SHREWSBURY – The beaches of Barnstable. The covered bridges in Colrain. The cliffs of Aquinnah. The waterfalls in Mount Washington.
Shrewsbury residents Laura and Scott Spangenberg have seen them all. The couple has spent the last four years traveling throughout the Bay State and walking one mile (or more) in each of the commonwealth’s 351 cities and towns. They’ve taken pictures along the way and blogged their experience at www.walkmasstowns.com.
“It’s a really cool state. You go from the ocean to the mountains. You’ve got something for everyone. I feel blessed to live here, really,” said Laura Spangenberg, who teaches at Maj. Howard W. Beal Elementary School. “There’s so many cool places. That’s been such a neat thing – just seeing the diversity of the state. There’s so many unexpected finds.”
During the peak of the pandemic, the Spangenbergs – who love to travel – felt cooped up in their house and decided to walk every street in Shrewsbury. The couple divided the town into quadrants and explored each of Shrewsbury’s 711 roads. With the challenge completed and the pandemic still lingering, the Spangenbergs looked for their next adventure.
“We finished that in August of 2020, and then we were like, ‘Now what?’ We were still in the pandemic, and you literally weren’t allowed to leave Massachusetts at that point. You weren’t supposed to go to other states,” Laura Spangenberg said. “[Scott] went on Wikipedia and I saw there were 351 cities and towns in Massachusetts. [He] just said, ‘What if we walked one mile in every spot?’”
And the tour of the commonwealth began soon after.
The duo started fast, visiting towns along Cape Cod like Wellfleet, Eastham, and Orleans. Once the pandemic-era restrictions were relaxed and the state opened up again, trips became much more intentional. The Spangenbergs printed a map of Massachusetts and filled in the towns they visited with a blue highlighter. They’ve made calendars with the pictures they’ve taken along the way.
The Spangenbergs got creative, knocking out several “must-do” items while in the communities. The Brimfield stop included a visit to the Brimfield Antiques Show, they were in Topsfield for the Topsfield Fair, and they attended the Christmas Stroll while on Nantucket. Norwood is known for its “automile” – so they walked it. The couple got a true-to-Burlington experience at the eponymous mall.
They’ve sauntered through Salem, wandered around Winchester, roamed through Randolph, and moseyed through Marlborough. The journey included trips to Florida and Peru – the Western Mass. towns, of course.
While the Spangenbergs did research prior to their visits, they still managed to find things that surprised them. In New Marlborough, they came across the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Berkshire National Fish Hatchery, where millions of trout eggs are harvested and shipped to populate the Great Lakes.
Other highlights included World’s End in Hingham and exploring almost every college campus in Massachusetts.
“I’ve got to tell you, it’s not very far west of Worcester that you get into rural, rural Massachusetts. Not a lot of people are living in these places. It’s not like suburbia at all. Most people think of Massachusetts as being very suburban, but most of the state is just country,” said Scott Spangenberg.
By mid-November, Spangenbergs had one last stop on their journey – Plymouth. Why save Plymouth, founded in 1620, until the end?
“The first shall be last,” said Scott Spangenberg.
