The Epic Summer Road Trip - On the Road to Philly: Day 1

Would you believe this trip began because I was watching Sleepy Hollow??

Now in all honesty, it wasn't until last week that I realized Sleepy Hollow is actually in New York.  But that's not important right now.  There was an episode this season that brought Ichabod and Abby to the Liberty Bell.  Turns out, Ichabod is the one who put the crack in the bell!!  I know, crazy coincidence, right??  The historical nonsense (meant in the best way) of this show was enough to to make me ponder.  I've never been to Philadelphia.  I've never seen this very historical stuff.  That doesn't seem right.

Elias and I have an Annual Road Trip and Philly made the short list of options.  So I did a search to see how long of a drive it would be.  One map said 14 hours.  One said 12.  I liked the map that said 12 hours.

The plan became pretty fully formed pretty quickly.  Whether the trip is 12 or 14 hours long, that is a big day.  So we decided to make things interesting.  The first day (well, today) would be the big driving day.  We go to Philly.  Then we twirl around Philly for a few days, seeing as many sights as we can.  There will be an amusement park thrown in for good measure.  Once we are done, we drive back towards Cleveland and hang out there for a few days.  More amusement parks and fun will be had before we hit the road for home.

That's the plan.  The execution of this plan...we'll see how it goes.  We did make it to Philly.  But Google Maps did lie most spectacularly to us.  There is no chance in hell it would have taken us 12 hours to get here.  Especially since I was speeding most of the time.  It took closer to 15 hours for us to get here.  Now, that included several stops for bathrooms and fuel, many slowdowns because of cops (so many cops on the road today), other slowdowns because of construction, and three bad accidents (not us, but other people who had a very bad day).  Whatever, though.  We made it!!

Did I also mention I caught a cold the other day and the symptoms are slowly making their way through my unsuspecting body??  Yeah.  That's...not good...

We left the house at 4a and arrived at the hotel around 830p.  Once we checked in and dropped our crap, we needed to find a place to eat.  If you've followed our stories in the past, you'd know that we have a hard time finding food choices on the fly at night.  As we left the hotel and walked up and down the streets in Old Town, we realized that it was pretty late on a Sunday.  Most of the places open were straight up bars.  The restaurants were either closed or too drunky for us.

The ultimate goal was ice cream.  And next to the ice cream parlor, we found The Gaslight.  The Gaslight is the type of place I would be eating at back home in Chicago.  Kind of old-timey.  Very hipstery.  Subway tiles and Edison bulbs abound. 

We weren't going to eat much, really.  There was ice cream to be had.  But then we saw a foie gras terrine.  And there was a pulled lamb "burger".  And saffron spaghetti with lobster.

We were doomed.

Seriously, the food was tremendous.  We were the only people eating, because who dines at almost 10p on a Sunday??  The other groups were drinking on the patio or at the bar.  Either way, we didn't care.  Elias ate his pulled lamb like it was his job.  I diverted my attention for one moment and he had eaten his entire share of the foie.  Bastard.  I'm not gonna lie.  I was hoping he'd have hated it.  Then there would have been more for me.  Nope.  He was even eyeing my portion.

Next door to The Gaslight was The Franklin Fountain.  It's another old-timey place that serves old-timey ice cream and soda drinks.  The place is super cute and very small.  Apparently there is a line out the door at all times.  And they are open until midnight most nights.  Very cool.  It's also Cash Only.  Just in case you're in town.  Originally, I read about this place in a USA Today article featuring Alton Brown.  He went there and loved it.  We did too.  Except...the popularity is a downfall because they do run out of ice cream.  So if you wanted a vanilla milkshake, you're out of luck if they are out of vanilla ice cream.  Or chocolate.  Which they were.

By the time we made it back to the hotel, we were pretty well spent.  That's what happens when you spend an entire day behind the wheel of the car.  So we packed it in.  It didn't take us long to fall asleep.  And there was so much planned for the next few days that we needed the sleep.  We had to hit the ground running in the morning.  There is so much to see and not enough time to see it all.  Here's hoping we can survive it all!!