Philadelphia

Those of you who know the area, know how close Philadelphia is to New York but even still we decided to stop in between for the night. After finishing up in Heather's with the internet and electricity we hit the road in the middle of Monday afternoon. Our route took us over the George Washington Bridge, a suspension bridge quite as spectacular as the Golden Gate in my eyes but obviously not with the location. We rejoined the pesky toll road system and crossed state boundaries into New Jersey. New Jersey seems to be alot more industrial than alot of the states we have visited on our trek across country but nonetheless we decided to go to the cinema to fill in the evening. We looked at the Sat Nav which told us that there was one in a mall along our route. Food and a film in one location. Goal!!!

We parked up in the oversize car park and went to the food court for dinner. We chose Johnny Rockets for burgers and fries. That sounds an awful lot like Eddie Rockets I her you say.......well it is. In fact, the only difference is in the name Johnny and Eddie. Everything else is exactly the same from the uniforms, the layout, the menu, down to the jukeboxes in the booths. We had a quick browse around a couple of shops before the film started and I picked up a pair of Quiksilver flip flops for $14 which I was happy with. We headed back to the cinema (we bought the tickets before the food so we knew how much time we would have - not just a pretty face, eh?! Not even says Emer;-)), bought popcorn and soda and headed into the theater to watch Public Enemies. Now I had heard mixed things about this film but I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's a slow burner but the battle between Johhny Depp and Christian Bale builds really well. Like the last film we saw, Americans seem to come to the cinema to chat and catch up, but we just dealt with it. After the film we hopped back in the RV and headed a little further to a rest area where we stayed for the night.

The next morning when Emer was getting cold milk for the cereal she got chatting to a garage man and found out how to get our pesky hubcaps off the wheels. While doing that and filling up our tyres for us he explained that they don't even make those hubcaps anymore. With full tyres and fuel we drove the remaining miles to Philadelphia. We went towards the city center and then drove around a bit looking for a place to park that wasn't metered or 2 hour only. After an unsuccesful few minutes we stuck a mall into the Sat Nav and headed for there, thinking that we would find a residential area close by and a bus stop. The route to the mall brought us through the park, whose avenues allowed free parking all day and all night. Not only that but it was on the route for the tourist trolley bus called Phlash which goes to all the tourist sites in the city so that was a good stroke of luck. We walked to the nearest stop which was at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Most of you would know it as the steps Rocky runs up training for his bouts with Apollo Creed. It's gas to see all the people finish their jogs and use the steps for plyometrics and stuff like that. We didn't have too much time to enjoy the scene as the bus came and brought us downtown.

First on the list of must-see things was Independence Square. We went into the Visitors Centre and picked up a map to the area. We walked out the door and went across the road to see the Liberty Bell, America's most important symbol of Freedom. There is alot of reading and stuff at the center but I got bored of it all after a while and just went and took some photos of it. After that we went into Independence Square which I was much more interested in. It was here that the Decleration of Independence was signed and where Congress sat until 1800 when they moved to DC. After going through security and having our bags searched we went into Old City Hall first. This housed the Supreme Court back in the day and it was amazing to see how the accused was made stand in an elevated platform surrounded by bars. From here we went to First Congress, where the House of Representatives and Senate sat up until 1800. We sat in replica seats in the House of Representatives while a talk was given and then we went upstairs to view the preserved Senate. As it is today, the Senate is a much grander room signifying it's status as the upper house in American politics.

Independence Hall is the main building in the square but unfortunately all tour tickets were gone for the day so we were unable to go on a guided tour but they have a first come first served express tour starting at 5pm sue to the numbers in high season which we went on. More on that later. Our stomachs were starting to give out to us so we headed for food. While in the bar in Brooklyn I got chatting to a couple who used to live in Philadelphia and I was told to make sure that we went to Geno's for a Philly Cheesesteak as they make the best one in the city. We found out where it was and strolled to it. It was about a half an hour walk through some Italian and Mexican neighbourhoods which had shops selling their produce on the street as well as inside. It made for an interesting walk seeing all the various items on makeshift shelves on the streets. We made it to Geno's and it was obvious that they had good food by the number of people eating and queueing to get served. We both got steak sandwiches with onions and I got American(Cheese) on mine. They were greasy and delicious, I'd expect nothing less. As we were eating and when we finished we looked at the numerous photos adorning the walkway and benches of famous people who have eaten at Geno's. And of course Rocky is given centre stage but there really are too many to mention. After the food we strolled back downtown to Independence Square where the queue for the express tour was relatively small so we joined it.

Groups of roughly 85 are let in at a time every ten minutes or so and of course we just missed out on the first group. We were front of the line for the next group which entered at about 5.15. We got to see the first floor, first we were told about the Supreme Court which was housed in the building. The public gallery was an open hallway which was seperated from the proceedings by a mere knee height barrier. After a few minutes we were shown into arguably the most important room in American history, the room where the American Constitution was voted on and signed. We were given a brief talk about the struggle to get consensus on the document and how delegates came from across the country and signed it at various seperate times, effectively committing treason by doing so. Sign it they did and look where it got them. After we saw this room and I got my photos we headed out onto the avenue and got the bus back to the RV. Here we chilled out for the evening, went back down to the Rocky steps when the sun went down to get some photos of the skyline and then headed off to a very slanty sleep.

We woke the following morning eager to see the other things on our list and hit the road before rush hour as we were pretty much parked in the city centre. We took the Phlash back to Independence Square and walked right past it to the US Mint. No cameras or cell phones are permitted in the building and they may not be checked in. On top of this photo ID is required so as I was the only one with some on me Emer said she would wait outside for me. I ran around it quickly, it was nothing amazing. There were loads of machines to press the various coins but everyone seemed to be on a break or they had minted their quota of coins as nothing was happening on the floor. I was out pretty much as soon as I entered and we hopped back on the bus up to City Hall to look into doing a tour up to tower. The City Hall in Philadelphia is the largest masonry structure in the world and you can go to the top of the tower for a view of the city. The next available spot was two hours away so we decided against it and went for food instead. We went to Reading Market on a recommendation of the city hall tourist lady and it was certainly a good idea.

Reading Market is an indoor market downtown and houses local independent fooderies. You can pretty much get anything you want from Sushi to BBQ and we went for reliable burgers and hot dogs. We almost got BBQ but Garrett said to wait until we crossed the Mason Dixon line until we had BBQ again as it's amazing in the south. The food and portions were excellent and neither of us were able to finish what we got. It was great to see the cross section of people all having their lunch in the market - from business types in their suits to tourists to the working class and unemployed. On the way out we bought some fresh fruit from a stall and then strolled down to Chinatown which was nothing amazing. It had the big Chinese entrance but once inside it was like any other part of town we had seen except the writing was in Chinese. Nothing like the Chinatown in New York. We strolled back out onto Market Street and then caught the bus back to the RV. It was mid afternoon at this stage so we stuck the address for the RV park into the Sat Nav and headed there. We stopped in a Wal-Mart and picked up some supplies along the way before stopping overnight in a rest area on I-95 just north of Baltimore.