philadelphia for two

Curtis and I had credit for plane tickets that needed to be used by the end of the year and he had earned a lot of hotel points after living there for  6 weeks between our move from texas to Idaho so a few weeks ago we went to Philadelphia.  we chose to go here for several reasons: we had to pick a city that southwest airlines flies into, we wanted something that had a lot of attractions close together so we could walk and not pay for a rental car, and we (or at least I) really love places that have a lot of history to them. Curtis had been there several years ago when his parents were living in New Jersey and he knew I would love it. my mom was gracious enough to drive up and watch the kids while we were away.   we had to be in boise by 5 a.m. to fly out which meant we had to wake up around 2:30 a.m. to make it there in time.  with a 3 hour layover in Denver and the time difference we got to Philadelphia with just enough time to check into the hotel (which was right down town...it was awesome!), eat dinner then crash for the night since we were both exhausted. we had been watching the weather and somehow just happened to pick the weekend that it was supposed to be cold, rainy and windy with a hurricane headed toward the east coast.  when we went to Washington DC about 6 years ago it was also rainy and chilly in the middle of October but we still really enjoyed it and we figured without kids we could handle this trip with no problems.  it was a steady rain all day on friday, very gusty (apparently its ok to just throw your umbrellas on the ground when they break?) and pretty chilly.  we were gone from the hotel from about 9 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. and by the time we got back to the hotel our shoes and socks were drenched and pants were wet from the bottoms to the middle of our calf.  even though we were preparing to catch our death, we squeezed a ton of things into that first day and it helped that because of the weather there were hardly any people out.  first up was independence hall. this is where the liberty bell hung, the declaration of independence was written, and the supreme court was held.  i'm sure there was a lot more but we only got to tour two rooms. 

 

before our next thing was scheduled we had a little time to kill so we walked over to the tomb of the unknown solider.  there is also a tomb of the unknown solider in Washington DC but this is the one for the Revolutionary War.

we took this picture of a building that says "Curtis Publishing Company" and that's what Curtis is pointing at...its hard to see in this picture.

 

next we went to the National Constitution Center. no pictures allowed in there. it was basically just a run down of the history of the United States.

 

The Liberty Bell was next. this first picture is of the remains of the house that George Washington lived in.  this is a pretty recent discovery and wasn't here the last time Curtis was in Philadelphia and is located really close to where the Liberty Bell is kept.

 

next we visited the Benjamin Franklin museum (didn't take any pictures in there) and learned a lot about Ben Franklin.  it was amazing to see how many ideas he had that are a reality today (like an odometer on a car).

after the Benjamin Franklin museum we walked a few blocks away to the Betsy Ross house. it was pretty tiny and didn't take us long to get through it but it was still pretty cool.  I took a lot of panoramic pictures but they look a little funky on the computer.

 

 another few blocks away from the Betsy Ross house was Elfreth's Alley. its the oldest inhabited street in the United States.

you can see a "for rent" sign in one of the windows...a few of the houses were also for sale. its crazy to me that people still live in these houses.

on our long walk back to the hotel we decided to stop at the U.S. mint. pictures weren't allowed in here either but I did get a few on the outside. it gave a brief history of money in the United States and then you got see them making actual coins. I think this was probably curtis' favorite stop :)

 

 on Saturday curtis' parents were able to join us (they only live like 4 hours away from Philadelphia). we were glad for their company and even more excited about having someone to drive us around for the day ;)
while we were waiting for them that morning we walked over to Love Park which was just down the street from our hotel...i'm assuming they had dyed the water pink for breast cancer awareness.

our hotel was just on the other side of this building.

 

 

 

 they had a plaza with oversized game pieces and mason loves the game "sorry" so I had to take a picture for him :)

 

 our first big stop on Saturday was Eastern State Penitentiary. this was the place I was most excited about! this place held prisoners from 1829-1971 and is considered the worlds first true penitentiary. super creepy but I loved it :) I did choose not to go to the haunted house there that night though...that was just a little too much for my heart to handle.

this is the locked gate of hospital wing. we got there just in time to get to see a few rooms including the pharmacy and recovery rooms and we got to go inside what used to be the operating room.

 

 this is al capone's room. rumor has it he was treated a little better than other prisoners as you can tell by his cell.

 

 this is just a picture of a mural on a building. these things are all over the city. this mural was on our walk from parking to the Mutters Museum (no pictures allowed there either).  the mutters museum is a medical museum and has a lot of unusual things including but not limited to skulls, skeletons, brains (including a sample from Albert Einstein), drawers full of odd things people have swallowed, fetus' at different stages and a plaster cast of the first Siamese twins. I think this was another of curtis' favorites.

 

  as our time ran out we made one last stop at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archeology and Anthropology.
we got here only an hour before they closed so we didn't get to see a lot here. my favorite by far was the Egyptian exhibits...just another thing I find fascinating.

they had quite a few mummies but I didn't take many pictures of them. they even had a few mummies of children.

these are from Greece not Egypt...we just hurried through this exhibit before the museum closed and I liked them so I snapped a picture on our way out.

we ended Saturday with a super delicious dinner, said goodbye to curtis' parents, then climbed into our nice warm bed so we could wake up early again to catch the flight home. it was only a few days away but we really had so much fun! and the hurricane stayed away so we could get home!  looking back on our 8 1/2 years of marriage, Curtis and I have been to quite a few places and I hope we can continue to check off our bucket list over the years :)