Days 45 & 46 - Arriving in Philadelphia and a little sightseeing!

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Yesterday, we were up early at around 7am as we needed to be ready and out to catch our Megabus to Philadelphia. We had bought some yoghurt and a muffin for our breakfast the previous night, so we ate those once we were dressed, before packing up any last things into our bags and cases.

We left our room and checked out at reception at around 9am. We caught the subway down to Penn Station, realising that we had timed it slightly wrong and had 45 minutes or so before we actually needed to be at the bus stop (although it's better to be early than late!). We went into Starbucks for a little while, as for some reason there are NO seats in that train station anywhere other than in eateries and coffee shops!

We left the station at around 10am, and walked down the street to where our Megabus would pick us up. We saw the signs along the street where we needed to wait, and joined a small queue for the bus to Philadelphia. At 10:30, we boarded the bus, which then set off around 15 minutes later, once everyone else was on. The bus was the same as the one that brought us to New York; a double-decker which was fairly comfortable and equipped with wifi (which actually worked this time, although we didn't really use it). The journey to Philly only took just over 2 hours, and it flew by compared to some of the other bus journeys that we have taken on our travels! Emma spent most of it playing on her DS whilst Craig listened to some music on his MP3 player.

Soon enough, we arrived at our stop at 30th Street Station in Philadelphia. We got off, grabbed our cases once they were unloaded, and walked inside the entrance of the station. We had already done our research and knew that we needed to catch the airport line to our hotel, so we went over to the 'Regional Rail' section of the station and followed the signs towards the Airport line. We bought a ticket each from the window and caught the escalator down to the platform, where our train arrived shortly after.

We boarded the train and found a seat, and rode it for a couple of stops until we reached Eastwick station (as far as we know, nothing to do with witches, it's just the name of the station!), where we got off seemingly in the middle of nowhere - 'station' is probably not the right word for it, it was literally just a platform with a small shelter on it and not much else! To make matters worse, as we were riding the train, we noticed that it had started THROWING it down outside, and was still raining fairly heavy when we stepped off the train. Thankfully, we kind of knew which direction we needed to go, so we crossed the tracks and walked towards the main road which we then needed to cross. We got there and stood there for a while, not really sure what to do, as there didn't seem to be a sidewalk anywhere. However, we soon realised that the sidewalk was actually on the road, next to the bike lane! We dragged our cases up the road towards the crossing, pressed the button and waited for the signal to walk across. After a minute or so, a guy walked past and told us that we would be waiting a while, as the lights never change there - least pedestrian-friendly place ever! We ran across the road when we had the chance and could finally see our hotel - Microtel Inn and Suites.

We walked over to the entrance (thankfully the rain had got much lighter since getting off the train, so we weren't too wet) and went into the reception. We were able to check-in straight away (even though we were a little early), so we went straight to our room to relax for a little bit. The room is pretty nice, much bigger than our last few rooms and we finally have our own bathroom again - plus a TV AND internet access!!

After relaxing for around half an hour or so, we decided to not waste the day - as it was only around 2pm - and instead go back to the city to have a look around. We walked back over to the "station" and caught the first train that arrived. We got off at Market East, and went to find the Greyhound station, as we wanted to enquire about the bus to Six Flags Great Adventure (a theme park) that we are hoping to catch on Sunday. We found the station and asked at the ticket window if we could pre-purchase the tickets, but the woman told us that we just needed to turn up on the day to get tickets.

We left the station and had a little walk around the immediate area, before deciding to catch the 'Phlash' trolley-bus, which goes in a loop, to see more of the city, as the passes that we had purchased for the train were valid on this. We found the nearest stop and got on the little bus when it arrived a few minutes later. We didn't really pass many of the historic buildings during the ride - we later realised that we needed to catch the bus in the other direction for the historic district - however we did go past the Philadelphia Zoo (the first zoo in America) and a few different museums, including the Museum of Art, outside which is the statue of Sylvester Stallone as 'Rocky', next to the famous steps that Rocky ran up in the film. We decided not to take any pictures today, instead opting to wait until tomorrow when we would have a full day of sightseeing, and when we would have more time to actually get off the bus and take pictures!

The bus eventually brought us back to where we got on (it does continue in the opposite direction before looping back around), where we popped into a CVS pharmacy for something to eat for our tea, and some hair dye for Emma, as her roots and the underneath of her hair were starting to look a bit dark, not helped by the sun bleaching the top of her hair! We went back into Market East station and made our way down to the Airport line platform. Unfortunately, the train was running a little late, and we ended up waiting for around half an hour before it turned up. Once it did, we rode it back to Eastwick, where we once again ran across the road to get back to our hotel. We spent most of the night browsing the internet and watching TV (we can't believe we haven't watched any TV for over 3 weeks!), before going to sleep at around 12pm.

Today, we woke up at around 8:45am, knowing that we needed to have some breakfast (complimentary at this hotel) before 9:30, when it would close. We put on some clothes and went down the corridor to the dining area, where Emma had a bowl of cereal whilst Craig had a couple of bagels with grape jam on them. We went back to the room, where we got showered and ready properly (and Emma dyed her hair, which looks a bit lighter than her usual colour), before turning on the netbook to start uploading some of the pictures of New York. By around 12pm, most of them had uploaded, but we didn't want to waste anymore of the day in the room, so we decided to leave it until later.

We made our way to the train station and caught the airport train towards the city. We once again got off at Market East station, next to which we had noticed a food court yesterday. We had some dinner at a Taco Bell within the Food Court, before walking down Market Street to the Historic District of Philadelphia. We soon reached the building in which the Liberty Bell now stands, and went to join the back of the long queue to enter the building. After a short while, we realised that we didn't seem to be moving very fast, and made a quick decision to leave the more popular landmarks until Monday, rather than have to endure queues and busy crowds on a Saturday.

Instead, we decided to go to Franklin Square (a small park in the middle of the city) and then go to the Rocky steps later on. We made our way over to the square, where we took some pictures and sat on a bench for a while. Thankfully, the rain from yesterday didn't make an appearance today; in fact it was fairly sunny all day, although it was pretty windy! We noticed that there was a mini-golf course on one side of the park, so we went over to see what the prices were like. $8 for an 18-hole game seemed fairly reasonable, so we paid, received a couple of balls, picked our clubs and made our way around the 18 holes - some of which were themed on buildings such as 'Independence Hall', the Liberty Bell, and the 'Benjamin Franklin Bridge' which crosses the river into Philadelphia. It was pretty fun, but we had soon made our way around all of the holes.

We walked back over to the 'Phlash' bus stop, and caught the next one that arrived. We rode it until we reached the Museum of Art, where we got off and walked to the foot of the steps. Emma ran up them, doing a little Rocky jump/celebration once at the top (something which the majority of people were also doing!). We took a few pictures, and walked over to the statue, where we took some pictures next to it, again in the Rocky hands-in-the-air-in-victory pose!

We got back onto the trolley, getting off at Market Street again. We caught the train back to the hotel, where we uploaded the rest of the New York photos (and also the ones of Salem which we were unable to upload at the time), and spent most of the night watching TV. Tomorrow, we plan to visit Six Flags Great Adventure, so it will be an early start for us in the morning!

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