One Sunday we explored the Salem area.
I guess many Americans know a town of Salem related to witch trials. There are some museums for the witch trials including National Park Service one's. It is only 30 minute drive from Boston area, so we decided to check the area out.
When I look up a trail in the area I found Salem Woods Highland Park. We like hiking, so we started the exploring Salem to walk on the trail there.
At the trailhead there was a trail map sign. Then a paper was put up: Tortie cat is missing. She escaped from a cat cage in the parking lot of vet. I guess she was angry after vet visit and ran away or she was scared of going there and ran away. Next to that notice, there was another paper put up about coyote. It is a warning of cyote.
Hmm, an escaped cat and coyote? An idea came to my mind: a coyote caught the cat?
Anyway we had a nice small brisk walk. Nobody was there and it was quiet and peaceful. First half was in the woods as the park's name indicates. Then at the half way there was big marsh area. The word "marsh" always reminds me of marsh area in Palo Alto, CA, because that is the first time I learned the word, and I hiked, biked, and ran there many times. It is not a great idea to hike IN marsh, but nice to hike around marsh area.
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| Forest |
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Marsh area
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Then we went to the Salem downtown area. I know a lot of normal (non-hiker) people visit Salem for weekend fun. I saw many people walking on the main street. There are many restaurants, coffee places, book stores, souvenir shops. In addition to those, there are some attraction spots, including witch house and witch museum. To be honest, I was a little disappointed to see even National Park Service visitor center had witch cartoon's T-shirts, mugs, key chains, etc. Now Salem looks a quite touristic place to me, rather than historic landmark.
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Witch House
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Salem Witch Musum
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I think that it is important to remember, learn about witch trials. How human fear gets crazy and spread in a wrong way (hysteria). Also it is a good example to think what the right judging system is. Based on this dark, tragic, but important history, I felt bit weird by seeing a lot of "cute"or "scary" witch cartoons.
Despite of that, cappuccino I got in Salem was great.
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