Philadelphia or Philly

Turns out some people get confused when I say, "I went to Philly." They don't get that I am talking about Philadelphia so maybe I am crazy, maybe Philadelphia is never called Philly.

Friday morning (10.7) Tabbi and I slept in. Then we got up and explored the city. First things first, we took the bus to the Philadelphia City Hall.

There were lots of Wall Street protesters. I like protesters. Sometimes they make very good points. People don't listen to them a lot, but when they do is when we have revolutions :0)





I loved this next picture. The protesters were at City Hall and behind them, on the steps of City Hall, among all their information was this picture of City Hall. It's a beautiful building and I loved how the picture stood out among all their information.


We walked around the city and passed the Reading Terminal Headhouse & Train Shed


The Reading Railroad Terminal complex was built in the 1890's and had a thirteen-track train shed and a farmer's market. The trains don't come in there today - but they still have the farmer's market.

So these photos are of the train shed. It was renovated in March 1994 to become the Pennsylvania Convention Center's Grand Hall. The thirteen original tracks of the train shed are represented by parallel steel lines embedded in the floor. I think that it is a beautiful room and such a fun history!

I finally got to see the Liberty Bell. Who knows how long I have waited for that!?

The Liberty Bell is a symbol of the American Revolution. It is a symbol of the liberties gained and a reminder of the liberties denied.


"The Liberty Bell is 'a very significant symbol for the entire democratic world.'"
-Nelson Mandela

The Liberty Bell's famous gap - often called a 'crack' and running from tip towards crown - makes it instantly recognizable.
That gap is really the result of an attempt to fix a thin crack that destroyed the Bell's tone at some moment after the American Revolution.
Exactly when that crack developed is lost in history. The repair work dates to 1846. It failed when, as the Bell rand for George Washington's birthday anniversary. The original crack reappeared and lengthened. It zig-zagged up towards the top of the bell. Silencing it - at least physically - forever.

"Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."
Leviticus 25:10


We took a walk around the rest of the Old City District. We saw Elfreth's Alley. The oldest inhabited street in the U.S. It currently still houses people. I think the houses look very well kept-up and nice. It's a really quaint street.

The tour guide said that the way that they used to tax back in the day was by the width of your house. This house is only 9.5 feet wide, but as you can see, very tall. It's known as the "halfway house."




I love this website of Elfreth's Alley. It gives all the history of the street as well as the history of each individual house - how awesome is that?!
Afterwards we saw the Betsy Ross House

Betsy Ross (1752-1836) lived and worked in this house on Arch Street during the American Revolution. In 1776, Betsy Ross lost her husband John. The young widow worked as an upholsterer, but when war came, she turned to making naval colors. In early 1777 she sewed the first Stars and Stripes for the naval vessels defending Philadelphia.

I found Betsy's history interesting - she outlived three husbands! So here is a snippet of her life story: Born January 1, 1752
Married John Ross on November 4,1773
He was in the militia and died January 1776.
She sewed the first American Flag in late May/early June that same year.
Married again, Joseph Ashburn, June 15, 1777.
He was captured by the British, imprisoned in England and died March 3, 1782.
She married again on May 8, 1783 to John Claypoole, a fellow prisoner of Joseph Ashburn's. They lived in this house until he died August 3, 1817.
She didn't marry again and died nearly 20 years later in 1836.
Can you imagine how hard that would be? To bury three husbands? My heart aches for her. Her and her final husband are buried outside of their home in Philadelphia.



The last thing we visited in the city was the Rocky Steps. I haven't ever seen any of the Rocky movies but I heard they were a place to visit - so we did. :0)


The 72 stone steps before the entrance of the Philadelphia Museum of Art in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania have become known as the "Rocky Steps" as a result of their appearance in the triple-Oscar-winning film Rocky and four of its sequels, Rocky II, III, V and Rocky Balboa, in which the eponymous character runs up the steps to the song "Gonna Fly Now". Tourists often mimic Rocky's famous climb, a metaphor for an underdog or an everyman rising to a challenge.[1] A bronze statue of Rocky was briefly situated at the top of the steps for the filming of Rocky III. (Wikipedia)




I think that's a ton of events and pictures for now. I will post more later. (And you don't have to read it because I know it gets boring.)

Utah's Own Haunted Circus

Okay, I know that I was in love with the Eastern State Penitentiary Terror Behind the Walls but I found a haunted attraction even more amazing that that! And, in UTAH!!! Who would have thought that the best haunted attraction would be so close to home? In Draper, UT right off I-15 is the Haunted Circus. The first time we drove past it Mike said, "We are going to that." I said, "Because you have heard about it or because you see it and just want to?" He said, "I just want to." The chance came, and so we did.

Jordan & Vanessa came with us and because none of us had really heard anything about it - good or bad - we weren't sure what to expect. We purchased our tickets and walked in. They had a whole bunch of rides outside and then a big top tent, which is where we stood in line and waited to go through the haunted train cars.

Some of our favorite parts of the Haunted Circus:
*At the entrance of the big top tent they had a Fortune Teller machine, kind of like the one on Big, and it looked completely like an arcade machine. But as people got closer, the Fortune Teller would come to life scare them. It was awesome. It fooled everyone. It made the line entertaining because we were able to just sit and watch all the new folks come in and get scared. ;0)

*The Haunted Circus was so long! It just kept going and going and going. We thought it was going to end a couple times, but it kept on going. Every bit of it was pretty awesome.
*They had a train car that was dark and lit only through some black lights. There were a number of jail bars that created a maze through the train car and the black lights seemed to make the bars multiply. The ceiling was glass or hard plastic, but either way it was see through and there was a scary person chasing you through the maze from up above. At the end of the maze right before we came out they were able to hang out of the ceiling and block our path. It was pretty neat.

*They also had a train car that was filled completely with fog. If I had put my hand in front of my face, I couldn't have seen it. We weren't able to feel our way around because they had white plastic mesh that led you away from the walls and into the middle of the train cart. It was seriously a task to find our way out of there. That was in the middle of the circus and on our drive home all of us could still smell the fog.

*Another train cart had blown up plastic paths that we had to squeeze our way through. It was all black except for the strobe lights and there were heads and bowling pins hanging from the ceiling. A clown came straight at us and the strobe lights made it look really neat. Then we were chased through the heads and the pins until we were finally able to escape.

*In between each set of train cars we went outside and into different locations. They had an awesome graveyard, swamp, a wrecked train cart with an escaped gorilla, a school bus of clowns and a few others that I can't remember. I loved going outside and inside and outside and inside.



*We saw where we were going as we walked into the last train cart. We walked onto train track, once we began walking down the path it became pitch black pretty quickly. All of the sudden a train was headed straight at us. A bright light, a horn, it was traveling fast. We all jumped out of the way and what do we see? A man dressed all in black with a fake light and horn. It was awesome all the same. It seemed so real. We really loved it and had a blast going through it together. Thanks Jordan & Vanessa for the fun night together!

Eastern State Penitentiary

This was the world's first true penitentiary, a prison designed to inspire penitence- or true regret - in the hearts of criminals. The original seven cellblocks spread like the spokes of a wheel, and had water and central heat before the White House.

It's vaulted, sky-lit cells held many of America's most notorious criminals, including bank robber "Slick Willie" Sutton and "Scarface" Al Capone.

The prison stands today in ruin, a haunting world of crumbling cellblocks and a surprising, eerie beauty.

(I took all of that off of a sign at the penitentiary.)

Friday night we went to the Eastern State Penitentiary for their "Terror Behind the Walls" event. "A Massive Haunted House in a Real Prison." It cost $30 to go inside but it was definitely worth it. The prison reminded me a lot of Alcatraz. It is open purely for tourists to walk through and it housed prisoners like Al Capone. But at Halloween times, it is haunted and amazing! If you look at the aerial view of the penitentiary, from the center you can see down every single row of cells. Very well designed I thought.

Before we even entered the penitentiary we were swarmed with creepy characters. They were seriously awesome. Their costumes and makeup were the best I have seen at a haunted house. And how many haunted houses have characters roaming the whole block?! They had so many characters entertaining us while walking to the penitentiary, purchasing our tickets and signing our waivers to go inside :0).




They have TV's all along the walkway into the penitentiary. So for as long as we were in line we were able to watch Ghost Adventures and Ghost Hunters both taking place at the penitentiary. Luckily for us, the line wasn't too long at all.


This is the creepy old man that showed us into the actual 'Terror Behind the Walls'.

A few things I don't want to forget about this haunted house. It was divided up into different sections so it went on forever, when we thought it was over - it wasn't. At first we started out in the courtyard. My favorite part of that was a HUGE mechanical dog that they had with a night watch person. It sat there growling and then when we walked past it got up and lept and you. And it was seriously HUGE! They had people around every corner. We walked through an old abandoned and totally creepy school bus. Then we went inside.

We went through the control tower, the infirmary (the doctor's office and the dentists office) and one of my favorite parts - we walked down a hallway of jail cells. There were prisoners that would reach at us and clank their handcuffs and some were actually like ghosts, able to move through the jail cell walls. CREEPY :0) It was awesome. We walked up the creepy stairs overlooking all the jail cells and then back down.

We went into a 3D section where they gave us 3D glasses and it was beyond amazing. People can blend in very well in the 3D section. They just wear black and paint their clothes like the walls. SO AWESOME!



Then we went into an area that was pitch black. They gave us little flash lights that didn't put off much light. But the only way we could see anything was with these flashlights. LOVED IT!!! It was doubly awesome as well. I turned my camera to video and just carried it in my hand so I didn't necessarily get very much but the pitch blackness. However, I just watched it and there is a portion near the end of the video where a wall almost falls on me. And instead of helping me - Kj just runs back - leaving me for dead :0/ Again, you can't see it - but you can hear us ;0)

The end was one of my favorite scenes ever. They had a couple different men in a room and one of them was telling us that this is what happens to bad prisoners. He pushed a button, and we saw someone get electrocuted. The person was tied to a wall so he wasn't standing on the ground but his body was upright. He was majorly electrocuted - limbs (arms, legs, head) flailing and everything. The lights were flickering and after the electrocution the body lept off the wall and came right at as. :0) SO FUN!!!! It was awesome! I hope I don't forget all the little scenes in between that made it so much fun. It really was a blast!

After the major terror portion we got to go down one of the hallways and look at the prisoner's cells and see what the penitentiary is like 'unspooked.' It was really awesome, and again reminded me tons of Alcatraz. Before we left they had one more scary scene for us to walk through in the courtyard. It involved us exiting and prisoners trying to escape with us. :0) We made it out - alive! And the prisoners fortunately enough were caught and remain at the penitentiary.



This video isn't one I took. It's just one I found on YouTube but I wanted to save it because when I watched it I remembered walking through the scenes that they show and I don't want to forget them :0)

Philadelphia

I just can't say no.

Someone invites me to vacation and I do everything in my power to make it happen.

It happened again.

Tabbi wanted to go to Philadelphia, invited me, and as soon as I made sure I could get the time-off, I bought my ticket. :0)

So - we took off Thursday night after work and flew to the Philadelphia International Airport.

It was a great day to leave because it snowed in Utah and weather in Philadelphia has been in the 80's. :0) SO NICE!!!!

Crossing Lake Michigan a little North of Chicago on the plane.

And then coming into Philly...