TRENTON, NJ & PHILADELPHIA, PA

TRENTON, NJ & PHILADELPHIA, PA

26 May - 2 Jun

The first time we had to change campgrounds, day trip to the City of Brotherly Love and Trenton baseball.

When stopping at a rest stop in New Jersey, we saw something that we never saw before. In NJ its against the law to leave your vehicle idling. There was a device that fits into the truck drivers window that allows the drive to hook up to heater, a/c, internet, TV and electricity.

We arrived at McGuire AFB in Wrightstown, NJ in the evening. After a quick look around the campground, we knew we could not spend another day there. No showers, no bathroom, no laundry, noway we are staying. We opened our Passport America book looking for a campground close to where we are, so we can still see and do everything we wanted to do. We found one at Timberland Lake Campground.

We headed to Philadelphia to visit Independence Hall. We visited here before we became full time RV’ers and did not have our National Park Stamp book.  This trip was to get the stamp, see and do stuff we did not do last time.  First, we got our free pass to tour Independence Hall. The ticket was for the 2:30pm tour, we still had all day to see the city before we had to be at the Hall’s entrance. We headed to the Liberty Bell and had to wait in the security line behind all the school kids on a tour. We walked to Ben Franklin’s grave. There is a $2 fee to enter, but his grave is along the fence line so I just took a picture from the street.  We shared a Philly Cheese Steak from a food cart for lunch. Lastly, we entered Independence Hall for our 2:30pm tour. As we left Philly, we hit rush hour that included the highway that was under construction made the drive out dreadful.

To give Hiromi a day to herself I went to Trenton, NJ to see the Trenton Thunder (Yankees AA) baseball game. I arrived pretty early, so I had time to walk around the outside of the stadium looking for practice homerun ball that might have left the stadium. Later, I found out that because it was a day game there was no batting practice today.  I got my usually goods of team set and mini bat from the teams store, along with a picture of me and the field. As the game started and the warmup tosses ended the balls returned to the dugout where the coach threw the ball into the stands. I caught the first inning ball, but the little girl standing next to me looked sad that I caught it, so I gave it to her. It was worth it to see the smile on her face after I gave her the ball. I was then determent to get another ball, this time for myself. As the visiting team Portland Sea Dogs (Red Sox AA) recorded the last out in the 7^th inning and returned to the dugout the shortstop threw the ball to me. This one I kept as it was a gamed used ball and added an Eastern League ball to my collection.  

Our last day in NJ and it was a cloudy, overcast and rainy all day, but we still had one more place on our list to visit. We made our way to downtown Trenton to se the Capitol Building. We could not just walk in the Capitol Building we had to be on a tour. This was something we have not experienced in the other Capitol Building we have visited. A group of elementary students came in and we were told to join the group. We saw everything we wanted. The Governor’s Office (Secretary desk and door to the office), and the speakers hall. As we left we took a picture of the dome of the Capitol Building. We had to walk around the building to try and get a good shot. There are lots of trees surround the build and very little room for a good view of the gold dome.

WHAT'S NEXT?
The big apple, NYC.