(no subject)
Returned from a conference in Philadelphia yesterday. The "city of Brotherly Love" seems to live up to it's name. Having experienced the big city rudeness firsthand in certain cities I was caught by surprise. People were genuinely pleasant for the most part and some people would have the courtesy to look you in the eye as you passed by on the street and excuse themselves if they bumped into you. We only really experienced downtown but is that not usually the ruder part of town? I had more rude/inconsiderate behavior from the people I was traveling with than I had with any particular group of people in the city.
We stayed at the Marriot downtown and most of what people would want to see is within walking distance of the hotel. There were bus and subway stops near the hotel and the hotel has a bellroom to store luggage but despite this my companions decided to rent vehicles. Parking in the area is very expensive by most standards. The cheapest lot we were able to find was 4.75 per hour. Parking on the street was much cheaper at $1 per hour ($.25/15 min) but was limited from anywhere to 30 minutes to 2 hours. The hotel has a per day rate and lets you come and go at will. Definitely the best way to go if you plan on doing a lot of driving. Since the others decided on a car rental I did not get to see what the public transportation was like. Judging from the frequency of busses and subway trams it should be as good as the reviews I have read. Since most of the tourist attractions are so close to this particular hotel one scarcely needs transportation besides to and from the airport. For this there were options of which we found out after our arrival we could either have taken a shuttle which would have costed $10 or a cab(s) for roughly $25 (at least from what I was told). It would definitely be my recommendation to pay for the shuttle and buy a day pass for the public transportation system ($6) if you plan on going far.
The following were places I visited.
Liberty Bell: 6 blocks, free
Independence Hall: 7 blocks, free but need tickets from building in which Liberty Bell is housed. A nice lady from NY was nice enough to give us her extra tickets as we did not know we needed to get them elsewhere.
Tomb of the Unknown Revolutionary Soldiers: 8 blocks, free
Mütter Museum: ca. 20 blocks, $8 students $12 adults
Miscellaneous art museums: 10-20 blocks, we did not go in any but I looked at some of the artwork and fountains on my way to meet my companions who wanted to see the Rocky statue.
Places I ate:
Hardrock Cafe: 0 blocks, good but somewhat expensive
Dunkin' Donuts: 0 blocks, very good, fast breakfast very cheap
Ho So Gai: 3-4 blocks, very good Chinese restaurant in Chinatown
Reading Station Market: 0 blocks, various vendors and restaurants vary in quality
Pizza Palace: 2-3 blocks, pizza was good but had been warmed over and they were stingy with the topping by my standards
I will write about the conference in a separate post.
We stayed at the Marriot downtown and most of what people would want to see is within walking distance of the hotel. There were bus and subway stops near the hotel and the hotel has a bellroom to store luggage but despite this my companions decided to rent vehicles. Parking in the area is very expensive by most standards. The cheapest lot we were able to find was 4.75 per hour. Parking on the street was much cheaper at $1 per hour ($.25/15 min) but was limited from anywhere to 30 minutes to 2 hours. The hotel has a per day rate and lets you come and go at will. Definitely the best way to go if you plan on doing a lot of driving. Since the others decided on a car rental I did not get to see what the public transportation was like. Judging from the frequency of busses and subway trams it should be as good as the reviews I have read. Since most of the tourist attractions are so close to this particular hotel one scarcely needs transportation besides to and from the airport. For this there were options of which we found out after our arrival we could either have taken a shuttle which would have costed $10 or a cab(s) for roughly $25 (at least from what I was told). It would definitely be my recommendation to pay for the shuttle and buy a day pass for the public transportation system ($6) if you plan on going far.
The following were places I visited.
Liberty Bell: 6 blocks, free
Independence Hall: 7 blocks, free but need tickets from building in which Liberty Bell is housed. A nice lady from NY was nice enough to give us her extra tickets as we did not know we needed to get them elsewhere.
Tomb of the Unknown Revolutionary Soldiers: 8 blocks, free
Mütter Museum: ca. 20 blocks, $8 students $12 adults
Miscellaneous art museums: 10-20 blocks, we did not go in any but I looked at some of the artwork and fountains on my way to meet my companions who wanted to see the Rocky statue.
Places I ate:
Hardrock Cafe: 0 blocks, good but somewhat expensive
Dunkin' Donuts: 0 blocks, very good, fast breakfast very cheap
Ho So Gai: 3-4 blocks, very good Chinese restaurant in Chinatown
Reading Station Market: 0 blocks, various vendors and restaurants vary in quality
Pizza Palace: 2-3 blocks, pizza was good but had been warmed over and they were stingy with the topping by my standards
I will write about the conference in a separate post.