Philadelphia

A monument on the waterfront in Philadelphia in memory of the Quakers who arrived here in the 1680's to escape persecution from the Church in England.

Benjamin Franklin's grave - the only non President to appear on a US ($100) Bank Note - if you ever get that question right on Who Wants to be A Millionaire - think you at least owe me dinner (or a plane ticket depending on how much you win!!)

The first American Flat was thought to have been made here at Betsy Ross House - 13 stars & 13 stripes for the then 13 states of the Union.

Because the Quakers didn't believe in naming streets after people when they established Philadelphia those running West/East were called after trees/food etc - I even saw one called Elbow St!!! The North/South running streets are numbered though 'First' Street is 'Front' Street as again the Quakers believed only God was First.

I was lucky enough to catch the Cherry Trees in blossom - very pretty - and they only blossom for a couple of weeks.
Elfreths Alley which was built in 1775 and is America's oldest continuously residential street.

Chom Poo Moo enjoys meeting some of Philadelphia's colourful characters.

Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence was signed on 4th July 1776.

The Liberty Bell which was brought over from England in 1751 to Philadelphia - the original USA Capital City - mainly became a national icon during the Civil War when anti-Slave groups (and later woman's right groups) used it in publications to promote their cause (hence the name of course!!) . The big crack in the bell was made deliberately in event to stop a hairline fracture circling along the bell - didn't quite go to plan though!!

The Jellybean People display at the Liberty Museum - don't want to count those things!! Quite an imaginative way to highlight the message of equality to kids - that though all different colours on the outside all jellybeans are the same....

An old Fire Engine at the Fire Brigade Museum.

There were some funny badges for the different fire crews.

And I liked this stained glass window.

Isaiah Zager over the last 30 years has recycled various items to cover over 40,000 square feet of Philadelphia with tiled Mosaics - these one's are at the 'Magic Gardens' which locals fought to keep after the local government wanted to sell the land for development.

I couldn't come to Phillie without trying one of the famous Philly Cheese Steaks and where else to do that than at Pat's place where in the 1930's 2 Italian brothers created them. You can tell Phillie's favourite Cheese Steak restaurants as there are big queue's outside them and as you can see from the board there is only one way to order them - I was warned that if you don't do it right they will just leave you standing there and move onto the next customer - enough motivation for me to make sure at least one person in the US understood me!!

My sort of message.....

After my visit to the Fire Museum I spotted lots of these plaques on the houses in Phillie - they show which insurance company you were with in event of fire only fire engines from this company would attend a fire at your house - there was lots of dirty tricks played - blocking of roads/smashed hydrants/violence - to stop fire engines reaching fires in an attempt to gain more control and of course money!!

Lots of nice old buildings here as well.

The Philadelphia Art Museum - most famous for the steps that Sylvestor Stallone ran up in the original Rocky movie before punching the air (are you now humming the theme tune??) - very funny to stand here and watch loads of people re-enact that scene from the movie.

And once they have their breathe back they have to go get their photo taken with Rocky himself :-)

The "Gates of Hell' & 'Thinking Man' at the Rodin Museum.

Some quirky artists & street entertainers along the streets.

The Eastern State Penitentiary built in the 1820's this place had running water before the White House - when it was first opened prisoners were taken to their cell with a hood over their heads and never saw another person during their whole sentence - fed through hatches/exercised in a small yard of their cell and hooded if they ever had to leave.......

Chom Poo Moo didn't like the thought of this life style so decided to mastermind her own escape...

Things had eased off a little by the time Al Capone served his sentence here for illegal possession of a firearm - though the police & courts were trying to be tough on him he seemed to have a pretty easy time on the inside!!

The sun came out so I went for a walk around Fairmount Park and was entertained watching groups of people Disco Skate....

Baseball certainly seemed the game the locals loved.....

Some road worker had a sense of humour and had drawn this little dead guy on the road next to the zebra crossing lines!!!

Sunset over Phillie.

Think the photo's about cover my few days in Philedelphia - the sun came out which made it really nice to wander round the city Lots of history here and it's a fairly laid back & pretty city.

Travels continue to go well - no disasters or illnesses (avoiding Pig Flu!) and no gossip for you....so am going to head off and get myself to bed.

Will be back soon.....

Jack xx

Chicago and Cincinnati

Remember Andrea the mad crazy American girl I was travelling with in New Zealand – after living in Germany for 11 years and travelling for 6 months she has returned to her home town of Cincinnati and we arranged to meet up in Chicago. All easy enough – well it would have been if those geniuses that run the subway hadn’t decided to call two stations on the same line by the same name. Of course neither of our mobiles were allowing outgoing calls so a few hours of hanging around and the help of one of Andrea’s friends who acted as a go between and couldn’t understand why we were not seeing each other given we were both describing being at the same place we finally worked it out (and no none of the very clever staff thought to tell us there was another station with the same name when we asked them if more than one exit!!)

So here we were ready to explore the windy city…..

Not sure I would have got in this guys tourist buggy – he looks like one of those guys who walked in front of a funeral parade!!

One of our first stops was the Mexican Art Museum – where we were able to watch this artist giving lessons to some of the local kids.

The Mexican Art Gallery is in an area called Pilsen which is famous locally for all the street murals – this one is the Legend of the Volcanoes – tells a love story of a young Aztec princess Izta’s who was in love with a brave warrior Popoca who went off to battle to earn her hand in marriage, meantime the bad guy warrior who was also in love with Izta tricked everyone into believing that Popoca had lost his battle and been killed hoping to be able to marry Izta himself. But she died of sadness – when Popoca arrived back just before the funeral he carried her off into the mountains and laid down beside her on a table of flowers where he also died of sadness – the gods recognizing their love turned them into two volcanoes. Sounds like a local version of Romeo and Juliet….

And then there is the Ghostbuster murals???

Travelling with Andrea always throws up something different – we ended up getting interviewed for a Mexican TV documentary on the Latino Film Festival which was on in Chicago……mmm – yes your guess is right neither of us knew anything about it but we improvised!!

Modern Art – someone gets paid for coming up with this…..maybe I could find a new career after all…..

As I didn’t get to play with the New York Bulls Bollocks I decided I was going to milk the Chicago cow :-)

‘Cloud Gate’ known as ‘The Bean’ in Chicago’s Millennium Park is made of stainless steel and gives an interesting perspective of the world around it.

I like this photo of the squirrel eating.

Andrea at Lake Michigan – one of the 5 Great Lakes. I was a bit surprised to find that Chicago has beaches…

The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum had a lovely butterfly garden.

And some odd looking amphibians….

And a couple of small birds.

Me admiring some of the views of Chicago

The Little Drummer Boy.

We stayed a few nights with Tanya in Chicago a friend of Andrea's. Here we had just come from seeing a new play called 'GhostWritten' which was a bit different.

We laughed at these pigeons getting a heat from the Eternal Flame!!

You can stand outside the TV studio and watch them filming the local news and weather - though Andrea having liked her taste of stardom got into trouble for jumping up and down in the background - you can't take her anyway!!

Andrea and I at Buckingham Fountain in Grant Park - one of the world's biggest fountains - so the sign said!

Chicago has a lot of interesting architecture and art in it's building. This is the Marquette Building which is one of Chicago's earliest skyscrapers (though just a baby corn compared to today's skyscrapers). Chicago in fact was the home of the first Skyscrapers (the first one no longer stands).

Chom Poo Moo and Kia (i think that's how Andrea is spelling his name) got a bit too friendly with this giant red dinosaur - I had to climb up and rescue them!! Well mainly from the 2 kids who spotted them and made to get them whilst we were trying to get this photo!!

I like this interchanging water fountain where the face changes and it spits water out that the kids cool off in.

One of the many skyscrapers.......

I like the contrast between the old and new buildings - in this photo the old building is reflected in the glass of the modern building.

This must be the only 'Picasso' that kids are actually allowed to play on.....

Jean Dubuffet's Monument with Standing Beast - more appropriately known as 'Snoopy in A Blender'.

I got some free counselling from this outdoor shrink!! Don't think it worked though......

The view over Chicago from the John Hancock Centre.

Interesting drive out of Chicago.

Emma and Pierre get to know Chom Poo Moo. Friends of Andrea's that we went to stay with for a couple of days just outside of Chicago.

Emma and Pierre's 3 beautiful dogs - Franklin (at the top in his dog training class), Saidy and Orion.

This castle is in fact a Pizza resteraunt - delicious Chicago Pizza though.

Moraine State Park - nice walk around the lake and marshes - Andrea nearly trod on that poor snake in the bottom photo, we saw otters, deer and some lovely birds.

We then drove down to Cincinnati Andrea's home town. I went to the Taft museum (when Andrea had to go back to work!) - which is an old 1820's house that has been donated along with lots of art work to the people of Cincinnat.

Next stop was the Cincinnati Art Museum which had a good mixture of art - Surrealism (not my taste - mainly as I don't understand it) through to old stuff like this Madonna and Child by Anotnio del Ceraiolo.

Chom Poo Moo wasn't sure if she wanted to join the baseball game after all when she realised what part she would be taking!!

Quite a few interesting buildings here as well - these photo's are all from the Cincinnati Bell building built in the 1930's it's one of the early Art Deco Buildings in this area and was in built for the phone company who still occupy it.

Then there was the Town Hall.

This Catholic Church in the centre of Cincinnati looked more like a roman musoleum.

Sharkey the cat loved playing with this box - think he would make a good advert for coca cola.

The Roebling Suspension Bridge - this is the same guy who designed the Brooklyn Bridge but this one came first.

Cheese Coney's - they are like a Hot Dog covered in chillie and cheese - very unhealthy but good :-)

I liked this mural which is in an areas in Cincinnati called 'Camp Washington' but the significance of President Washington being dressed as a woman is lost on most locals who don't use the term 'camp' to describe the effeminate characteristics of a guy!! Funny how words/terms you take for common use are in fact limited to your own local area/country!!

I went to my first ever Ice Hockey game - The Cyclones V Wheeling - the local team (Cyclones) won after 2 extra times.....not being the biggest sports fan I did quite enjoy this - and no there was no fighting or blood!!

Cincinnati's history is told in a series of murals along the waterfront.

Chom Poo Moo gets some reading lessons from the locals.

Some more butterflies at the Indian Butterfly show at the Cincinnati Conservatory.

Mother of God Church - not being a religous person I still love going into churches etc as I love the buildings and the art - and the idea of faith!! I liked this one as it had some pretty impressive paintings.

The Bascilica of Assumption - again just accross the road from the one above but I gate crashed a school tour of this one and actually learnt a few things - a Bascillica is one step up from a Cathedral and there are seemingly only 4 in the whole USA - this one was given this honour due to the art work - such as the big stain glass window which was the world's biggest at the time (now 2nd) and the tiled mosiacs which contain about 70,000 individual pieces in each one!!!

Just to break the religous theme.....some groovy modern art.

A lot of the older houses in Cincinnati (and some other cities here) are really narrow at the front but really long like this one because in the past the owners got taxed on the width of their houses!! I also like the 'Drive Through' Pharmacy - what next - 'Drive Through Dentist'?.

The Freedom Museum was really interesting it explained the history of slavery and the underground railway etc that went on before and during the civil war with personal experiences etc. Quite touching and sad. The quilt canvasses in the photo tell some of the general story and some individual people's story like the makers family. The reason it is at this location is that Cincinnati on one side of the river is in Ohio (north) and Kentucky at the other side (south) and the slaves had to cross the river if any hope of getting their freedom but still had a long way to get to the Canadian Border.

What I found really interesting was how they brought in todays issues like 'bonded labour', 'sex trade' etc and debated whether this was just a modern form of slavery.

The Purple People Bridge - I particularly liked the rule about 'No Shoeless Persons' - what made them come up with this one is what I want to know?

The Proctor and Gamble World Headquarters - also known as the "Dolly Parton Towers'!!

Union Station in Cincinnati built in 1933 was another Art Deco building which had up to 17,000 people passing through it a day when at it's busiest - now it houses a couple of museums and and Imax theatre.

Some views over Cincinnati.

It was great to catch up with Andrea again so soon after saying goodbye to her in New Zealand at the end of February.... she is settling back into life in the US but is happy the recession is allowing her to get some extra 'furlough' time off work to stop it being too much of a shock to her system :-) .

I loved Chicago it was a fun city with lots to do (theatres/museums etc) and a lively atmosphere but can be very chilly so I'm told!!

Was also good getting to see Andrea's home town of Cincinnati which had a lot more to do than I had imagined.

Big thanks to Andrea for showing me around and to Tanya, Emily & Pierre (and pups of course) and Brian for all their hospitality. I certainly have an ever growing list of people to add onto my list of people I owe some favours to - hope they come visit Scotland some day so I can return the favour.

Till the next time....hope your all good - what gossip at home?

Jack xx