Hi Steemit!

Hope you all are doing well. This morning I am waking up in Philadelphia! Our hotel is literally across the street from Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell. We are half way through an east coast USA vacation that started June 27. The trip has been great and there is SO MUCH TO POST ABOUT!!!

But who wants to epic post mid vacation?

For the moment I will share some highlights, which hopefully my lazy self will revisit in a week or so.

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The Jersey Shore

The first full day of the trip was spent exploring the southern coast of New Jersey. It was way too hot and humid for this west coast girl, but also absolutely gorgeous. The shore has white sand beaches for miles. Classic boardwalks with carnival rides and water parks dot the coast. We visited a lighthouse and even saw a TURTLE crossing the road. Each little town looked so stereotypically American, and with July 4th Independence Day celebrations coming US flags and red, white and blue bunting were up everywhere. East Coast 4th of July is way more festive than west coast 4th of July. You can really feel the historical vibe of the holiday over here.

Anyway, here are a couple pics from our explorations along the shore.

^{Sunset Beach - Cape May, New Jersey}

^{Me and the hubs before the humidity turned me into a sweaty, frizzy haired, red faced mess. 🤣🤣}

^{Carnival rides along the boardwalk and piers of Wildwood, NJ.}

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The Vans Warped Tour

The next two days were spent in Atlantic City, NJ attending the Vans Warped Tour. Warped tour is the longest running touring music festival in the USA and this year marks the tour’s 25th anniversary. There were so many bands.The festival took place on the beach which was challenging and awesome all at the same time! Day One got evacuated for severe weather! It was a great time. ☺️

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Comic Stores

Day four took an unexpected turn for the nerd. We decided to drive up the coast to surprise visit @blewitt at his store, Conquest Comics. SO FUN! If you aren’t following @blewitt you should be. He is an awesome guy online and in person. We spent almost 2 hours shooting the breeze, exploring the front and back of the store and checking out the toilet (at @summertooth’s request.... 🤣😂🤣 long story). We bought some schwag and were gifted schwag. It was awesome. Thank you @blewitt! I am so happy it worked to meet up!

^{@blewitt, me and my hubs}

We also drove to a town called Red Bank, NJ. Red Bank is home to a comic shop called the Secret Stash. The Secret Stash is owned by movie maker Kevin Smith (Clerk’s, Mall Rats, Dogma). The shop was also featured in an AMC show called Comic Book Men. We saw two of the guys from Comic Book Men actually working in the store. I was excited but they didn’t seem up for a fan girl, so no selfies were taken.

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Philadelphia

The rest of our trip will be spent in Philadelphia, PA. Like I mentioned before, we are staying right across the street from Independence Hall. We will be right in the center of the Independence Day action. Today we took a hop on hop off bus tour and met up with a friend I haven’t seen in almost TWENTY YEARS! We met on a 39 day European tour in 1998 and ended up being roomies. The last time we saw each other was in 2000! Other than being middle aged ladies now, it was like zero time had passed. So much fun!

^{1998 v 2019. Smiles for miles. 😁😁}

^{Independence Hall}

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Hope all is well in Steemit land!

❤️ @dfinney