a train, a river, two mueums, and a several parks.

Today Angel, Darrell and I went to Philly to do a Volkssport walk, and two museums. I don't know about them but my feet hurt. The tween decided to go to Grandmas. Clearly we aren't fun.

Angel picked me up about 8. Darrell double parked the car and Angel came to the door while he waited outside. I came out and they switched seats. I was about to get in the car and it started rolling down the hill. Thankfully, Angel was in full control. Darrell left it in drive, so when she took off the emergency brake, it rolled. Being fat, sometimes, pays off. I did not go crashing to the ground.

We arrived in Philly in one piece and started looking for parking lots. They are hidden. We found a space at a meter in front of Drexel. There was a sign saying no parking 10-9. It's the 11th so we parked. Then I put my card into the meter kisok, and it returned it. Free parking day. This trip was looking up.

We walked to check in at 30th street station. I opened the door to the restaurant and the clerk said, "I'm sorry we aren't open". Say what? Thinking on my feet my reply was, "we came for the Volkssport box". She left us in!

 (The story of Noah in cunniform. It was about 6 point type.)

And then we were off. The route headed down 30th street to the Penn Athletic fields, and around by Franklin Field. We arrived at our first stop: The Penn Museum. I wanted to see the Sacred Writing exhibit. (We planned on buying a combo ticket--saving $6 each--for Penn and the Mütter Museum. ) The clerk asks if any of us are teachers. I said yes. I got in FREE! After a rough start, this day was looking up. But I did have to pay full price at Mütter.

 Illustrate Bible

The exhibit was a lot smaller than I thought it would be. But the pieces were exquisite.

Qu'ran

Many faiths were covered including a Rabbinical Bible and a Qu'ran.  There was also one in 6 different languages. I should have had Angel take a pix of that one. (She took all the photos.) Afterwards, we went to ancient Egypt and saw hieroglyphics, mummies and the Book of the Dead on papyrus. Then it was off to Rome, Italy, and Iraq. Then we had enough of the past for one day. It was beginning to get repetitive—pots, jewelry, busts, coffins.

We left the museum and picked up the route. We crossed a bridge, and headed down the stairs to the boardwalk. I'm pretty sure we walked this route on the 3-Day. At the end of the boardwalk we crossed the pedestrian bridge and headed into another park. Then into a neighborhood of row houses that were quite nice and certainly yuppy-fied.

At 22nd street we broke off the volkssport route to go to the Mütter Museum. From the the website: "America’s finest museum of medical history, the Mütter Museum displays its beautifully preserved collections of anatomical specimens, models, and medical instruments in a 19th-century “cabinet museum” setting. The museum helps the public understand the mysteries and beauty of the human body and to appreciate the history of diagnosis and treatment of disease.

Bonnie would have loved this place. I knew it would be a place Angel and Darrel would enjoy, and they did. I get a little grossed out by things floating in formaldehyde. And dead things. The skulls were really cool. They were all written on in a beautiful script.

I enjoyed the surgical instruments, and the Civil War exhibit. And of course the Vesalius On The Verge: The Book and The Body exhibit. The soap lady was 1000% gross.

The main galleries were a very old fashioned museum with rows of cabinets. And maybe because I had walked there, it was very warm. Too see anything, it was a process of weaving in and out of people. Especially if you wanted to get up close. The man with the unicorn horn was worth the jostling.

I was kind-of shocked it was packed. Maybe weekends aren't the best time to go. We even ran into a class touring. The guard did make us take off our backpacks and put them in a locker. I put in the quarter and one fell out! Woo-hoo.

Somehow -- thank god --I missed the dissected and flayed rats. I might have had to run to the rest room.

We came out of the museum and would have had to backtrack to pick up the route. We were about 5 blocks from the car and had already walked more than 5 miles. Plus another mile and a half or so in museums. We chose the car and googled the check point answer. (Three)

We arrived back at the car, and headed out. On the Expressway Angel couldn't figure out why Map My Walk ate her map. She was pissed. Then she figured it out. She never turned off the walk. It was still mapping us. We covered 23 miles in 3.5 hours. Damn, we're good.