As a New Yorker who lived in Philadelphia and is now a Bostonian, I strongly urge you to spend extra time in Philadelphia. I don’t know your preferences, but it surely’s received a number of the finest museums, out of doors actions, water actions, historic websites, and quirky actions round. Some private favorites:
1. The Franklin Institute – not fairly as good because it was once, however nonetheless one of many two finest science museums (I’ve been to >40; the opposite one is the Ontario Science Middle in Toronto).
2. Penns Touchdown – parkland on waterways, historic ship excursions, maritime museum
3. Franklin Courtroom – Benjamin Franklin’s dwelling coupled with the primary put up workplace, an outdated time printing store, and a superb underground museum
4. Philadelphia Zoo – oldest zoo in US and one of many nicest
5. College of Pennsylvania Museum – an archaeology and anthropology museum bar none
6. ENIAC – when you’re already at or round Penn, dip into the EE constructing at thirty third and Walnut to see ENIAC
And an entire bunch extra, and much more when you’re prepared to go outdoors town to close by locations (Longwood Gardens and the Brandywine River Museum, to not point out Brandywine Battlefield Park can, on their very own, make an awesome weekend -and the Hagley Museum simply over the border in Delaware is fabulous too).
I second Baltimore – I’ve spent a whole week with out leaving the inside harbor, however there are a ton of different cool and attention-grabbing issues to do too. I’ll focus primarily on the harbor because it’s unlikely you’ll go very far afield when you’re simply spending a day or two:
1. Nationwide Aquarium – it’s one of many nicer aquariums round, and one of many largest
2. Maryland Science Middle – it’s fairly good for a mid-size science museum
3. Baltimore Museum of Business – proper on the water however not within the inside harbor, it’ll make you understand how a lot brief shrift the business half will get in most science and business museums (and I say this as somebody who’s all concerning the science)
4. Fort McHenry – not on the harbor, however you may take a ferry from the inside harbor. One of many nicer historic nationwide parks, extremely suggest.
5. Virtually the rest within the inside harbor (ship excursions, Baltimore World Commerce Middle, and so on)
6. McCormick and Schmicks – excessive finish chain seafood restaurant that’s proper on the water and has out of doors seating overlooking a lot of the inside harbor. Good, not nice, meals however probably the most enjoyable and satisfying meal.
Let me additionally put my voice into the group cautioning in opposition to doing DC and Boston on the identical journey. I might even suggest not foing it if flying, however positively not by practice. I don’t suppose you perceive how terrible practice journey is within the US. The northeast hall has the perfect practice service within the US, however that’s actually damning with faint reward.
Washington-Baltimore-Philadelphia is okay. Philadelphia-NYC is first rate, though it will get backed up and isn’t as good because it was once. As quickly as you hit New England it’s a catastrophe. The tracks are historic and have extreme velocity limits. The tracks cross a whole lot of actual roads and have site visitors jams. It’s a multitude. The final time I took the practice from Baltimore to Boston it took simply over 12 hours. The final time I took it in any respect it took virtually 3 hours from Mystic/New London Connecticut to Boston.
