PHILADELPHIA FREEDOM

My road trip encompassed Boston, NYC and Philadelphia.
It almost lasted longer than planned but I escaped the streets and skies of Philadelphia.

Home in Port Charlotte
63*

I’ve completed my first trip to the Northeast Territory and it wasn’t bad. The weather in Boston was surprisingly mild, in the mid 50’s all day. From there it just got colder all week. NJ/NY featured 46 degrees at 5AM wakeup and it just got colder all day. I must say I enjoyed seeing the Manhattan skyline for the first time since I was 18 years old. Lady Liberty was inspiring. Driving around New Jersey was a pain in the ass.

My coworkers and I decided to head for lunch at 12:15; to a Subway sandwich shop nearby. Imagine my surprise when, not only was there no bathroom to wash up, there were no tables and chairs in the restaurant. I’m not saying none were available. I’m saying the restaurant had NO SEATING! What’s with that? We went next door to a Chinese place to find the same arrangements. We punched Subway into the GPS and found there was another one 2.6 miles away. The streets are stacked on top of each other so you can’t exactly make u-turns. We spent over an hour travelling that 2.6 miles, with the aid of a GPS. Unreal.

The drive from NJ to PA was uneventful, albeit, 2 hours. The hotel in PA was in a town called Phoenixville, a largely Irish settlement with a great pub called Molly Maguire’s. I enjoyed a couple of Guinness brews and a seafood medley linguine.

Friday morning I worked in the Philadelphia area and it was windy, rainy and cold, with temps in upper 30s. The rain cancelled most of the work crews so after doing an office audit and seeing the one crew on the road I headed to the airport to catch an earlier flight home. It’s a good thing I did or I may have not made it home. The weather was turning worse as the day wore on.

My original flight was set to depart Philly for Tampa at 550PM. I found a nonstop departing at 135PM and grabbed a standby pass. By the time I cleared security the 135PM had been delayed to 305PM. After reaching the gate it had been pushed back to 520PM and my original flight had been cancelled. While standing at the gate I overheard an announcement that a flight was boarding to Fort Myers. I quickly asked if I could get on that flight and grabbed the last available seat! I was freee from Philadelphia. My truck will remain in Tampa but hell, I’m flying back out on Sunday anyway.

I called my bride and she was happy to pick me up in Fort Myers, an hour from home. We had dinner together and are enjoying a nice evening at home, listening to Sirius radio.

Up next: Sunday afternoon flight to Norfolk for a 5 day trip across Virginia.