Photos from the 4th July are still relevant, right?

In years past, to celebrate the 4th July in Boston, Lia and I have gone to the Charles River Esplanade to watch the fireworks display — but on the Cambridge side to avoid the throngs of people. It works remarkably well, as relatively few people think to watch from that side, where you get the Boston skyline in the background of the display, avoid the smoke that inevitably blows from the explosion over the Boston side, and avoid a big crowd, which is always a plus.

But this year, a friend of a friend had access to Boston University's boat house, and we were able to snag a few seats on a boat to watch the fireworks from ON the Charles River. Aside from being preemptively hungover from day drinking a little too enthusiastically as we sat on the boat, it was an amazing experience neither of us will forget. 

So, while the event has come and gone some time ago, I finally got around to editing the photos from the night in question and wanted to share them. I didn't brave taking my camera on a boat for nothing.

We arrived early to the BU boathouse, which is right next to the BU bridge; the only place in the U.S. where a plane can fly over a car as it drives over a train which is going over a boat. Pretty neat fact.

James — the friend who had the friend with access to the boathouse — decided to go for a quick paddle boarding session. He made some animal friends, but he's no stranger to that as he's worked for the zoo before.

Lia made a friend too.

Jake tried to.

We ate questionably grilled meat while the sun set, and I got passive aggressively chewed out for using a bottle of ketchup out on a table by a woman who was oddly protective of her red sauce. 

Finally the time came to cast off toward the Mass Ave bridge, where we'd drop anchor to watch the fireworks. We had a beautifully unobstructed, thick of the action view, and the reflections of the fireworks on the water were almost as impressive as the exploding sky.

Night photos aren't the highest quality shots to begin with and reducing the file size to make them easier to upload to my blog makes the quality even dodgier, but you get an idea of the view.

As the sky began to look like it was on fire, the smoke increased to match. The view became a little less clear but no less impressive. 

It was a brilliant way to begin to say goodbye to Boston.