Boston and visited Cambridge too. Boulia later asked me if
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