Philly

Oh how glad I am that we are finishing up in Philly tonight!  The traffic here is HORRENDOUS!!  Cabs pull right across in front of you.  Pedestrians ALWAYS have the right of way in a crosswalk even if your light is green, so you must be prepared to stop on a dime if they wander out in front of you.  There is lots of congestion, and SHAME ON YOU for driving your car into the city!!  Most of the garages start at $4.50-$6.00 for the first 30 minutes.  We just took a quick trip through Macy's and it cost us $12 to buy nothing!!  We are now in the rain stopping and starting our way out of downtown Philly to locate a statue of Rocky in the art district.

We began our day with a visit to the Declaration House.  Here we met Thomas Jefferson and listened to him tell us about when he wrote the Declaration of Independence in the Jacob Graff house where he rented some rooms.  He too could not concentrate in what was then the heart of Philadelphia and had to find some peace and quiet on the outskirts of town.  From here we headed a few blocks east to view the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. 

From there the tour continued to Christ Church Burial Ground where Benjamin Franklin is buried along with four other signers of the Declaration.  Today, however, he was making an appearance (Kinda creepy, huh?) and visited with us for awhile.  He told us of how he had tested his theory of electricity with his kite and key.  He went on to tell about a time that he was going to test the ability to cook a turkey with electricity since he had seen other animals get cooked when they were struck by lightning on the farm.  He had his batteries all connected and ready to attach to the turkey to complete his circuit when his son said something to him and distracted him.  The last thing he remembered as he accidentally touched his contacts together was the smell of sulfur as his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he passed out for two hours.  The moral of the story is to be careful with electricity because instead of cooking the turkey he almost cooked his own goose.

As we wandered the streets a little more we were able to see Betsy Ross's house and the U.S. Mint.  Sadly they were not giving out free samples today.  We made our way over to Penn's Landing where we were able to view the Spirit of Philadelphia and the Mashulu Restaurant located on a large replica of Christopher Columbus' boat on the Delaware River.  (Unfortunately it was in this same river that the Ride the Ducks boat was hit by a barge yesterday and sunk.  All on board were saved except 2 visiting from Hungary.  The wreckage was trying to be retrieved today while we were there. I don't know whether it made national news, but it has been all over the news here.) It was from here that we went to Macy's to view the world's largest organ.  We are going to grab a bite to eat and then head back for a 7:00 performance.  I can only imagine the magnitude of the sound this organ will put out in this massive 7 story structure.  http://www.wanamakerorgan.com/ states: In its present configuration, the Wanamaker Organ has 28,482 pipes in 461 ranks.[2] The organ console consists of six manuals with an array of stops and controls that command the organ. The organ's String Division forms the largest single organ chamber in the world. The instrument features eighty-eight ranks of string pipes built by the W.W. Kimball Company of Chicago.[2] The organ is famed for its orchestra-like sound, coming from pipes that are voiced softer than usual, allowing an unusually rich build-up because of the massing of pipe-tone families.

Well it was not an entirely free concert tonight since this time it cost us $18 for just over an hour of parking, but the concert was fabulous!  He played about 4 different pieces and gave a 30 minute concert.  He incorporated different voices in his songs and gave quite a display of the abilities of this grand instrument.  We listened in awe as we stood across the room from all those pipes in the ladies' department of Macy's.  After he was through playing we were able to meet the organist and get a close up view of the monstrous keyboard.

We are now near Delaware City, DE and have traveled about 3300 miles through 13 states and Canada.  We have two more scheduled stops before heading home.  We are certainly ready to wind it down.  We have had a blast, but we are having an Oz moment - THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME!