We have been to Boston twice. Both times we went 4 days before our cruise left to explore. Not sure why you didn’t plan to see the town. We lived in upstate New York 40 years ago. The East is beautiful but also gets a lot of snow in places, very damp and winter is the longest season. All of this is probably not true of Boston but obviously very expensive and not sure I would want to live around that many people. Maine is beautiful also.