Pittsburgh!

Two weekends ago we decided to take a road trip to Pittsburgh - about a 5 hour drive straight west - and are we glad we did! We thoroughly enjoyed the city and could have spent an other night or two there easily. We were struck with how different it felt from the other big east coast cities we've visited. While still a big city, it's significantly smaller than Philly, and it has a much more mid-west feel. Located at the convergence of 3 rivers, we had no idea the town would be so picturesque, have so many bridges, or be such great exercise hiking up and down the inclines in town. (We thought Conshy was hilly...check out my past blog post with the steps we ended up tackling at the end of Saturday - yikes!)

In our quest to check out all Mike's favorite ball parks, we enjoyed a Pirates game on Friday night. I think it's the most fun I've ever had at a non-Twins game with a great crowd and even better venue. We even got free t-shirts so we could cheer on the home team. :)

In our Pirates gear - free tee shirt night!

Awesome view from the game!

Roberto Clemente's statue outside the ballpark

The view of the city from the ball park was awesome, and we got to explore it even more on Saturday. The Ranger in me came out too - the tallest building in town had the familiar US Steel logo flying on the flag out front.

I had expected a more industrial town - and apparently a couple decades ago, that was the case - but Pittsburgh of today was a great downtown with a vibrant cultural scene, and only hints of the industrial past. We walked all over town, and checked out the downtown area, the north shore district which houses the sports stadiums, and East Carson Street which has a funky and eclectic vibe.

Fireworks on Saturday night

We drove up to the Mount Washington neighborhood which gave us some amazing views of the city before we started the drive home.

We realized too that just about a hour outside Pittsburgh is the Flight 93 crash site - the 9/11 airplane that crashed in a Pennsylvania field. It's a national memorial that is still being completed, but we were so glad we stopped. It was an eerie site to visit, but was something special to see especially after seeing the memorial in NYC as well.