A POSTCARD FROM PHILADELPHIA
HAPPY NEW YEAR to you, my dear followers. Thank you so very much for another year of following along with me in the blogosphere. You mean the world to me and I thank you very much for your support. I hope you enjoyed a wonderful holiday season. Once again I went to the east coast for the holidays. This time we began our holiday with a visit to Philadelphia. So today I’m bringing you a postcard from Philadelphia. I hope you don’t mind a belated dose of holiday spirit and, I’m warning you, a very long post.
Our Philly dwelling son and his girlfriend planned a wonderful 3 days chock full of all the holiday sights and delights that abound in the City of Brotherly Love & Amor. They prepared an itinerary that I’m sure included every possible thing to do, see and eat in a city where…
even the friendly police dogs were dressed for the season.
The good news is that despite all the wonderful food and drink we consumed during our visit, we also got lots and lots of exercise doing things like climbing the “Rocky Steps” at night.
These iconic steps are the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, immortalized by Sylvester Stallone’s triumphant run in the film “Rocky.”
At the top of the steps we were rewarded with a beautiful view of the city and a lovely lighted tree.
When not plying the streets on foot and trying to keep up with our fast paced 20 somethings, we made the obligatory drive down “Miracle on 13th Street” where every resident of the 1600 block of South 13th Street had gotten a dose of the Griswold’s decorating fever.
Next stop: The Christmas Light Show and Wanamaker Organ Concert at Macy’s. It’s a holiday tradition in Philadelphia that dates back more than half a century.
The beautiful Center City store is housed in the historic Wanamaker Building. You can just make out the Wanamaker Organ at the bottom of the photo below.
During the show visitors to Macy’s watch snowflakes, ballerinas and reindeer float across 4 full stories of the impressive building.
They watch the light show from the Grand Court atrium below.
More than 100,000 LED lights combine to create whimsical holiday images. The finale of the light show is accompanied by music performed live on the Wanamaker Grand Organ.
The Magic Christmas Tree seen during the show is made up of approximately 34,500 LED lights in six different colors.
And as if this weren’t enough holiday cheer, Macy’s also features another children’s fantasy land where Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” comes to life inside Macy’s 6,000-square-foot, walk-through experience.
The display uses animatronic characters from the classic story to transport visitors back to London in the 1840s.
Also not to be missed are Macy’s holiday windows that were all dressed up for the season.
This year Macy’s windows celebrated the 50th anniversary of “A Charlie Brown Christmas”.
Leaving Macy’s we headed over to the Comcast Center…
where gigantic screens broadcast The Comcast Holiday Spectacular.
Visitors gather in front of the 2,100 square-foot Comcast Experience video wall, one of the world’s highest resolution LED displays, to catch the holiday magic that dances across wall.
The 15 minute show includes a conductor who orchestrates holiday music…
scenes from The Nutcracker Ballet as performed by the Philadelphia Ballet Company…
high stepping holiday swing dancers doing the Jingle Bell Rock…
and carolers singing from rooftops in the snow.
After all that holiday cheer it was time for happy hour at the White Dog Cafe, a favorite watering hole of my son and his girlfriend, Ann, who both attend UPenn.
Here they serve up dogs of every description along with delicious and creative $5.00 signature cocktails, craft beers and gourmet cheese platters.
The friendly bartender told me that despite their college campus proximity, he doesn’t actually get a lot of student patrons. He said the Ivy League crowd is too busy studying to spend much time drinking. WOW! What an anomaly. College students who don’t drink. That was music to my ears, despite the fact that I was buying UPenn students drinks! But hey, it was Christmas.
Afterward we walked through the lovely campus at dusk…
and visited the new medical school where Ann is studying to be a Pediatrician. Nice place to be a student wouldn’t you say?
The next day we took a walk around the city, first stop: The Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter & Paul.
This is where the Pope recently visited during his stay in Philadelphia.
I have seen so many impressive cathedrals in my European travels and was surprised to find that this beautiful cathedral rivals many I’ve seen abroad.
Continuing our walk in the rain we we’re tempted to catch a ride on one of these horse drawn carriages.
Instead we ducked inside the impressive City Hall which is the largest municipal building in the United States, containing over 14.5 acres of floor space. It is an architectural treasure inside and out.
Flanked by these beautiful iron gates, one enters the very stately opulence of the inner courtyard.
Well folks, I’ve already rambled on far too long so I’ll say goodbye for now. Our whirlwind trip to Philly was so chock full of fun experiences that I’ll share more of our trip with you soon. It included a visit to the amazing Italian Market which is actually several streets of wonderful shops full of wonderful things to eat…
and a visit to Reading Terminal Market where we ate Pork Sandwiches at Dinic’s…
and a visit to the legendary Italian Bakery, Termini Bros., where we got a tour of the kitchen, met the owner and ate Cannolis…
and I will take you along for a famous Philly Cheesesteak.
Last but not least, after all that good food, we did visit the Liberty Bell too!
So there you have it: A POSTCARD FROM PHILADELPHIA
You might also like my prior post: “A FOUR DAY VISIT TO PHILLY”.
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All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Unless otherwise credited, all photos are the original property of Celia Becker @ www.AfterOrangeCounty.com and may not be reproduced without specific permission.
