Phoenix Landing - best bar in the Boston Area (actually in Cambridge)

As a friend is currently over in Cambridge MA to raise his personal geek army at the Boston Area HacKidCon, I recommended he visit Phoenix Landing, which is a bar at 512 Mass. Ave in Cambridge, where my partner and I spent Halloween last year, in the middle of our 3 week meander around the NW. Being run by an Irishman might make it an Irish bar I suppose. But for us, for one night only, it felt like our own peculiar version of Cheers.

We'd been to Salem that day on the ferry, thinking to spend Halloween there and although the costumes were pretty cool, the history was presented in such a sterile manner that it was hard to engage with. It's almost like the locals were ashamed of it all somehow. And as the afternoon wore on it was hard to ignore the ominous energy building from the flood of wide-eyed costumed chaos monkeys and the ever-increasing numbers of National Guard and Boston Police. Being all puritan and all, Salem is pretty dry, booze-wise, so those hostelries available were pretty rammed by about 2pm and it was hard to even get a beer. As the lively crowds poured in later it was clear they had mostly brought their own, and lots of it.



Now I'm not normally someone who shies away from indulgence in Misrule, but my leg was pretty bad - I'd got pyriformis syndrome in NYC after all that walking, it was hard for me to stand, let alone run - so we slipped back to Boston on one of the trains newly emptied of revellers, waved on ticketless by the resigned station attendants, no doubt on the lookout for far larger crimes than fare jumping as 100,000 people descended on their town, fully intent on mischief.

The news reports said it was relatively peaceful compared to previous years, just assaults rather than full on rioting. Most of the time I follow adventures on whims, like Mr Benn donning a new outfit at the fancy dress shop. But I've come to pick my battles more carefully as I get older, and I do not regret missing out on that one.



Instead we wandered about in a slight rain through the crowds intent on Halloween fun, until we travelled across the river to Cambridge on a whim, following the sniff of a shared passion. I'd picked up a guide magazine in the second of two Boston bars visited that night that carried an ad for a place in Cambridge that said they showed Premiership Football - not soccer. An unassuming frontage led us into what turned out to be a very friendly place, already decked out ready for the party that night. We sat up at the bar and made conversation with strangers who seemed genuinely interested in exchanging stories with us and making us welcome.

I'm not sure if the whole Road aspect of travelling makes it easier for people to just engage with you - maybe, knowing it is unlikely to ever happen again - they open up faster, because they know you aren't a threat to their world? If you just show an interest in people, they will usually respond kindly and in kind, well, this is my experience, on the whole. We met some ex-pats, and some locals, and soon enough we were all together drunk and happy for the evening, which turned out to become rammed and rowdy once the DJ turned up, but still well-spirited. Some excellent costumes, including the Fear and Loathing couple pictured who were just fantastic. Best Halloween costume, ever.



It was an excellent evening, one I hope I will always remember. And the fact that the bar owner was the spit of Howard Moon from Boosh should help.