Europe and Prague-i-licious Prague stuff

Ahhh. Qantas. How do I love thee (comparatively)… let me count the ways. I love you to the height, depth and breadth of the extended leg-and-seat-room of our premium economy seats (random upgrade, I might remind you) and to the baby-less curtained section (of premium economy) and to the extent that I ‘savoured’ (relatively, of course) your tiny airplane dinners.

Sigh. Lufthansa… no good. Well, definitely not great, and because the company is german… filled with real German people (not Australians who have the last name ’Schneider’. Unfortunately. Because we‘re mostly awesome) who think they own their seat, your seat and the whole plane. Word to the guy in front??? You can’t beat a headrest into a comfortable shape. It’s not made of that kind of substance. You’re just knocking the drink of girl behind you into her lap every 5 minutes. And when it came to “put your seats into upright position” time, a certain two obedient (POLITE, rather) Australians complied. As did the people behind. But the germans in front… nein. Which left us SFA room between our faces and the inflight screens. Which meant that every time that damned german man bashed his seat, I was obviously at risk of getting a black eye as well as an even-more-saturated lap, and Nick doesn’t want TWO continents thinking my occasional (note: not ’rare’, per se) accidental (toilet doors, car doors, and potential air-plane-headrest slam) black-eyes mean woman-beater…

Munich - the efficiency of the germans (how this was taken an incredibly sinister/evil turn I will describe in the Krakow post) meant that even though we were early for our car booking, they thought they could do something for us. That’s when the usual extra gee-up of car rental prices came out… we thought we’d booked for 2 drivers… but apparently nein. Being that it was going to be an extra $700 plus AUD we thought we’d stick to one. Which had to be Nick, because I was keen to try out every wine region in Eastern Europe, and my Slovene for ‘I‘ve only had one glass‘ (hiccup) is not so good. So we picked up our beautiful Mercedes (they’re cheapin Germany obviously, EVERYONE has new beemers, Mercedes, Vws… so shiny, and FAST) and headed the one hour to Deggendorf. Our ’close-to-Munich’ place of choice for a night to gather our wits after the flight. NOTE: bad planning meant we were flying into Munich at the start of Oktoberfest. Which sounds awesome, except when you realise cheap accommodation books out a year in advance and… well… you planned badly (well, 'poorly', whatever).

The Autobahn was… a place of contrasts. Cool-as-a-cucumber Nick, and crying/scared/white-knuckled-bracing Lauren. I know where I get that (I know from my driving lessons, that is). Completely undeserved on Nick’s part Imight add (I.e. that I would be scared) but it’d been a long flight and it’s weird sitting in the ’driver’s seat’ by Aussie standards, and seeing a corner hurtling towards you but having no control over preventing your seemingly-inevitable death. Anywhoo, so clearly day one (and let’s not mention days 2 and 3) of Europe were… challenging. For both of us. But let’s leave that alone.

So, Deggendorf was cute and pretty typical (I imagine) of a german 'dorf' (look it up…) It was pretty much German Lismore. We went out for tea to the local pub, which was packed with locals (what a surprise,but that meant we knew it was good). Waittresses were very kind with our crap german, and the locals pretty much ignored us until (reading from my “Lonely Planet German phrasebook”) I said (at a coincidental lull in conversation in the room) “Huh. Condom is just Kondom is german”. Awkward.

Anyway, the next day we drove to prague on German and Czech super-duper-awesome, eat-your-heart-out-Australia roads. So it was fast. And safe. And surprisingly flat (surprising to me, at least). By the time we got there, we’d forgiven Lufthansa (or put it aside, at least) and had nicknamed the car ‘Klaus’. Very reliable, safe and cute as a german button. GPS… details to come in ‘Krakow‘ episode.

Nick had a baptism of fire in terms of ’ancient street driving’. You know, narrow, crazy turns, and for large portions of road, Prague trams SHARE YOUR LANE. Yes, the tram tracks are in your lane for trams going both directions for sometimes a couple of hundred metres. Everyone else seemed unphased (which we later learned is actually just the primary blank expression Eastern Europeans use) so we just kept on truckin to our hotel. Thank god for the GPS (beerrrh baaarrrh - for later…) Anyhoo here’s the view from our window!



Prague is HUGE, there are just suburbs upon suburbs of 150+ year old equisized, but differently coloured buildings…here’s a shot (with a tram. We never took one, figured we’d fail epically in the discussion about how much it costs and where we’re going).



The next couple of days are a bit shady (we’ve been to 2 places since then!) in the actual order of things, but I’m pretty sure we went to a place called the Beer Factory on the first night. A place where the beer taps are in the middle of your table, and you pour your own beer and get the bill at the end. I’m almost sure it’s that we’ve been to two places since that I don’t remember much… apart from that Nick had his first taste of Gulyasleves (Gulash) there and I had a half a duck with some cabbage, which was surprisingly delicious. Beer factory was on Wenceslas Square (one of “the sights”) of Prague, but it’s really just a looooooooong square of shops/cafes/casinos/bars/nightclubs/markets/strip joints/food stalls. And it’s awesome. And by Australian standards… very cheap.

Top of the square looking back up our hotel's way. They have those smarmy politician posters too. Since then, I have found they are common to all countries. Yay.

Looking down Wenceslas Square. And yes, he is the 'Wenceslas' of 'Good King Wenceslas' fame. Obviously the Chrissy carol was sung constantly under my breath. Nick had prevouslybeen unaware of said carol, but... now he's definitely not.

We later found out that the two main tourist drags (Wenceslas and Old Town Squares) offer food and drink about 3 x the normal price, bu sometimes that’s worth it, depending on how keen you are to try your luck with Lonely Planet phrase-book and the waiter’s patience. Nick described Wenceslas as Times Square on valium. With sweeter local laws re drinking… or rather, all of Prague has these. Please see my pic below of the next day’s ’cart food AND BEER’. And of me looking like someone who is really enjoying their cart-food, which was the barbequed paprika chicken skewer placed in a roll (so you get the same amount of chicken as everyone else, and it‘s all cooked perfectly… how smart is that!!!!), with mustard. Yuuuuuuuum. Nick loved his huge Czech sausage (tee hee) hotdog too. There’s people just walking around at 9am with cans of beer, or cups of beer (cart beer) and at lunch, it’s part of the culture to be having a beer with lunch. So all of the food/beer carts are going off, and the sitting areas and well-positioned tables (I.e. next to cart J ) are filled with people eating and drinking. There’s a slight problem of cute old men (and less-than-cute/dirty/angry men) hitting you up for your change, in Czech, but the locals ignore them and you kind of have to as well or there’d be a bit of a swarm.

My most attractive eating face, clearly. Although to be honest I was of the impression Nickwas taking a picture of the beer (piva) and food.

Anyway, back to the sights. Old Town Square. Amazing. Our first experience of the real true amazing historical parts of Europe. Even the walk there, through tiny cobblestone lanes, was really touching. It’s a cool place, and I’d already long decided that I could live there. Something I would later re-emphasise… and then state more strongly about other places on the trip, to-date. Argrggh.

The pic below is the Astronomical Clock, which is really old (can't be bothered looking that up or finding the Tourist Guide for Prague) and to the right is the streets on the way to the Old Town Square.

To the right is a view of the Square itself. And there's us there (I like to include a few mugshots, vain as I am).

So, I know you can see how old Town Square would have blown our mind. Perfectly preserved buildings, and a several-hundred-year-old clock that are just fairy-tale to a simple Aussie girl like myself. What blew my mind just as much was a couple of hundred Belgian bikers (I.e. a middle aged motorbike appreciating club, by the looks) rolling up, doing circles, parking in the middle of the square and then heading into various cafes for beers and lunch, one of the days we were there.

Re the astronomical clock, we discovered that night (after we’d piccied up) that the clock does ’something’ on the hour. Something about apostles and bells, and Nick said his mum said something about a monkey. So anyway, we went back the next day… nick sat in the nearby bar having 2-4-1 (saying, incorrectly, that he could ’see from his seat’) and 5 min before I joined the crazy throng developing in front of the clock to see what the fuss is about. Ummm. Maybe I have high standards for things that are supposed to do things… but I saw 2 statues ringing bells, and then there was a guy at the top blowing a horn/trumpet. I think I was looking at the wrong part or something, although the clock itself is a thing of immense beauty, and it’s really incredible to think that any kind of mechanical components made that long ago have lasted so long and still can hold the attention of a crowd of 1000+ on a random Tuesday at 11am.

Anyway, we also visited Prague castle (how could you not) and as we rose the steady climb of stairs Nick turned and said “Look at the view… it’s almost breathtaking”. And it was. And he wasn’t talking about me, ha ha. Prague… when we got to castle, the view was something to write home about.

Check it out…

Looking up at the castle on the way there.

Just a third or a quarter of the view you get up there. It just wraps around.... streets and streets and suburbs and suburbs of beautiful old buildings and churches. And from up here you can see how maze-like the streets are.

See? We were here too.

The one above is taken in the 'village' part of the castle, so inside the castle walls from when they used to bring everyone inside when sieges were going down (or when the town was smaller...or both).

One of the churches within the walls. A few generations of polish royalty from wayyyy back are in a tomb here. We went to the free tomb bit - which appears to be some more recent additions, cos there was a lady in there sobbing on her knees in front of a big sarcophagus thing as people traipsed through. We made a quick get away.

On the way to Prague Castle we visited the Jewish Cemetary, near the Old Town Square. This was on the recommendation of Donna-sky, and a bit of additional google research. It’s one of the last jewish cemetaries left in Europe (or rather, the area that was occupied by Nazis during WWII, which we learned at Auschwitz was most of the continent…) because Hitler ordered them destoyed. The tombstones are all higgledy piggledy because in the Jewish religion you cannot/do not touch a headstone after someone is buried. And they’re so close because people are buried up to 12 deep there. It’s not a scary cemetery, if anything… it’s a beautiful, communal use of space. :)

We did the obligatory walk along Charles Bridge on the way home, as the weather just turned from beautiful and slightly hot to slightly threatening. It’s an amazing piece of architecture, having been built in 1357 (I looked that up) but it is THRONGED with tourists. And market stalls. And hawkers. And pickpockets, they say, although Nick and I have figured were among the few tourists they wouldn’t target first up as a) we’re of an age where we’d probably have diddly worth taking; and b) we’re able-bodied enough to give them a good chase, and perhaps a clip around the ear. I would have liked a quiet moment with the bridge (to really enjoy it) but the thought of a dawn tip across town (about 5km) was beyond me. Here’s Nick on the bridge.

One photo I’m proud of from Prague (not being artistic, myself) is this one, looking up to the Charles bridge from the bridge closer to the castle…

Two more note-worthy (but I have problems with keeping things concise,so see what you think) things are that Prague people are… or Czechs are (not having explored the Republic at all beyond Prague, I can’t say how far this extends) really into Marionette Theatre. And, ergo, there a lot of marionette shows. Freak-a-deaky, in my book. I’m sure we saw around 10 such shops in our wanderings. But I think ONE is too many. Supply and demand, I guess. Check this out:

The other thing (sans picture, but just imagine our confused faces) was that Nick and I attempted to use Czech poker machines in Wenceslas Square to try and use up our spare Czech coinage. Yeah. I know they call them ‘money takers’ in Australia, but if you can’t understand the Instructions, and the buttons which normally would make it ’more lines’ don’t do anything that you can discern… that’s what it was. It was a long and painful attempt to become Czech millionaires (which wouldn’t make us anything of the sort in Australia) but it was all for nought. And the small number of calories used in pressing every button on the thing trying to get it to work. Cart food, cart beer and half a duck? Everything helps.

Cheers for now,
L.

NYC

Our 1 star luxury.










The train ride from philly to new york was luxury. I wish it could of lasted a bit longer because I think I needed a bit more chill time before I entered the rat race. As you probly know, we had a big one, the night before in philly so I wasn’t exactly on my toes for this one. As we made our way up the escalator from penn station to the street (the Madison square garden entrance for anyone who knows what that is), there would have been a crowd of maybe 500 people with varying sized luggage milling around waiting for buses. Thank christ we didn’t need a bus. Im not riding another bus in my life anyway but that’s another rant for another day. We had our backpacks on and we missioned it northward up 8th street towards what would be our place of residence for the next nights. The thing about new york is that no matter what you look like or what you are doing, or carrying, or dragging, no one blinks an eyelid because either a) they’ve seen it all before, or b) theres a possibility you might stab them.
So we hiked the 9 or so blocks to the hotel, weaving through the torrent of bodies. Not expecting much from the 1 star joint that we booked. We didn’t get much either. Although as it turned out, it did the job. Hotel carter. One thing its definitely got is personality. I liked it and eventually it ended up being like ‘home’. although I didn’t mention the mouse I saw on the second night to lauren until we were in the shuttle bus to the airport….
Anyway, I hate doing laundry at the best of times, and personally I could of got away with anther month or two without seeing a washing machine, but it seems we needed to do some laundry. If I thought laundry was hard when we actually own a machine in our own place, its gonna be a nightmare in new york. But a nice way to acquaint ourselves with the city I spose. We managed to find a Laundromat and get the gear clean. It was interesting to see the residents of hells kitchen go about their daily business. Definitely not threatening. Just interesting. And surreal.
Speaking of surreal, after we finished up at the laundry we had the rest of the arvo/night up our sleeves so we thought wed check out times square. It was literally a minute from our hotel so before we knew it we were right in amongst it. We both agreed that it was absolutely mind blowing. It was complete sensory overload. The lights, the people, the sounds and smells, the hawkers trying to flog either tickets to comedy shows or for the big red buses, the challenge in negotiating the pedestrian crossings. It was crazy. It was a natural high. It was exhausting just standing there. We walked around for god knows how long but it seemed like somewhere where you lose time, hence the name I spose. It was thee most challenging when trying to cross the roads because you need to not only make sure you don’t get bowled over bythe tsunami of people coming towards you, you’ve gotta make sure you don’t get cleaned up by one of the million taxis or limos that frequent the area. amazing place, and something that needs to be experienced to understand.
We bought tickets to this hop on- hop off bus tour in times square the next day, that lasted 3 days and took you on 3 different loops of the island of manhatten. it’s about 50 big red double decker buses with open tops that have guides giving you the lowdown on all the different sights and sites you pass on the way. You pretty much pass them all too I must say. It does the job if you can put up with the other tourists and the knob head guides practically begging you for a tip. Its pretty funny because they remind us ignorant touro’s at every stop, most people from other countries choose to ignore this custom and breeze right by while theyre holding their respective hats out. The only one that deserved a tip was the first dude that we had. He had charisma and a sexy new york twang. Unlike the new york squawk we got used to. Although we tipped every time. Because lauren is so nice. I would of told a few of them to stick their tip hats in their gobs and do everyone on the bus a favour.
Went to central park the next day, using the bus again, because even if the guides are a pain in the arse, it’s a good way to get around. Wed be stuffed otherwise. And by the way, this isn’t to say that we didn’t enjoy the buses. they were great. The guidess just tried a bit hard sometimes. Anyway, so central park was nice. Saw strawberry fields which is the memorial to john lennon and just cruised around, watching the funny crowds playing softball and generally enjoying the last days of summer. Twas a beautiful day. Although we had to get on the bus and do the uptown/harlem bus loop to get home. We cooked up there on the top deck of the bus so that zapped us big time.
The third day was dedicated to the statue of liberty. And it was meant to be a simple excursion. But as ive learnt now after 5 weeks on the road, nothings ever easy. I sound jaded but im not. its just a fact. We got on the bus again and took the same tour we did on the first day to get down to the ferry. We got herded through security that was tighter than any airport and onto the ferry and got a sweet view of manhatten, the statue and the other boroughs. It was pretty hard to get a good photo though, with every other person on board doing their best to block every one of our shots with their heads. Ended up with some good ones though. Being on the island was another surreal experience. It was as if she was watching everything you did. Shes even more impressive than we both imagined, even in the bad weather. The wind was picking up and the rain was coming so we decided to battle the ferry back again. That was a hoot! Sitting with an old couple from Hoboken, Long Island? Who were about an hour or two away but hadn’t seen the statue before. The old bloke was a classic and practically took over the boat, letting everyone know that we were Australian and that mel gibson is an aussie and hes in a bit of trouble. He couldn’t figure out Mel’s name for about 10 mins and we kept trying to tell him he was talking about paul Hogan.we got there painfully in the end. His wife was practically deaf so she never really bothered trying to listen to him anyway. Although youd pretty much have to be deaf not to hear him. It would-be pretty funny home they have because he never shuts up yet she never listens. Quite the contradiction to the norm, some might say…..It was pretty funny because hed ask us a question, then wed try and answer but he wouldn’t listen to a word of our answer and just either ask us another question or try and tell us a completely irrelevant fact that was so obviously not true. His wife forced us to take some of her snacks that she’d prepared. After refusing to take them for 5 mins she got quite adamant and was letting half the boat know. She practically unzipped our bags and stuffed them in. nice people. Made the ferry trip go pretty quickly.
it started raining as soon as we got off the ferry and we were a long way from home with no umbrellas or whatever. So the big red bus it was! But lo and behold, the only seat left were on the top deck of the open top doubledecker. We gave it a crack, but with the rain getting heavier and the bus sometimes hitting 60km/hr we got hammered. They gave us ponchos which helped a lot but it was bloody miserable. I could even see the dogs that were chained up in Chinatown laughing at us and shaking their heads. But we made it back to the relative comfort of the hotel carter and all was well again.
Did I mention that I had had a raging cold for the last 3 days? If not, I have now.
The next day was just a shopping day were we picked up afew things that may or may not have been cheaper because theyre bought in new york. But at least we can say we bought them in times square if anyone asks! After this we went down to the lobby of the hotel to check emails etc and realised that this day was our only chance to try and get tickets to be in the crowd for the live recording of the show ‘the Colbert Report’. its on abc2 every weeknight at 7.30. Hes a hilarious political satirist weve been watching for ages. Im sure hes right up a lot of you guys’ alleys. Anyway we jumped online and found that amazingly, there was 11 tickets available for that night! We got them and had to be there 2hrs later. We were so stoked! We had a few celebratory beers while getting ready then ventured off to find the studio. Which was only 10 blocks away. Should ofbeen easy but we made it hard and got there only to be told that we needed a print off of the confirmation. Already being late, we hailed a cab, who took us straight into the slowness of times square so we jumped out in the street. We ran back, got the thing printed and cabbed it back in time to be 60th and 61st in line. Perfect seats in the end. It was a funny episode as always and we even managed to get our mugs on tv, so weve been told. I caught a goose too. This was the perfect way to finish up a big 5 days. Or more to the point, a big 25 days.
New york though, was definitely amazing. it really is alive. so much soul and character. we'll beback.
Its been a whirlwind but the usa is behind us now and im writing this in Europe. Theres already plenty to tell you guys and that wont be far way at all.
Its been such an eye opener. Stay tuned for one of our next entries which will be tips for future travellers to the states. Ive got some important things that you will need to jot down if you plan a trip to the boss country of the world!
Cheers!







this is honestly a grandstand set up for people watching and generally taking in the craziness that is times square.































the famous 'flat iron' building.















the police pipeband doing their thing for 9/11 memorial.













this thing was in the lobby of world trade centre before the attacks. its now set up in battery park, still with the dents and holes from the day.
















we couldnt go through central park without going to strawberry fields. we also went past the steps where john lennon was gunned down.














this is a hobo's can collection. i put it in because if you look carefully, theres a manequins head, complete with long brown wig and light blue beanie on a stick. freaky...













times square at night.

















on the boat tothe statue oflibert. you can almost see her over the top of red-shirt's head. and dogger, this boat was one boat thatyou werent gonna get into the wheel house of. unless you were interested in a few bullet implants.



















i was sad coz i couldnt get any good hotos that didnt have other tourists heads in them.















the grand old girl.














nice shotof us and manhatten.

this was what our trip from the statue of liberty back to the hotel was like. 45mins of it!

can you see us two thirdsofthe way up, right between the numbers? this was an electronic billboard in times square.

even the subway signs were blingin' in times square.

oh yeah and i met the real elmo. well thats what he told me. his voice is so different when your hearing it straight from the mans mouth....

our prized tickets..... awesome!

Sweet chilli Philly (which I also love)

The streets of Philadelphia…

We left Washington in a ball of rage. After getting to the train station, we realised (or rather, remembered, having discovered this before the greyhound bus… ick) that all things American are deliberately oversold, and then - too late, so sad. And then they have standby as well, so all american transport companies make a killing - and all areas for gathering people for mass commercial transport are crap-diddle. Stand, wait, get a seat, old person arrives… feel guilty about sitting, offer… But getting on the train itself was easy, so was the trip, and you’ve already got your bags with you. And the leg room is completely superior to that of planes, and (for some reason) noone brings screaming children on trains. Ahhhh (blissful sigh). Trains rock. Trains are better than planes (apart from in speed of getting somewhere) and are waaaaaaaaaaaaay better than greyhound buses without toilets. With people on there whose religions prohibit them from using deodorant. Noone’s pointing any fingers (hint hint Amish people, who apparently don’t want to HAVE cars, but are OK with taking buses… Whaaaaa????)

So basically, we got there - Philadelphia. To be honest, it was probably one of the places on the US itinerary that I was least interested in. Hadn’t really heard that much about and didn’t know what to expect. Especially after the barren, boring, hell-on-earth that was Washington D(on’t) G(o). So not my joke, but so funny.
The taxi ride from the train station was noteworthy in that I think I still have some of the guy’s back seat upholstery under my nails. We HURTLED there. Thankfully I couldn’t see the speedo as was on the wrong side (and had my eyes closed), but Nick said we were up around equivalent 170km/he which is nice…

The comfort inn was so aptly named. For the first time in a long time, the air conditioning was cold, the bed was a King, the bed was comfortable, and not only were we comfortable walking down the street - in day and in night - there were places to go. And the lift didn’t take 20 minutes to pop up a couple of floors. God forbid you leave anything behind in the room at Chicago - it was dead to you til the end of the day.

The comfy comfy room, and the view from one of our windows. Yes, we were between two major roads, but it was quiet as, and only a 10 min walk into town.

First day’s walk around in the stinking heat brought us past maybe 6 or 7 pub/bars, more delicious-looking small restaurants than you could poke a stick at, philly cheese-steak vendors, beautiful old buildings, narrow streets - a crap load of coppers, showing their presence - and not a bad vibe in the place. It was an OASIS after the horror of dry (where are the watering holes???), dull but irritating and apparently dangerous (I’m hungry! But I’m back at the hotel… But the pool party is driving me mental, after 3 damned days… and I can’t go out to get food because it’s either ’not for our type’ or 5km walk, and even then, dull and tasteless… Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh)

Back to Philly, beautiful Philly. We walked, we had a couple of quiet beers in a nice big air-conditioned sports pub - all the while gob smacked that an hour and a half away from HOE (“hell-on-earth“, get with the program) could be such a pretty, character-filled town that was so laid back. Philly cheese steak was delicious, although being from a beef farm I kind of have a question about calling chopped up meat (even beef) ’steak’. For those who don’t know, it’s pretty much chopped beef cooked on a hotplate over a flame, and with ’juice’ (meat juice) poured over it to keep it juicy, then cheese melted onto it while it’s on the hotplate and then juice poured over your finished product as well. We had onions on the shared cheese steak on day one, and then day two Nick had the same and I was (cough cough) convinced into having ’hot sausage’. Which is a mildly spicy hotdog sausage on a roll. Just so you know. The cheesesteak is delicious and the hot sausage, so so.

Philly cheese steak - not much to look at, but way delish.

After a nap, it was my turn to decide somewhere to go for tea. OMG! Yayyyy! “I’d like to thank my family, and my fans…” Anyway, being such a comfortable and helpful place, the comfort inn had a book of eats (a FULL book, maybe 200-300 local bars/cafes/restaurants of different persuasions) and I chose McGillins Irish pub, Philadelphia‘s oldest continuously operated Irish pub. Or something. I chose it based on… pretty much nothing. But then, when the shuttle bus guy (’free’, but you tip - thankfully we‘re saying goodbye to that nonsense, with Europe!) was taking us there he mentioned how popular it is, and it’s crazy at St Paddy’s time (hopes start edging higher) and then after a crazy trip through the town stopped at the end of a small alleyway between two streets in the city. A smelly alleyway, but we could see the sign. And on the topic of ’smelly’, I think we forgot to mention that lots of American cities have open sewer grates. No doubt a leftover from the past (excuse my disgusting pun) but still, the streets often stink like you-know-what.

McGillins was all I could hope for (http://www.mcgillins.com/). We paid USD43 for 3 pitchers (each about a jug and a half in Aussie terms), plus two main meals - and they were big and delicious and fresh tasting. It was why we went back the next night. And THEN I had an USD8.50 mussel pasta, with probably 30+ mussels in it.

Day two we looked at the ‘sights’ of Philly. It’s a very historical place, being that it played a role in the civil war and the constitution was drafted there (hence all this ‘liberty this’ and ’freedom that’). We were actually pretty nonplussed by their Liberty Bell, which is actually a replica, but it used to ring to tell the government guys (in Franklin’s time) that it was time to get their butts to parliament. Basically, it was interesting, but neither of us is likely to have a photo with a replica bell (which made us the exceptions there rather than the rule).

Below: City Hall

But our first stop was actually something Nick had picked out in all the considerable internet research that was done on our likely destinations - Eastern State Penitentiary. THAT place was cool. We walked across town to get there, and did a walking tour of the joint with headsets on. Which sounds way nerdy, but it meant you could choose which stations you cared to listen to. Here’s the webby http://www.easternstate.org/
But basically the place was built by the quakers as the first ever ’penitentiary’, inventing that meaning of the word, I.e. to make you contemplate what you did to get in there and essentially do your penance before getting out. Won’t bore you too much, but there was a mock-up of Al Capone’s cell (apparently it was really pimped out, even though they weren’t supposed to have gramaphones, rugs, comfy beds and cognac, so by then the whole system was obviously at least a little corrupt) and the place was really atmospheric, having served as an active prison for 150 years, been abandoned for 20+ years, almost been sold to make shops and units - like Boggo Road, and then been rescued for its historical value. So they’ve done up parts of it, for tours and are slowing the degradation of the other areas to preserve it as a ruin. It’s like ’Old Town’ in Philly, in that you can see the plan is to eventually save and restore as many historical (they are ALL historical) buildings as possible, but for the moment, because its such an expensive process, they’re just stabilising a lot of places with scaffolding etc. I thought it was really cool that they valued those buildings (up to around 300 years old) rather than knocking them down and building high rises.

Here are two shots of cell blocks in Eastern State Penitentiary.

Mock-up of Al Capone's cell...



Nick getting in my shot... AGAIN. LOVE fountain, in Central Philly. Yes, it's blue (no reason apparent to me).

Left: Just a cool street shot.
Below: Some of the street art around the place.

Below: Just a shot of the bridge, at night, from the pedestrian bridge... our last night in Philly. Sob!

Day 2 night was McGillins again, where we spent considerably more money as we were there pretty early, having skipped the weird hotel bar (which was actually just some bar stools in the lobby of the hotel - talk about shags on a rock!)

We wished we could have had more time there - just to hang out and soak up the atmosphere, which is the best bit about Philly, but we’d locked in 5 nights in New York to attempt to do the place justice, so it was off on day 3.
Sorry if this was a boring post! We loved Philly, but it was mostly the atmosphere and culture we loved, and I forgot to strike while the iron was hot re blog. or rather, because Hotel Carter in New York was such a dive, we didn’t have wifi access in our room. New York will go up in next day so stay tuned….