Philly take 2

Went to Philadelphia yesterday with the SU group; the same trip I did last year. This year i decided to do the museums I missed last time. In looking at a map of the area around National Constitution Hall, I saw that the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall and a lot of other sites were right nearby. So I figured it would make a nice re-enactment of the first National Treasure movie to see all those places. (Too bad the National Archives is back in DC... another time)

First stop in Philly was the PA museum of Art again, but I jumped right on a shuttle to the LOVE fountain. It is super, super cute. Then I walked up Market street 10 blocks to the Visitor Center to get my ticket for Independence Hall. It was about 11am then, and I got a ticket for 1:00. the tickets were free but they gave them out quickly.

Then I headed over to the Liberty Bell and stood in a quick line to get inside the mostly glass building housing the bell and its history. It was very crowded but impressive.

Then I walked back across the lawn to the National Constitution Center. Very friendly people there. I checked out the Signers Hall which has all these figures standing about the room representing all the men who signed the Constitution. I got a picture with Georgia's delegate. Then I walked through the main exhibit. It was very interactive with lots of touch screens on various people from the constitution's history, information on the states, the branches of government, and models of the White House, the Capitol, and the Surpreme Court. Afterwards it was about 1:00, so I walked back across the lawn to the Independence Hall.

National Park Rangers monitor the Hall and its adjacent buildings. It's in a very pretty park area. I got to meander one of the connected rooms while waiting to go inside. The steps into the hall are very, very worn. There were 3 parts to this tour. The first part was the Ranger tour guide telling us all about Ben Franklin (they LOVE Ben Franklin in Philly). Lots of quotes from Poor Richard's almanac, his inventions (bifocals), and his early life and businesses with his brothers then on his own.

The next part was seeing the Hall itself. First we saw the Court Room with the box for the accused to stand in and the jury boxes, etc. They used to have the King's coat of arms over the Judge's seat, but it was taken down and burned. It was replaced with Philadelphia's coat of arms. Then we saw the meeting room where the Declaration of Independence was formed and signed, the Articles of Confederation were written and then revised into the Constitution. They said Ben Franklin was 1 of only a handful of men to have signed all those documents. Probably helped living just down the street. And Nicholas Cage was mentioned. Yay National Treasure!

After having done these three things, I walked the few blocks to Christ Church cemetery where Ben Franklin is buried. they throw pennies on his grave. A Penny saved is a Penny earned. I eventually made it to Christ Church itself, but along the way I stopped at Betsy Ross' house and walked up and down Elfreth's alley, the oldest residential street in the US. After seeing Christ Church, I walked the 10 blocks back to LOVE fountain, and took the shuttle to Rodin museum (Rho-DAN).

I stopped for lunch along the way at a mall, and tried to find a short cut out. Which led me to their subways terminals. Which I wandered around in for a bit before finding a staircase up and back to the street level. It's bizarre down there. You can imagine Masons and torches, etc. I walked through the City Hall building. It's set up so you can use it as a pedestrian cut through, and I saw a man playing flute! You rarely see flute street performers.

It's a lovely little museum for the works of this Frenchman named Rodin. It looked a little under-taken-care-of. After viewing that, I went back to spend the remainder of the day at the PA museum of art. I found some of my favorite exhibits from before, and checked out the Modern Art section I had skipped last time.

The weather all day had been gorgeous, but now it turned overcast and chilly. I still sat outside on the steps Rocky runs up in his movies while waiting for my bus. It was a great trip!