Daddy-Daughter Trip - Day 4

Today we started off the morning with very tasty french toast at the KOA Kitchen. We had to get up really early to go to the wonderful city of Philadelphia because Daddy wanted to beat the crowds. So we were on our way!! We arrived in Philadelphia (it took an hour) and got tickets to visit Independence Hall. A nice tour guide named Larry showed us around inside the building where the delegates signed the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. We worked on our Junior Ranger, too. There were people on the tour from Australia and Switzerland! Afterwards, we decided to take a carriage ride through the city with Kim and her horse, Omar. She showed us around town and we got to feed Omar a carrot! It started to rain a bunch, but we brought our rain ponchos (the ones from Sea World and Disney's Animal Kingdom). We walked over to Benjamin Franklin's house and he was there! We got to talk to him and he told us a story about when he was a little boy. He told us to look around in his museum and print shop, so we did. His house isn't there any more (there is a frame that shows what it looks like). It was really pouring, so we decided to have Philly Cheese Steaks for lunch at a place called "Sonny's." It was really good. Then, we walked over to the Betsy Ross House. There were some funny people in front who took us back to the time of the Revolution by waving their hands and making a funny noise. We took an audio tour of her house. She was inside! She showed us how to make a five pointed star for the flag she was working on and she called us "thee" when she talked. We bought some good souvenirs, too. Later, we went back to Ben Franklin's print shop and learned how to print things. We finished our Junior Ranger and, here is the very exciting part, went to the Independence Visitor Center and got our pins! We were walking on the street when we saw some people filming a show called "Cold Case." We think we might end up being in Episode 2 this season (how cool is that?). A lady from the show talked to us! We walked along the Delaware for a little bit and we found an Irish Memorial. We walked back into town for gelato (Brenna got pistacio, Erin got tiaramissu and Daddy got strawberry) and bought a few more souvenirs before leaving. It was really rainy all day and there was a lot of construction on the interstate. The detour ended up taking us by the ball field where the Phillies play - and there were people at the game (they must have been really wet!!!). On the way back to camp, we stopped at Valley Forge and drove around. Valley Forge is where George Washington and his soldiers stayed during a cold winter. There were tons of deer there (more than 20!) and we got to call on Daddy's phone to listen to an audio tour. Daddy found a place where he went to camp back when he was in high school [Freedoms Foundation (see APR 1985)] and we stopped to eat at Bob Evans for dinner (yum yum!). When we arrived at the campground, we learned that there had been a big hail storm and lots of flooding while we were gone. Our tent was OK, though, and we told spooky stories and went to bed.