Pinning the city

You seem to have missed the Arboretum and Stony Brook Reservation in the article.

actually stony brook and the arboretum are on her list -- see the last paragraphs of her column, which was a surprisingly good one!

You could just go to geocaching.com and start finding geocaches (hidden boxes with log books and trinkets for trading) in nearly every single one of the best locations around.

OR...

You could go to the spin-off of geocaching called waymarking.com, where the goal isn't a box but just to take a picture or answer a small trivia question to prove you were there, which is chocked full of the best and coolest places to go in the city.

The best part of both of these things is that they are user-driven, so if you know a location that isn't currently "marked", then *you* can mark it for others to come find as well! Unlike the Pins campaign where it's up to the Mayor's office to know what it's missing and then have to solve the problem. In fact, the mayor's office should just contact the people at waymarking.com and come up with a cross promotion. The pushpins could actually become an entirely new category there, really easily.

While you're visiting historic Lower Mills, why not take an equally quaint and historic form of transportation to it?

Constitution Beach in East Boston (at Orient Heights, a short walk from the Madonna shrine). Swim and watch airplanes at the same time.

Piers Park, a short walk from Maverick station, with a stunning view of the Boston skyline

Jamaica Pond

Not just the Arboretum, but the [b]back[/b] part of the Arboretum, where even most locals don't go. Climb (treeless) Peter's Hill and get another great view of the Boston skyline.

If we can include nearby towns, I'd add in these:

Danehy Park in Cambridge -- like Millennium and Pope John Paul II parks, this is built on a large former landfill. It's a great place to fly kites.

Prospect Hill Park in Somerville. (Unfortunately, the tower is not open to the public.)

The Old Powder House at Nathan Tufts Park in Somerville.

Coolidge Corner in Brookline, with its indpendent movie theatre and independent bookstore across the street from each other

Fresh Pond in Cambridge (and the Water Works adjoining it)

Spy Pond in Arlington

Horn Pond in Woburn

Dorchester Heights aka Thomas Park in South Boston (not Dorchester!)

Highland Park at Fort Hill, Roxbury

Isn't there a park at the top of Mission Hill (Parker Hill) with another great view? Unfortunately, I don't remember its name or exactly how to get to it.

Corey Hill in Brookline