city of brotherly love.

it was friday, february 17th. we awoke, lazily in NYC only to check-out of our amazing hotel, head to the train station to continue on our journey. so we go to the amtrak kiosk to check-in and get our train tickets, but for some reason it wasn't reading our confirmation scan correctly. so we headed over to the ticket window. well, it turns out that our tickets were for the wrong date. how the hell did that happen?! ok, ok, so let me shock you to your core right now...i am not perfect. i planned and planned and planned a multi-city road trip. this was my only mistake.
it turned out not being a big deal at all. other than us leaving on a train 45 minutes later than the one i bought tickets for 2 days prior, plus we got to pay for the tickets again. that was fun.
so while we waited we thought lunch might be a good idea.

we said our goodbyes to NYC and hello philadelphia!! in a very quick 1 1/2 hour trip. it was awesome! no 10+ hour train trip here. it was sooo great. once we got to philly, we felt confident in utilizing their subway system to get to our hotel. well, i don't know if you've ever been to philly, but philadelphians aren't the most friendly of people. plus the subway system was stupid. and overwhelming. we couldn't find a kiosk to buy tickets. and the ticket window line was super long. so we said screw and headed out to find a cab. well, guess what? we walked outside and there were just cabs waiting to take us to our destination. perfect! we arrived to our hotel in a quick 25 minutes during rush hour traffic on a friday afternoon.

we stayed at aka hotel in rittenhouse square. when we got there, the doorman helped us with our bags. and of course held the door for us. we were immediately treated like royalty. and i felt like they knew who we were before we even checked in. this hotel also commented about us being on our honeymoon. while we checked-in at the front desk, another man took our bags to our room. whhhaaaaattt?
we arrived to our room, on the 12th room, which was as high as we could go, other than the penthouse. and we were greeted with roses, wine and a cheese plate! i thought "wow! what a hotel!" there was a note in the flowers. keith said, "read it." i was just like...ohhh they even left us a note. turns out it was a note from my husband. he had contacted the hotel prior to our trip and set all of this up. that sweet, sweet man. ♥ :)
i was completely blown away. he never ceases to amaze me. in nothing but wonderful ways.

view from the top.

we weren't really sure what to do with our afternoon. we had plans to meet my oldest friend carly and her husband, sean for dinner. we had a couple of hours to kill. so we were like "should we nap? shower? sight see? go get a drink?"
we decided to get cleaned up then head over to the restaurant, good dog, a little early and grab a drink while we waited for carly and sean. the bar was right up our alley. laid back. good beer, with even better food. and it was wonderful to catch up with carly, 10 years later. and of course, to finally meet sean. :)
plus, they helped us figure out the subway. you don't get tickets. you use tokens. yeah, you give your money in exchange for a token. i told you it was stupid.

saturday, february 18th. this was the day of hockey game #4. pittsburgh v. philadelphia. plus it was a day game. puck dropped at 1pm.
the flyers play at the wells fargo center. which is part of the bank owned stadium complex that also includes the eagles stadium and the phillies stadium.

citizens bank park

lincoln financial field

wells fargo center felt the most like what is now known as the PNC arena. the atmosphere was great in that the fans were into the game. they were loud. they like to cheer, boo and curse...A LOT. we noticed that the fans were either really nice or complete assholes. there was no middle ground with the philly fans. they even booed the youth hockey league that played during intermission. i mean, really?
this was the 2nd best game. the first two periods were great. it was competitive and the score couldn't have been any closer. philly just fell apart in the 3rd period and pittsburgh just ran away with it. FINAL: PIT: 6 PHI: 4

Game 4: PIT v. PHI

yay! more hockey!

it was tied after 2 periods. TIED.

the view from our seats.

FINAL score. what happened PHI?!

the view of dt philly from the arena.

since it was a day game, it kind of ruined any touristy stuff we wanted to do. however, we managed to walk over to south street for a cheesesteak, a philly must have! and on our walk we saw some of the historic row houses. we then walked over to independence hall. we also saw the liberty bell and the first president's house.

the bell-o-liberty.

independence hall

our trip to philly felt even quicker than new york. before we knew it we were getting ready to leave again. this time it was the end. we were leaving to come back home. sweet. home.

xoxo,
ks