Boston Bits ~ Insiders’ Tips -- our monthly journal of things Bostonian, to give Boston Your Way site visitors a sense of our city.

It is October – Boston’s goldenest month. Our skies are clear and our weather crisp. Every day our trees grow more vibrant. The city’s arts scene hits its stride, with a rich calendar of theatre, dance, music and sports.

Red, Yellow, Orange…
October in New England means Foliage (which too many people pronounce “folidge.”). This drama of autumn color could have been created by gods of nature. But it is caused by a straightforward physical phenomenon: the loss of leaves’ green chlorophyll when touched by cool weather.

Mythic or scientific -- the fall foliage show truly is a wonder. And as if it isn’t enough that the colors alone are spectacular, they are enhanced by the dramatic backlight of the low autumn sun.

New England’s fall foliage season is high tourist season. Daily weather reports track the paths of prime color, descending from Northern Vermont and Maine in late September to Connecticut and Rhode Island in early November. (Massachusetts’ prime time is October.) We call the season’s tourists, “leaf peepers,” and we dread the traffic they create.

Insiders’ tip
If you are in Boston in October but don’t have time to go “leaf peeping” in Vermont or the Berkshires, you’re still in luck. Boston is the greenest of cities, and you can find “foliage” in local gardens, parks, riverbanks and pond sides, much of it along the Emerald Necklace.

Just walk to the Boston Public Garden, America’s first botanical garden, to see the brilliant yellowing of the weeping willows and beech trees.

After a visit to the Museum of Fine Arts or the Gardner Museum in the Fenway, cross into the Fens to see sumac and euonymus going to deep red.

After a meeting in the financial district, wander over to Post Office Square and wonder at so much beauty in a pocket-sized park.

Stroll along Back Bay’s Commonwealth Avenue or Marlborough and Beacon streets for rainbow displays by cherry, crabapple and magnolia trees in the front gardens of private brownstones.

At Moakley Court House on the South Boston side of Harborwalk, appreciate the well-labeled garden of native plantings.

Arnold Arboretum, Mount Auburn Cemetery, and Forest Hills all offer vivid shows in serene settings. All can be reached by public transportation.

Where’s Tim?
Tim’s Bar & Grill on Columbus Avenue in the South End makes the best homemade burgers in Boston. It is a basic place that has been around for years, well before the neighborhood was gentrified. This summer it shut down to renovate its kitchen. But it is still closed and there doesn’t seem to be much going on inside. In fact, it has that abandoned look, and we are worried. Stay tuned.

The Fenway
As we just mentioned, the Fenway is a great local foliage destination, but not one that comes readily to mind. We must admit that aside from Fenway Park, few think “Fenway” when they think of Boston. It is just sort of there, a busy neighborhood filled with students and ethnic restaurants.

Yet, it is the center of the city’s leading cultural and academic/research institutions, many of them world renown. The dense neighborhood may not be chic or spruced up for tourists, but it definitely is a rich and lively part of contemporary Boston.

So, what’s there? For starters, The MFA and the Gardner Museum. And Symphony Hall. Simmons College, Boston Latin School, Harvard Medical School, Northeastern University, The Berklee School of Music, The Massachusetts Historical Society, Northeastern University, The Huntington Theatre, The New England Conservatory, the YMCA, the Christian Science Mother Church. Beth Israel-Deaconness Hospital, The Joslin Diabetes Center, Dana-Farber Cancer Clinic, Brigham and Women’s Hospital -- all within walking distance of each other, in the Fenway.

And anchoring it? Fenway Park -- home to the World Champion Red Sox, who just grabbed the Wild Card for the American League East division playoffs, on their way to their second World Series title.

Isabella in the Fenway
When Isabella Stewart Gardner opened her Venetian Palace in the Fenway in 1903, the area was still an outpost. She gave up her mansion in the elite Back Bay to make the new museum her home, intending to pioneer the next top-drawer neighborhood. But Brahmin society stayed put. They had never accepted the flamboyant New Yorker even though she was the city’s foremost arts patron.

As for the Fenway, it could not compete as a residential neighborhood with the new street-car suburbs, including Jamaica Plain and Brookline, which could now be reached by trolley and the latest invention, the automobile.

The Fenway did become attractive to institutions feeling pinched for space. One after the other, they made their way “west” from downtown, Back Bay and the South End.

Insider’s Tip
There is always a concert or art show or something doing in the Fenway. But October 10 is an especially big day. The district celebrates “Opening Our Doors.” Virtually every school and cultural institution in the Fenway will host a free activity. The MFA and the Gardner Museum will offer free admission. Even life-long Bostonians can discover something new about the city at one of the open-house events or tours.
For details see: fenwayculture.org

Head of the Charles
Probably the signature happening in October is the Head of the Charles Regatta, the world’s largest two-day boat race, held on the river that separates Boston and Cambridge. This year it occurs on the weekend of the 22nd and 23rd.

Although known mostly as a major intercollegiate event, it is actually the creation of a private institution, the Cambridge Boat Club, and draws rowers of all classes – from college crews to 75-years-old-plus grand-veteran singles.

"Head" regattas are three mile-long races, in which boats compete against each other and against the clock. Winners of each race receive the honorary "Head Of The Charles" title. More than 7,000 athletes from around the world compete in 24 different races.

If you are in town that weekend, there is no better way to enjoy our city than to secure a spot on the river’s edge, and let yourself get caught up in the energy and camaraderie of the Head of the Charles.

Insiders Tip
Best viewing is between the Weeks and Anderson bridges in front of Harvard undergraduate houses on the Cambridge side and in front of the Harvard Business School on the Boston side.

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