Philadelphia: Into the Pennsylverse
Philadelphia, PA • 2026-08-12
Left at about 8:30 in the morning. Silvia rode with me as far as the D&R towpath, where I picked back up from yesterday. The canal runs as far as Trenton, still in New Jersey, before turning back upwards to follow the river. My route, though crossed the Delaware River into Pennsylvania and started following the Delaware Canal towpath to Bristol.
Bristol is a lovely small town and I stopped for lunch at a restaurant there. From there into Philadelphia is not a super pleasant road but I managed to get to the city limits before too long. However, Philly’s city limits extend really far, so I still had almost 20 miles left. While this did mean a bike lane, it also meant constant traffic lights.
At one point, I tried to take a trail closer to the river, only to discover that it’s only open on weekends (I don’t get why), and the resulting detour took me through the Philadelphia Police Academy, which was unexpected.
I won’t lie, I was not pleased with how much of the semi-urban and urban expanse I had to slog through to get to the city center. Once I did, I sat by the Delaware for a bit to recover, then met my host for the night, Tim.
After a shower I went out on foot and got to be more of a normal tourist, seeing the Liberty Bell, getting a cheesesteak, and walking around the Society Hill neighborhood. All in all, it’s a very nice place.