The Philly skyline

The Philly skyline
Originally uploaded by Tom Scholes.

Hello0o0o0o everyone! We’re back from our adventures in Philadelphia.

We have had a wonderful time over there and took plenty of photos which are on Tom’s flickr account so go see!

Well I survived the flight out, just about! Felt really ill in the airport and decided to ring my mum to take my mind off it who very kindly said “You’ve seen Final Destination haven’t you?” evil woman! Plus being the dodgy pair we are we got our bags searched by airport security hehe I tried to blame it on Tom until our return trip…

We were met at the airport by Martin and Sharon. Martin is looking really happy and well and Sharon is so lovely!

As there was a few hours before we could check into the hotel they kindly took us to chill in their apartment were Tom played games and played with Sharon’s cats. The trip to the hotel was amusing as the hotel did not want to be found! We finally found it and walked in and our mouths dropped a bit as it was faaaar to posh for us hehe but it was lovely and we crawled into our big squishy bed and passed out.

We got up bright and early on Monday and day one of our walking began. We took a walk in the area around our hotel and had dunkin’ donuts for breakfast. Dunkin Donuts are EVERYWHERE they seem to have taken over America. We accidentally found the train station to get to Philadelphia centre which was just a 10 minute stroll from our hotel. We hopped on the train and headed into Philly.

We got completely lost which was great, it just meant we saw more of the city hehe. We ended up buying a map and headed in the right direction to do all the touristy bits.

We had a look at City Hall which is just in the process of being cleaned and it a lovely building. The picture on flickr doesn’t really show it very well.

We then went a joined the queue with all the other tourists to go into the Liberty Bell Center. The security to get in there was stricter than the airport! We had a nice time looking around the there and keeping warm hehe.

We then just kept walking around philly and I saw one of the highlights of the trip. A man stood in the street outside a stereo / musicy shop just randomly dancing to the music being blasted out haha he was funny.

Tuesday was the only bad weather day when it rained and rained but it didn’t matter! That was the day we travelled across Philly on two trains and a bus to go to the Franklin Mills where Martin works so we spent the day looking around the Mall which was huge and then spent went to meet Martin and Sharon and their friend Tom spent some time in an arcade, they had a neon light game like the Trafford centre that I am somewhat addicted to but I didn’t go near it woohoo, in fact I only played air hockey and just watched everyone else hehe. The five of us then went for a meal in a place that did the yummiest onion rings!

Wednesday we hopped on the train again back into Philly and took a walk down to Penn’s Landing which was deserted save for one bloke sat feeding the seagulls. We took a stroll down the Delaware River and had a look at the boats and watched them get the ice skating rink ready for thanks giving.

We then took a walk up to the Art Museum that was in the Rocky film where he runs up the stairs. Sadly we couldn’t run up the stairs as there were hundreds of kids getting ready to do a performance of Annie. Tom was gutted bless him.

Thursday was thanksgiving so most places we closed so we spent most of the day resting our walked out feet watching TV and had a little walk around the area. They are advert crazy on their TV every two minutes there are adverts. Most of the adverts are either for diamonds or Sears hehe oo apart from one for carpet that gave all these great interest deals and don’t pay until 2007 plus a free turkey hehe made me giggle.

As things were closed we decided to order room service and it was tasty!

Friday was Black Friday. Black Friday is where all the shops open super early in the morning offering mad deals which make the Americans sleep outside the shop and try and force their way in. We watched it on the news and decided to head out to one of the malls a little later to see the madness. We got directions form the bell hop dude to go to the Cherry Hill Mall which took us ages to walk to and Friday was the coldest day! Its mad walking in New Jersey as people obviously don’t walk as the pavements just come and go as they please heh. We got to the Mall about 9ish maybe and it had calmed down a lot!

Saturday was our last full day of holiday so we went back into Philly and took a walk up the SkullyKill River to see if the Museum Steps were clear and HURRAY they were. There were so many people running up the steps so we merrily started humming the tune and legged it up ourselves hehe.

We took one last walk down the main street right down to the front again which took a while then decided to go on the Phlash Bus to go on a trip around the city with a funny lady bus driver. She had to announce what number stop we were up to and what was near the bus stop. After each announcement she would add her own comment like you guys aren’t even listening or I’m having such a bad day hehe. Then to her joy a group of ten French folk got on the bus and she spent so long trying to explain to them how much to pay and what type of tickets they needed she was amusing!

Sunday morning we packed up and Martin and Sharon came and picked us up and took us to the International House of Pancakes yuuuuuuummy. We then went to their apartment to chill before we had to go to the airport. Sharon went and got us some popeyes chicken which was nice but mixed with me stressing about getting on a plane made me feel a little ill hehe

We then went to the airport said our goodbyes. We went to security to get our hand luggage scanned and my bag had to go and be searched as they thought I had something naughty in their :o it turned out just to be my brush! Plane back was delayed and flight was horrible save for the fantastic view I had of the sunrise as we flew into it. It was brilliant!

So now we’re back home to weather than is colder than out in Philly! It’s probably the same really except out there we had lovely sunshine and here is the usual great sky.

I’ve had an amazing week and met some lovely new people. Folks in USA are so friendly and polite. If you sneeze you’ll get a few bless yous from strangers just made me smile. We had nice weather, cold but sunny but we wrapped up warm and the walking kept us warm. Plus as it’s autumn the trees were so lovely with reddy brown leaves. Plus things were getting all lovely and Christmassy yaaaaay

We beat the jet lag yesterday. Stayed awake faffing about doing not much. Ordered Papa John’s pizza YUMYUM and finally went to bed at 10 pm and watched Final Destination hehe

So now its back to real life with a kitchen to sort out which I am now panicking about, we’ll mess it up haha. New oven was delivered this morning so hurrah when it’s hooked up I may actually be able to cook!