USA Trip 2012 - East Side!!
Oct. 10th, 2021 10:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
waitingmanDay... somethingorother... 2012 roadtrip
Oct. 9 Tuesday – Washington D.C. to Atlantic City
A little bit of travel fatigue is affecting both of us. We’re still really excited to be in this amazing huge country, but the little mechanics of checking in, unpacking, repacking, checking out, drive X hundred miles & repeat is starting to grate a bit after four weeks. It will be nice to get to New York, where we’ll be staying in the same place for a week, before it’s all over. I wonder if this is why musicians tend to go a bit crazy when they’re on tour? At least neither of us has turned to drugs or thrown a TV out a window... yet
As is becoming customary, we got ourselves lost in the big city, with absolutely no help from Jeeves Navman, trying to find our way down to the National Mall – a two mile strip that includes the WWII, Korean War, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt & Luther King Memorials, the Washington Monument, Capitol Building &, off to the left, the White House, which was another of those “I thought it would be bigger” moments
Not as white as it looked last night!!
Not as imposing during the day... still impressive though!
Still, it took us two & a half hours to wander most of it, then got ourselves lost again trying to drive over to the Jefferson Memorial, finding the Pentagon & Arlington Cemetery when all we were looking for was the correct turn-off!! By this time, we were more than a little hungry, so entrusted Jeeves with finding us a petrol station (which took two attempts), then the nearest Five Guys, Burger & Fries (half an hour & non-existent), before we gave up & headed for Baltimore, running on nothing more than a shared packet of bacon jerky
Once there, we had Jeeves look again for Five Guys etc... (two attempts & a non-existent location), then gave up & used Googlemaps & found it down by the harbour, along with a parking spot within ravenous, staggering distance. After inhaling a couple of cheeseburgers & way too many fries for a supposedly ‘small’ size, we went in search of Charm City Cakes, even though we knew you can’t go in without an appointment & since their TV show it would be rather difficult to arrange one in the month we’ve been here. A bit of ‘celebrity’-spotting when the front desk manager pulled up in a car carrying food & coffees, but otherwise there didn’t seem to be much going on. A couple of photos, including a cheesy one of Julia at their door & we were bound for Atlantic City, on the to-do list because of another TV show – Boardwalk Empire. We wanted to make sure we passed through Delaware on the way, just to bump up our visited-State number, but by combining Jeeves with Googlemaps, we ended up seeing quite a bit more of that small State than we thought we would, albeit in rainy weather & twilight
So over the Chesapeake & Delaware Rivers, onto more small highways & back roads, small towns & wrong turns... & eventually into Atlantic City some time after 8pm, then into the Rodeway Hotel somewhere near the Boardwalk, their advertisement claims, though in increasingly heavy rain & mist, it’s hard to tell. Nice to have a night in though & see what Americans watch on TV on a Tuesday night. Apparently they watch a video clip show called Dumbest Stuff on Wheels... so we did too. The clip of a skateboarder falling off a wall before he’d even started his jump, then the skateboard rolling down afterwards, had us both in stitches - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUUs5U5onfM ... & we wonder how the human race continues to thrive??
Hotel Room view...
Bright lights, big city...
Oct. 10 Wednesday – Atlantic City to Philadelphia
Well, the plan last night had been to stay in Atlantic City for two nights. But a couple of things have changed that – the less-than-clement weather & the poor quality of our accommodations. We were the only guests in the place last night, so you’d think the hotel owners would be at least trying to lift their game to attract travellers... but the bed was badly made-up with cigarette burns in the sheets, the room smelt musty & the burning dust when the air-con fired up only made that worse, there was a drainpipe outside the window that gushed rainwater run-off all night... Having a sparkly pebblecrete ceiling doesn’t exactly make up for poor room quality. Easily the worst room of the trip... Minus several million stars out of five
Rain or shine, one doesn’t come to Atlantic City & not go to the Boardwalk. With no rain & increasing shine, that’s what we did, after first driving all the way to the end of Atlantic Avenue to look back down the coast at this strange place that’s a mix of Las Vegas & Surfers Paradise. All the usual casino suspects are there – Trump, Bally, Tropicana, Caesar’s Palace, albeit in slightly smaller & a (tiny) bit toned down fashion. But you can still be ripped off here if you’re not careful. Looking for a late breakfast, we entered a bar that ‘served’ food. Having ordered hot wings, fried shrimp & a crab cake sandwich (burger), one of the bar staff disappeared out the door & returned fifteen minutes later with our meals in a plastic bag bearing the logo of the seafood shop on the other side of the Boardwalk. At least they took it out of the bag before they brought it over to us, along with two Diet Cokes. The food was passable, not great, so we ate quickly, eager to move on. When I got the bill, the food total was $50, with sales tax of about $3, then a $10 ‘Service Charge’ had been tacked on at the end, so our lunch had cost a grand total of $65 for something they hadn’t even cooked themselves. No tip for you!!
The Boardwalk itself is a wide promenade that goes for a few miles, most of which are now taken up by various casino fronts & their associated outlets. There was a wooden façade of old-time shops that are no more, including the ‘Boardwalk Empire' but, similar to how the place is now, there was nothing behind the façade. We did eventually find the saltwater taffy shop that had been on the Boardwalk since the 1920s, only now it’s inside the shopping arcade that’s attached to the Tropicana casino, between the t-shirt stand & the slot machines. Speaking of t-shirts, if there was one shop selling the usual bad jokes on black ones, sexist jokes (‘Cool story babe, now make me a sandwich’) on pink ones & the inevitable ‘... all I got was this lousy t-shirt’ in any colour you like, there were at least half a dozen of them, all selling the same things. The other notable industry is the pushcarts – a two-seater carriage that you pay someone to push along on foot, while you sit & prattle on about how things aren’t as good as they used to be... or something similarly insensitive. All the while a poor schmuck heaves you along however many blocks you’re too lazy to walk yourself. At least, that’s what seemed to be happening in the ones that passed us... & that wasn’t many – we could walk just as fast, if not faster than them
Not too sure about the Delicatessen being next door to the Living Infants humidicrib shop?!?
A few postcards from the Visitor’s Centre & it was time to get out of town. First though, we drove back down the avenue a bit, clear of the casinos & found a part of the Boardwalk that offered direct access to the beach & the breaking waves of the Atlantic Ocean. Shoes off & we paddled around as the wavelets soothed the agony of de feet. Now we can say we’ve truly crossed the country
Looking north
Looking south
Onto the expressway & a trip to Philadelphia that took about an hour & $8.75 total in tolls at three different collection points. When the first toll was only 75c, we suspected that might be too good to be true... the next, about ten miles on, was $3... the next, a further twenty miles or so, was $5. Before we could be charged any more, Philadelphia came into view & we exited to cross the Delaware River, for the second time, via the Benjamin Franklin Bridge & then a short drive to our Comfort Inn, with great views of the bridge if you have a room at the front, or of the traffic-filled access ramps if, like us, you have a room at the back
Love the curve in the bridge... how did they do that?!?
Nice room, but after last night anything would be an improvement. Priority one for us was a load of laundry, so armed with directions & a vague map from the hotel front desk, we set off on foot, garbage bag of dirty clothes in hand, point’n’shoot cameras in pockets. We soon discovered that our directions had been incomplete & the map didn’t have the street we actually needed printed on it. So back to the car & Jeeves found us an alternative wash house right in the middle of Philadelphia’s Chinatown. While the clothes washed, rinsed & dried, we had a look around the area, but one city’s Chinatown is really very much like another – same shops, same restaurants, same atmosphere... if you’ve seen the one in your city, you’ve seen everyone else’s too. One shopkeeper did recommend a nearby place as having good dumplings, so after we’d laundered, we set off in search of it. Two blocks & a couple of turns & we found the American cousin of our favourite dumpling house in Sydney – cheap decor, rough’n’ready service, but when the dumplings arrived, if we closed our eyes, we were back home... they were wonderful
Returning to the hotel, a couple of drinks were required in the bar & now bed...
Oct. 9 Tuesday – Washington D.C. to Atlantic City
A little bit of travel fatigue is affecting both of us. We’re still really excited to be in this amazing huge country, but the little mechanics of checking in, unpacking, repacking, checking out, drive X hundred miles & repeat is starting to grate a bit after four weeks. It will be nice to get to New York, where we’ll be staying in the same place for a week, before it’s all over. I wonder if this is why musicians tend to go a bit crazy when they’re on tour? At least neither of us has turned to drugs or thrown a TV out a window... yet
As is becoming customary, we got ourselves lost in the big city, with absolutely no help from Jeeves Navman, trying to find our way down to the National Mall – a two mile strip that includes the WWII, Korean War, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt & Luther King Memorials, the Washington Monument, Capitol Building &, off to the left, the White House, which was another of those “I thought it would be bigger” moments
Not as white as it looked last night!!
Not as imposing during the day... still impressive though!
Still, it took us two & a half hours to wander most of it, then got ourselves lost again trying to drive over to the Jefferson Memorial, finding the Pentagon & Arlington Cemetery when all we were looking for was the correct turn-off!! By this time, we were more than a little hungry, so entrusted Jeeves with finding us a petrol station (which took two attempts), then the nearest Five Guys, Burger & Fries (half an hour & non-existent), before we gave up & headed for Baltimore, running on nothing more than a shared packet of bacon jerky
Once there, we had Jeeves look again for Five Guys etc... (two attempts & a non-existent location), then gave up & used Googlemaps & found it down by the harbour, along with a parking spot within ravenous, staggering distance. After inhaling a couple of cheeseburgers & way too many fries for a supposedly ‘small’ size, we went in search of Charm City Cakes, even though we knew you can’t go in without an appointment & since their TV show it would be rather difficult to arrange one in the month we’ve been here. A bit of ‘celebrity’-spotting when the front desk manager pulled up in a car carrying food & coffees, but otherwise there didn’t seem to be much going on. A couple of photos, including a cheesy one of Julia at their door & we were bound for Atlantic City, on the to-do list because of another TV show – Boardwalk Empire. We wanted to make sure we passed through Delaware on the way, just to bump up our visited-State number, but by combining Jeeves with Googlemaps, we ended up seeing quite a bit more of that small State than we thought we would, albeit in rainy weather & twilight
So over the Chesapeake & Delaware Rivers, onto more small highways & back roads, small towns & wrong turns... & eventually into Atlantic City some time after 8pm, then into the Rodeway Hotel somewhere near the Boardwalk, their advertisement claims, though in increasingly heavy rain & mist, it’s hard to tell. Nice to have a night in though & see what Americans watch on TV on a Tuesday night. Apparently they watch a video clip show called Dumbest Stuff on Wheels... so we did too. The clip of a skateboarder falling off a wall before he’d even started his jump, then the skateboard rolling down afterwards, had us both in stitches - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUUs5U5onfM ... & we wonder how the human race continues to thrive??
Hotel Room view...
Bright lights, big city...
Oct. 10 Wednesday – Atlantic City to Philadelphia
Well, the plan last night had been to stay in Atlantic City for two nights. But a couple of things have changed that – the less-than-clement weather & the poor quality of our accommodations. We were the only guests in the place last night, so you’d think the hotel owners would be at least trying to lift their game to attract travellers... but the bed was badly made-up with cigarette burns in the sheets, the room smelt musty & the burning dust when the air-con fired up only made that worse, there was a drainpipe outside the window that gushed rainwater run-off all night... Having a sparkly pebblecrete ceiling doesn’t exactly make up for poor room quality. Easily the worst room of the trip... Minus several million stars out of five
Rain or shine, one doesn’t come to Atlantic City & not go to the Boardwalk. With no rain & increasing shine, that’s what we did, after first driving all the way to the end of Atlantic Avenue to look back down the coast at this strange place that’s a mix of Las Vegas & Surfers Paradise. All the usual casino suspects are there – Trump, Bally, Tropicana, Caesar’s Palace, albeit in slightly smaller & a (tiny) bit toned down fashion. But you can still be ripped off here if you’re not careful. Looking for a late breakfast, we entered a bar that ‘served’ food. Having ordered hot wings, fried shrimp & a crab cake sandwich (burger), one of the bar staff disappeared out the door & returned fifteen minutes later with our meals in a plastic bag bearing the logo of the seafood shop on the other side of the Boardwalk. At least they took it out of the bag before they brought it over to us, along with two Diet Cokes. The food was passable, not great, so we ate quickly, eager to move on. When I got the bill, the food total was $50, with sales tax of about $3, then a $10 ‘Service Charge’ had been tacked on at the end, so our lunch had cost a grand total of $65 for something they hadn’t even cooked themselves. No tip for you!!
The Boardwalk itself is a wide promenade that goes for a few miles, most of which are now taken up by various casino fronts & their associated outlets. There was a wooden façade of old-time shops that are no more, including the ‘Boardwalk Empire' but, similar to how the place is now, there was nothing behind the façade. We did eventually find the saltwater taffy shop that had been on the Boardwalk since the 1920s, only now it’s inside the shopping arcade that’s attached to the Tropicana casino, between the t-shirt stand & the slot machines. Speaking of t-shirts, if there was one shop selling the usual bad jokes on black ones, sexist jokes (‘Cool story babe, now make me a sandwich’) on pink ones & the inevitable ‘... all I got was this lousy t-shirt’ in any colour you like, there were at least half a dozen of them, all selling the same things. The other notable industry is the pushcarts – a two-seater carriage that you pay someone to push along on foot, while you sit & prattle on about how things aren’t as good as they used to be... or something similarly insensitive. All the while a poor schmuck heaves you along however many blocks you’re too lazy to walk yourself. At least, that’s what seemed to be happening in the ones that passed us... & that wasn’t many – we could walk just as fast, if not faster than them
Not too sure about the Delicatessen being next door to the Living Infants humidicrib shop?!?
A few postcards from the Visitor’s Centre & it was time to get out of town. First though, we drove back down the avenue a bit, clear of the casinos & found a part of the Boardwalk that offered direct access to the beach & the breaking waves of the Atlantic Ocean. Shoes off & we paddled around as the wavelets soothed the agony of de feet. Now we can say we’ve truly crossed the country
Looking north
Looking south
Onto the expressway & a trip to Philadelphia that took about an hour & $8.75 total in tolls at three different collection points. When the first toll was only 75c, we suspected that might be too good to be true... the next, about ten miles on, was $3... the next, a further twenty miles or so, was $5. Before we could be charged any more, Philadelphia came into view & we exited to cross the Delaware River, for the second time, via the Benjamin Franklin Bridge & then a short drive to our Comfort Inn, with great views of the bridge if you have a room at the front, or of the traffic-filled access ramps if, like us, you have a room at the back
Love the curve in the bridge... how did they do that?!?
Nice room, but after last night anything would be an improvement. Priority one for us was a load of laundry, so armed with directions & a vague map from the hotel front desk, we set off on foot, garbage bag of dirty clothes in hand, point’n’shoot cameras in pockets. We soon discovered that our directions had been incomplete & the map didn’t have the street we actually needed printed on it. So back to the car & Jeeves found us an alternative wash house right in the middle of Philadelphia’s Chinatown. While the clothes washed, rinsed & dried, we had a look around the area, but one city’s Chinatown is really very much like another – same shops, same restaurants, same atmosphere... if you’ve seen the one in your city, you’ve seen everyone else’s too. One shopkeeper did recommend a nearby place as having good dumplings, so after we’d laundered, we set off in search of it. Two blocks & a couple of turns & we found the American cousin of our favourite dumpling house in Sydney – cheap decor, rough’n’ready service, but when the dumplings arrived, if we closed our eyes, we were back home... they were wonderful
Returning to the hotel, a couple of drinks were required in the bar & now bed...
