Philly Trip

Niki and I had a really good time in Philadelphia, but we really did miss Taryn quite a bit. It was the first time we had both been away from him at the same time. Philly is a really nice city and we felt safe the entire time we were there. Our hotel was right in the middle of downtown and we walked almost everywhere we went, splurging only a few times for a taxi. Everything touristry was within 1 - 2 miles of our hotel, so that made it really convenient and made for good excercise.

Although it wasn't a true vacation for Niki since she spent almost all day every day in lectures we were able to spend evenings and a couple of afternoons together. With all my freetime I was able to explore the city and get in a ton of excercise. I even took a private pilates lesson which was really great and very challenging! I pretty much went everywhere I could so as to see as much as possible during our stay. By the end of the week I had the city memorized and could get us where we needed to go pretty quickly. It was really fun to be back in a big city even if it was just for a little while. One thing that I don't miss about the big city is the smells especially all of the exhaust fumes from buses and cars.


As soon as we got there we headed over to Jim's which is a local cheesesteak place. If your in Philly you have to have a big cheesesteak! Yummy! Reminded me of Texadelphia... hmm how I miss you!
The view from our hotel room at night. This picture does not really do it justice.
The view from the steps of the Philadelphia Musuem of Art down Benjamin Franklin Parkway.
One great thing about our trip was going out to eat every night. In a small town you just don't have many options. This restaurant is called "Morimoto", owned by the Iron Chef from Food Network. Niki had some yummy sushi and I had some Kobe beef. This was a very popular place, luckily we were able to get reservations!

This was probably our favorite restaurant we dined in during our stay. Philly has over 200 BYOB's which is really cool. Niki and I really enjoyed the food and the waitstaff who spent a lot of time hanging out at our table and telling us good places to try out during our stay!
Things we saw:

Remember the movie Mannequin? Well, this is the actual storefront where they did the filming.
The Reading Market was right by our hotel and had tons of options for food, shopping just about anything you could think of, fresh veggies, fruit, seafood. There was something for everyone. I have literally never seen so many choices and so many people crammed inside one building. There were even a few Amish run delis and restaurants. It was neat to see them in all their traditional clothing. The Love Statue
City Hall which was gigantic! I have no idea how they built this thing back in 1870.
The National Constitution Center -- self explanatory...
Independence Hall where they signed the Declaration of Independence and drafted the Constitution.
The Liberty Bell
You have to make sure you get your picture taken with the Rocky statue! Yo, Adriene!
Running up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, just like Rocky did in the movie!
Our friends Dee and Jessica (Dee is a good friend of mine from College) made a road trip up from DC to hang out with us for a day. We had a really great time with them and are excited that they are in the process of trying to get back to Texas in the near future.