Hey there friends, and happy Sunday! I spent the last week catching up and getting back to work. I was away for a long weekend that spilled into last week’s work week. This year, one of my goals was to visit 10 new cities and so far I got two under my belt. Last weekend I went down to St. Augustine, FL to do a little exploring, but a few weekends ago a group of us headed down to Philadelphia for my first weekend trip of the year.

I have a friend I grew up with who plays base in a band, so when we had the option to go to Boston, which we’ve all been to a million times before, or Philadelphia to see the Revivalist play, my friends and I chose Philly. We had the show at the Met on Saturday night so that gave us 24 hours to eat all the cheese steaks and visit as much of the historical city as we could.

What we did and Where we ate
Our first stop was food. We headed to Reading Terminal Market to explore Philly’s food scene. Conveniently located across the street from the Pennsylvania Convention Center, and just a few blocks from Philadelphia City Hall, Reading Terminal has a plethora of coffee shops, fish markets, cheese stands, and a ton of cheese steak places. We started our food explorations with Old City Coffee and an amazing black iced coffee.

For our first Philly Cheese Steak we tried Spataro’s traditional with cheese whiz and grilled onions. I know, I know I questioned it too but it wasn’t half bad. I’m not a huge fan of cheese steaks to begin with so this one didn’t really knock my socks off, but it was ok.

We walked a few blocks up Arch St. to snap a quick photo of the Chinatown Friendship Arch. There were so many eateries I would have loved to run into but we had just left Reading Terminal Market and were not ready to stuff our faces with Pho and Dim Sum.

After checking out Chinatown, we really wanted to see Love Park. We headed down Arch St. until we essentially walked straight into Love Park. Beautiful. The views down Benjamin Franklin Parkway, with the stunning views of the Philadelphia Museum of Art were outstanding. I would love to see these views during the summertime. I could only imagine how stunning it would be.

After all of our exploring and walking we needed to sit down and enjoy some of the libations Philadelphia had to offer. Sansom St. was very good to us. We visited Mission Taqueria, a cute bar that channeled all of my Los Angeles vibes with the indoor-outdoor feel and cute little outdoor courtyard in the middle of the restaurant. The drinks were fantastic but my favorite was the Bee Sting.

One thing that we kept hearing the entire day was that we needed to try Jim’s Steaks on South Street. Before this month, when I hear of Philly, I heard about Pat and Geno’s. The two dueling cheese steak restaurants that are open 24 hours, and fight for customers as well as the title of best cheesesteak in town. But the locals (and Ubers) said they’re both overrated. (Listen to your Ubers people, they know what they’re talking about.) We needed to go to Jim’s. We went late night, and it may have been the drinks from the concert so take this with a  grain of salt, but Jim’s was lifechanging. But in all seriousness, the area was beautiful. Skinny streets, pretty row homes, it looked like an area that would be great to walk around during the day, close to the water with a super local feel.

The next morning, we headed back to Sanson St. to Harp & Crown for one of the best brunches I ever had. Harp & Crown is a beautiful English pub style restaurant that apparently has a secret basement bowling ally for late nights. Next time I fully intend on taking advantage of this.

How we got around
Ultimately Philadelphia is a very walkable city. We stayed across the Schuylkill River right near the campuses of Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania. To get over to the city center it was about a 10-15 minute drive but parking is not too easy to find, and definitely not cheap. We decided to try out the SEPTA, or subway system.

We are used to New York City subways, where the stations are packed and the trains are plentiful. This was the complete opposite. There weren’t a ton of people on the subway, and it was pretty easy to get to different areas of the city on the subway, but we waited for about 10 minutes for our train. Once we were in town, we decided to check out Ubers to get back to our hotel and the price was AMAZING and there were a ton of cars available. It was even cheaper, and quicker to grab an Uber from our restaurant back to our hotel. From then on, we stuck to rideshares.

We didn’t get to try it out but there is a trolley system also run by SEPTA and it seems like there are a ton of stops as well. Maybe something to try out when the weather is a little warmer.

Where we stayed
We ended up staying a little out of city center, but the Sheraton Philadelphia University City was a great place to stay, especially if you are visiting either Drexel or the University of Pennsylvania. For us it was right along the subway line and just a quick two stops to city center.  There was a good amount of quick bite restaurants around and a few shops that we ended up taking advantage of to buy new outfits for the concert.