Philly Philly

Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, was the next stop on our tour of the North East.  I'll be honest that I knew very little of the city besides it was where the Declaration of Independence was written.  However, it was a place we felt we needed to visit, and I had some incredibly generous friends from my hometown that are currently living in Philadelphia who welcomed us with open arms.

During our time in Philadelphia, we thoroughly enjoyed walking the city.  While the population of Philadelphia is quite large, the Center City is fairly small and walkable.  The people we encountered were friendly, helpful and proud of the history of the city.

We purchased tickets to a Hop-On-Hop-Off bus to get around the city a little and also learn some of the fun stories, and background information of the city.  For instance, did you know that Philadelphia's City Hall is in the Guinness Book of World Records for having the most window air conditioners?

One of the other things I absolutely loved about Philly was the way that they deal with graffiti artists.  Quite some time ago, the city decided to combat graffiti problems by giving people who were caught defacing property the chance for either jail time or to help artists create a mural around the city.  Now, the city has almost 4,000 murals throughout, featuring all sorts of scenes that represent different areas of the city.  What a great way to combat crime and give people a second chance!

There is a whole lot to do in Philadelphia, and I will admit that we only scratched the surface, but we had fun seeing what we did see!  Although I've never seen one of the Rocky films (I know, I know...), I have seen the scene where he runs up the steps multiple times.  And don't worry, I, too ran up the stairs and celebrated at the top.  Although, we never actually made it into the Art Museum at the top of those steps, we still did thoroughly enjoy the climb!

And, in a similar manner, we enjoyed posing for fun photos with The Thinker, out front of a small art museum down the road, but we never actually made it through the doors to see more of the collection.

Some of the museums that we did enter though, and thoroughly enjoyed were the Betsy Ross Museum (I had no idea how incredibly independent and forward-thinking she was!), the Benjamin Franklin Museum (man that guy was clever!) and the American Revolution Museum (my favorite part may have been learning that when they pulled down the statue of King George in New York, women used the metal to make bullets for the revolutionaries).  The American Revolution Museum also did a great job of pointing out how many people were not freed with the war even though we claimed it was for freedom.  I found the museum much more powerful than I expected, and absolutely full of information.  We stood in a long line and went into a small museum about the Liberty Bell.  Although the bell was actually a little smaller than I anticipated, it was, nevertheless, inspiring and hopeful.  It is a great symbol for freedom.

I had found out just days before coming to the city that you had to get timed tickets to get entry into Independence Hall.  It is free, but as it is a historic site and you must be on a guided tour, there are limited spaces.  Unfortunately, all of the tickets for the weekend were sold out, but we learned that after 5, you don't have to have a ticket, rather you wait with large crowds of people, they let in 70 at a time for a quick 15 minutes, and you hope you make it in before they close at 7.  We arrived promptly at 4:25 and we were the first people in the third group of people.  It was totally worth the wait even though the view inside was quick.  The crowd of people was escorted by a young ranger with a knack for story-telling who told us about the Declaration of Independence that was signed in this room and the Constitution that was also later signed in this room.  He told us of the chair that George Washington sat in, and how it had a half-sun at the top of it.  The men surrounding Washington wondered if the sun was a symbol of a rising or setting sun, but after the Constitution was finished, they were certain it was truly a rising sun.  It was in this room that our Founding Fathers made wise, forward-thinking decisions and formed a totally new government unlike any others before.  If you are going to Philly, don't miss out on this stop - but do try to get tickets ahead of time!

And of course, what trip to Philadelphia would be complete without some food highlights?  We wandered around the crowded Reading Market packed with tourists and locals getting everything from ice cream to fruit to cheesesteaks to fresh fish.  I know that we did not go to the famous nor best place to get Philly Cheesesteaks, but as neither of us had had one before, we decided that one from Reading Market was just fine.  I must admit, that it was much more delicious than I expected, although, I'm still not quite certain what it is.  While wandering around the market, we also encountered a long line of people and decided to join in, happily discovering it was for Beiler's Donuts which were homemade, Amish donuts of just about every flavor you could imagine.  My caramel apple one was to die for, and in fact much of my face ended up being covered in caramel as I tried to lick the plastic it had come wrapped in.  Jan also introduced us to something called Water Ice, which sounds odd, but it was a step closer to a slushy from a sorbet: quite delicious and fruitfully refreshing.  And don't worry, of course we also had a scrumptious pretzel as well!

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Philadelphia, but as much as anything, I enjoyed catching up with some friends from home whom I had not seen in years.  I loved hearing about their new lives in the big city, and how they had found their place amongst thousands.  What a joy, and a blessing, to have great friends scattered about the country who willingly and generously open their homes up to us!