After our quick trip in NY, it was off to our hotel in Philly! We had plans to be there four nights and do a mix of some historic stuff, patriotic stuff, food stuff, and plenty of walking around. Here’s a little about what our week entailed:
HOT weather. I’m talking about hot. I went for a run one day and it was feels like 100+ degrees early in the morning! I can’t imagine how hot it really was later in the day.
The kids (and B) were troopers and we still got in plenty of walking each day. We visited The Liberty Bell, saw where the Declaration of Independence was signed and even saw what was left of George Washington’s early home.
We saw the city’s Fourth of July Parade.
We went to their Fourth of July festival! Philly did it big – they had a huge party downtown with tons of food vendors, a free concert and fireworks. The concert included Ludacris and Demi Lovato and we may have kept the kids up a little too late just so we could participate in some of the festivities.
We checked out Reading Terminal Market on more than one occasion. FW enjoyed a real Philly cheesesteak! I was partial to the cookies.
We (per usual) got in plenty of hotel pool time – each day we let the kids burn some energy in the water.
We also got in some good museum time. We checked out the Franklin Institute and the kids had a blast running around and interacting with all the exhibits.
Another day, we went to the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. They also had a lot of fun things for the kids to do, including several dino exhibits and a room with small animals and bugs for the kids to touch.
We visited Chinatown, and stopped for a sweet drink.
I also was able to get in two runs, which isn’t always easy when traveling with the family. Luckily, B was able to take the kiddos two different mornings while I got to go running. One of the days I ran up the famous Rocky steps at the Art Museum!
We even got in two side trips to see friends, including our friend Mitch from Boston College. He and his wife Becca have two kids, so we were able to join them for dinner one night and our kids loved playing with their kids and playing with their outdoor water equipment.
On the way back, we stopped in Lancaster to meet up with my friend and former coworker, Wendy. She showed us around the cute downtown, we enjoyed lunch at a crepe restaurant, some post-lunch candy shopping at the fun Swedish candy shop, and some book purchases at their kid bookstore.
As always, it was a bummer when the trip ended. We didn’t cross off nearly everything on our list, so I hope we can come back soon!
Saturday, we started off with breakfast. I had made a French toast casserole that we just had to heat up before the day began. Our activities began with a drive to Ash Cave and a hike to the cave. We hiked the Gorge and Rim Trail. Those trails were only about 1/2 mile or so, so we ended up walking a bit on the Grandma Gatewood Trail before turning around and making it back to our car for a picnic lunch.
After lunch, we opted for another trail – this time to Old Man’s Cave! We hiked the lower falls and Gorge Trail, both of which were fun and not too hard to do with the kids – we had the little ones in backpacks and preschoolers with us at all times (basically FW was holding my hand as we walked up the tons and tons of stairs and anytime we were along the cliffs).
Then, back to the cabin for nap time. We finished the afternoon with a cookout, complete with s’mores and the s’mores cookie bars I had brought.
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