On the Town in Philadelphia

MOH and I have been planning an early summer vacation (to be honest we like to go before school is out for the summer) and we decided to give Philadelphia a try.  I’m guessing it’s not a particularly popular destination based on the reaction of friends and family that asked where we were headed.  “Philadelphia?  Really, why are you going there?” or “Philadelphia, oh.  Do you have family there?”

What can I say?  MOH likes history and I like the city, so it seemed like a good choice.  Here are a few highlights from our recent excursion.

We walked – A LOT – every day.  SO many historic monuments, buildings, and interesting city sites.

 Historic Christ Church and Christ Church Burial Ground.  We attended the tour with a classroom of kids on a field trip. The irony was not lost on me. Their teacher was dressed up like one of the founding fathers.  (God love those teachers that go the extra mile!)

Founded in 1695 Christ Church hosted the delegates to the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention.  Many notable figure are interred both within the church and church grounds.  I took a picture of MOH sitting in George Washington’s regular pew.

Masonic Temple.  The best tour we went on was at the Masonic Temple on Broad Street directly across from Board Game Art Park.   The beautiful artistry of the rooms!  My favorites were the Blue room and the Egyptian room where I was able to snap a picture of my favorite super-hero, Isis.  “Zephyr winds that blow on high, lift me now so I can fly.”

Italian Market. Our VRBO was on Broad Street (the main north/south drag) near the Italian Market district. This was a very nice area and I enjoyed strolling down the sidewalk and peeking in all the shop windows. We had morning coffee at Anthony’s café and were WOW’d by the gelato and delectable chocolates available.

I was looking forward to having a yummy dinner at one of the authentic Italian restaurants.  Unfortunately, I didn’t want squid ink in my fettuccini (Burrata) or my gnocchi baked with a cherry tomato and onion (Dante & Luigi’s) so we wound up at Ralph’s.  The name wasn’t as enticing, but my gnocchi blush was FANTASTIC and we enjoyed listening to Dean Martin singing Volare and That’s Amore while we ate.

Residential row houses.  I was intrigued by the cobblestone alleyways in the residential area.  They were often lined by trees or potted flowers.  I found these pedestrian walk ways to be very cute.  Right?  Well, while its true they were cute, they were actually vehicle alleys! I didn’t see too many Ram tough trucks and now I know why.  The streets and garages there are just right for a Mini Cooper. And although the individual houses looked small from the outside, when we looked them up on Zillow we saw that many of them were 2000+ square feet with three bedrooms, two full baths, and million dollar price tags.

Murals.  I’ve blogged twice about the beautiful murals that I see on the regular in Jackson, Michigan, so MOH was not surprised when I pulled up a map on my phone and set off to see the murals of Philadelphia.  They had some pretty great ones, but I can’t say they had anything as fabulous as our three-eyed Alice Cooper. Still, they were fun and colorful.

Wanamaker Organ at Macy’s. Built by the Los Angeles Art Organ Company for the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair, this amazing instrument has 28,482 pipes. It was a majestic sight. Concerts are played daily Monday through Saturday at 12:00pm and 5:30pm. I enjoyed listening to both traditional church music and Disney tunes blasting up into the multi-storied mezzanine of the shoe department. (The Lion King theme was definitely worthy of royalty.) Some shopped and others sat and listened.

Good Dog Pub. What a great find by MOH on our last night in the city. This happening place was NOT listed in our Fodor’s travel guide, and it should have been! The food was yummy and the atmosphere was fun, although the Jack and Coke’s could have been a little stronger. 😉

So that’s it.  There’s my 500 words about what I did on my summer vacation.