Lancaster County and Philadelphia

27.8.2010 by Inken.

We have to add the following states to our count:

New Jersey - Garden State

Pennsylvania - Keystone State

So we are up to 15 now.

Because heavy rains approached New York City, we changed our plans and started a day earlier in the direction of Philadelphia.

After leaving the island of Manhattan we quickly reached New Jersey, the Garden State. It didn’t look like a garden at all, but somewhere around here our container and my little Gizmo were/are waiting for their ships…

Schau, Florence, sogar hier kennen sie Dich!

We made use of the time we didn’t spend in NYC by visiting Lancaster County, a stronghold of the Amish People. This certainly means that it is mostly farm land. We saw green fields (mostly corn), well maintained farms, very neat and German looking…

 

We tried to get dinner, but as always when we are in a rather orthodox religious area, it was Sunday, and even the Stoltzfuses wouldn’t open for us on Sunday…

Hungry like bears we proceeded to Intercourse, which is named after a crossing of important roads, not after what YOU might think. The only shop that was open would only sell us canned veggies. Well, no luck here either.

So we decided that we could just as well drive on to Philadelphia.

Gap Diner was closed, too, but maybe they would have opened for Gudrun?

For those who never stayed in an American motel: this is an average room.

Philly welcomed us with great weather and a beautiful, light blue bridge, named after Benjamin Franklin.

  

And what would you eat in Philly? Especially when you are REALLY hungry? Right! A Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich. This is basically a white bread role, which could well serve as dish washing sponge. This white sponge is filled with thinly sliced steak and a hot, cheesy sauce. Some take it with onions, which adds at least some taste, some like peppers, but this is absolutely depending on ones personal taste. Yeah, talking about taste… Almost everything tastes well when you’re hungry…

There are two places competing for the best Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich “in the world”. And it comes in handy, that Pat’s and Gino’s are just across the street. We certainly made the test.

Pat’s Steaks:

Well lit

Clearly understandable instructions

Friendly chefs

Excellent fries and clean tables

And definitely an impressive list of VIP customers…

 

Gino’s Steaks

Also well lit

Friendly chefs too, but what is it with the attitude? Do they have a problem with non-English-speaking people? A sign at the order window read “If you can read, thank your teacher. If you can read English, thank a Marine”. I do not like that, I must say! What if I not able speaking English properly? They no feed me? Or they shoot me? Or grill me? Or grill me first and teach me English later?

 

However, we continued our “meal” and besides all political reservation we tried to stay neutral.

But we agreed immediately. Did Pat’s sandwich taste like a whole lot of nothingness, Gino’s  sandwich tasted like even more nothingness. Both managed to burn my mouth with the sizzling hot cheese sauce. But this was rather sensed as grace than as a hurtful loss. Pat is the winner, clearly.

However, located exactly between the two “restaurants” is a bar, we definitely can recommend, the Gin and Tonic is excellent and helps digesting the cheese-steak-sponge…

The next day was designated to the Declaration of Independence and its most important sites. Philadelphia greeted us with wonderful sunshine and blue sky. We headed directly for the Independence Park and stood in line for a free tour of the Independence Hall.

 

We were led into a room by a tour guide who gave us instructions including everything but the command to breath in and out regularly. If this guy will ever change his career, his choice should be Drill Seargent for the Marines…

Our tour included three rooms and a stairway. The rooms are up to 80% original, or so our Drill Seargent told us. We were not told what happened to the other 20%.

In these rooms the basis for an independent Union of American States was drafted. There was a lot of fighting and arguing, and the 13 states involved were anything else but ready to agree on a common wording. Only when Thomas Jefferson was assigned to take over the hard job, he succeeded to find the words, everybody would agree to. It wasn’t on the 4th of July, by the way, it was a little later…

   

The next stop would have been the Freedom Bell, which is housed in this building.

The wait would have been quite long, another security check would have been necessary, and to be honest, we were a little overdosed on national pride. We are just not used to it… So we skipped the bell and walked down to Penn’s Landing through the beautiful old city of Pennsylvania. 

Surprise, surprise, we were hungry again…

Where is our Sushi?!?

Here it is!

Oh, by the way, Benjamin Franklin had more than one job. He was not only one of the founding fathers of the USA and a gifted inventor, printer and political theorist, he was also the first American Postmaster General, a real homo universalis, as we miss them in today’s politics.

All in all I must say, Philadelphia is definitely worth visiting. But even if the meaning of this city and its importance in the revolutionary process are understandable and appropriate. It reminded me of a basic problem I have with the way, how within this whole bubble of national pride some people seem to forget to look outside their own country. It just doesn’t completely open up to me, why everything connected with this topic has to be so blown up, huge, shiny and constantly present. I certainly understand, why the Declaration of Independence was and is so crucial for the USA. But I also can’t help the feeling that many US citizens can’t even imagine that there are other countries in this world, who fought for their independence and reached a decent democratic status without having to stress that point at any given time. Well, I guess my own history and those of my two mother countries tought me that overboarding national pride can also lead into desaster. And my understanding of history is based on European history, which holds a huge number of examples to prove me right. I think I just have to learn to live with it.

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New York City - my personal Favorite…

26.8.2010 by Inken.

Being 1/4 German means that I like things to be in order. So let’s start with a count.

States in the US visited so far (and their nicknames used on the license plates):

Connecticut - Constitution State 

Massachusetts - Bay State

Maine - Vacationland

New Hampshire - Granite State (the license plate show “live free or die” though…)

Rhode Island - Ocean State

New York - Empire State

Louisiana - I prefer “Pelican State”, although the license plates show “Sportsman’s Paradise”

Illinois - Land of Lincoln

Florida - Sunshine State

Utah - Beehive State

California - Golden State

Arizona - Grand Canyon State

Nevada - Silver State

(See a complete list of the States nicknames at: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Spitznamen_der_Bundesstaaten_der_Vereinigten_Staaten in German and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._state_nicknames in English)

13 aren’t bad for three years, ey?

Now the count will be continued on our roadtrip from coast to coast.

After visiting the MTU boat crew at the dragonboat race down in Hartford, we took off to spend our first night of the  vacation in New York City.

On our way there we passed a mammoth tree, which is actually an antenna mast.

I often complain about how the Americans manage to mutilate their landscape with huge malls, Dunkin Donuts, etc. But this is a bright idea to turn something inevitable into something, well, pretty.

We entered Manhattan over the Triboro Bridge with quite a view this time.

We even had a room with a view!

Because this was not our first visit to NYC, the following pictures won’t show the tourist hot spots, but rather images of things and buildings, I love, no matter how important they are for the city’s image. So don’t be disappointed. Rather take this as an invitation to see the rest yourself one day.

 

Staying in a hotel in the Financial District made it easy for us to walk down to Battery Park to board one of those double decker busses, which would carry us through Manhattan for a lot of money. But this was money well spent, because being on a bus keeps me from going into shops…

Show this picture to your kids and tell them, it was 95°F and humid that day. I bet they will be thankful that you send them back to school…

 

So we drove through the Financial District…

  

passed Pier 17 and the South Street Seaport, …

Had a short photo stop to take a picture of the Manhattan Bridge.

Chinatown followed. And we saw the Lower Eastside, where you definitely don’t want to live.

Crossing Houston Street along 1st Avenue we entered the East Village. And this is a totally different world. Here you can still feel the melting pot atmosphere New York is said to have. All kinds of alternative livestyles are found and accepted here. But the yuppies already found out about it and start to occupy this part of the city.

He will probably have to retire when his building is taken over by a real estate corporation.

See what I mean?

 

Katz’s Deli is the place where Sally proofed to Harry that he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between a real and a fake orgasm.

This is for the girls, they know, whom I mean…

Should have taken a note of the address!

Following 1st Avenue to the North one passes Stuyvesant Town. Planned and built in the 1940s for returning veterans it also housed those families, who lived in the area before. See www.wikipedia.org and search for Stuyvesant Town—Peter Cooper Village.

Before the bus then headed towards 5th Avenue, it passed the big Medical Centers along the East River and the United Nations.

The favorite steakhouse of various Presidents.

It was time for a coffee break. So we got off the bus around the corner of the Rockefeller Center.

This is not the Rockefeller Center, but some mean looking skyscraper.

 

I just can’t stop taking pictures of the NYC taxis…

The Plaza.

Beyonce lives in one of these towers.

Times Square, one of the messiest, most stuffed and crowded places. I was glad that I was on the bus again.

Our tour guide, heavy NY accent, lovely!!!

For Dunia, the Target-ista.

We entered the Garment District. At Parsons this ridiculous fashion show is produced, you know the one in which Heidi tells designers, if they are talented or not…

   

More than any other building in New York City the Flatiron Building conquered my heart. Considered ugly when it was built it became an icon of Manhattan. If you take a closer look at the facade details you just cant help but loving it.

Through Greenwich Village and SoHo we went further South.

        

And then we were back at the former infamous Five Points and it was almost time for dinner.

The Bridge Cafe is a former brothel. The owner said, the “ladies” perfumed themselves and their rooms with so much lavender that it still smells like it in the upper floor.

The food was fine, we were tired, and so the night ended early for Manhattan standards…

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