Cheese Steak Anyone?

September 19-22, 2014

When in Philly you do as the locals do right? Well not for us. We landed at an RV Park about 30 miles from Philadelphia and when we went into the city to take in the history we didn’t have a philly cheese steak. More about that later.

The RV Park that was home for us had a wonderful view and the drive to and from the park was simply beautiful. Nice rolling green hills with plenty of trees hinting at the fall colors. We chose this area so we could visit some friends that lived nearby.

Our View at the RV Park

Eddie and Sarah met us on Saturday for a day of touring the Longwood Gardens. These gardens have quite the history and are definitely something to see if you are ever close to Philadelphia.  

Longwood Gardens was known as Pierce’s Park when Pierre S. DuPont purchased the land in 1906. His primary purpose at the time was to stop the selling of part of the acreage and the harvesting of trees. Over the years he developed the property and continued to purchase adjoining lands.

His master plan included adding many water features, specialty garden areas, green houses, and a conservatory. You can explore the gardens and if you really want to explore them you need to plan on one full day at a minimum. The current organization does a great job in maintaining the gardens and facilities and it continues today as an educational site. If you are curious about the 300+ years of history of this land you can check it out on their web site.

The Cat Loves Kids

Enjoying the Day

Enjoy the beauty of the gardens with us as you look at a few pictures from the day.

A Train Among the Garden

Work of art

Bonzai Beauty

East Indian Lotus

Field of Colors

Raining Fountains

Gorgeous Orchid

Longwood Hybrid Water Planter

The Tower

 Tropical Night-Flowering Water lily

Colors Abound

We had a great time hanging out with Eddie, Sarah, Emily and Andrew for a bit. Izzy had fun too and she was happy to get and explore some as well and hang out with Mickey.

We headed to Philadelphia Monday to check out Independence National Historical Park in downtown Philadelphia. We found the park easily enough but finding parking for “Big Red” proved to be challenging, but heck we were up for the challenge!

After getting tickets to go into Independence Hall we ventured over there amazed at the building and everything else in the area. They control the number of people entering the Hall each day and we were glad we were able to see it shortly after getting there.

Independence Hall

George Washington

The Delegates met in the Assembly Room (now Independence Hall) of the Pennsylvania State House creating the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. We are standing in this room where history was made, pretty amazing.

 

Delegates Meeting

 

Assembly Room

The Court Room

Independence Square includes Congress Hall, Supreme Court Chamber in Old City Hall, and a statue of the father of the U.S. Navy, John Barry.

 

John Barry Father of the Navy

 

Liberty Bell Center houses the Liberty Bell and as you wander through the building you are engrossed with more history of our nation. The Liberty Bell went on tour in the country in the early 1900s and landed here for its permanent home.

The Dalai Lama Visiting the Liberty Bell

 

In this area Benjamin Franklin is buried and you can even walk through the graveyard. They have a plaque that lists what Mr. Franklin did during his life. It was great to relearn all of this as well as help you realize what a great man he was.

 

 

Textured with 1,000 Keys from Local Schoolchildren

 

 

We aren’t done with our history lessons during September as we will be venturing to the Washington DC area from here. Hopefully we will also be treated to some great autumn colors while our brains are treated to historical facts!

More to come from SIT so stay with us.

 

 

 

The Big Apple

September 16 – 18, 2014

Florida New York isn’t necessarily a destination point for us but we figured since we were this close to New York City we should probably adventure into the city one day. We found an RV Park in Florida NY that provides tours direct from the RV Park.

I don’t know about you but driving a dully pick-up truck into a city like New York isn’t on our bucket list so we let the bus driver do the driving and Al our tour guide do the talking. We walked quite a bit on the tour and were able to take in some of the most popular sites.

Al Our Tour Guide

Time Square, Wall Street, and Ground Zero were places we took time to see and take pictures. The crowds were one thing, but the sites were pretty cool. We also appreciated Al’s history lesson concerning George Washington being inaugurated here and then going to church at St. Paul’s after the ceremony. He also told us how Wall Street was named. Do you know? Okay I’ll tell you. Wall Street was named after a wall (wood fence) was constructed down the middle of the street to help separate livestock from the steps of buildings. The end of the street was an arriving point for trade from ships and the business community just didn’t appreciate walking through cow pies every day! 

 

Advertising in a Big Way 

 

 

 Just a Few People   

 Time Square Straight Ahead

Getting Close to Going to the Top 

Guess Where?

History at the End of Wall Street

George Washington's Statue at Place of Inauguration

Al Engaging with NYPD

St. Paul’s church is also the place that housed many of the volunteers and other emergency response personnel who came to help with 9/11. They have done a great job with providing visitors a snapshot in time from both 9/11 and George Washington days.

 

Forged From Destruction

Remembering In The Church

George Washington's Pew

 

Walking from Wall Street to the 9/11 Memorial Park and Museum took us by the fire department with its own memorial along the street. The North and South Reflecting Pools are well done and provide every visitor with a place to remember what happened.

Survived

Remembering the Fallen

Freedom Tower

Reflecting  

Eloquent

Our next spot on the tour took us to Liberty Park in New Jersey. This is the location where the immigrants would come after arriving on Ellis Island to get railed to other parts of the country. It is also where we caught the ferry to Ellis Island.

 

Liberty State Park

The National Park Service has done a great job with the museum and you can do research here to see if your ancestors came through here.

Manhattan

 Arriving at Ellis Island

   

 

 

 

From Ellis Island we headed to the Statue of Liberty. The height of the statue is 151’1” and the height from the ground to the torch is 305’1”. In order to complete construction of the pedestal some funds were needed so Emma Lazarus wrote a poem called “The New Colossus” in 1883. This poem is where “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free…..” came from that we often here.

 

 

The seven points on her crown represent the seven seas and seven continents. I am pretty sure we learned this years ago in school but I am glad Al told us again!



 

Overall we enjoyed the day in the city and you never know we may go back and take in a show. We did manage to play a round of golf before we were heading out of New York. The course had beautiful views and in a few weeks will be even more spectacular from the foliage changing colors. We won’t talk about our game.

A Course with Awesome Views

I Think We Made the Putt!

 

Next stop for us is Pennsylvania so don’t go too far!