Philadelphia Miniaturia
Crowne Plaza Hotel , Cherry Hill N.J. Nov.3,4, 5th 2006
Expedition Diary:
Following three weeks of hysteria, re-pricing all stock
(in dollars) and packing everything to fly, buying ready meals for the
boys, cleaning out all the animals, doing the ironing, doing the Halloween
pumpkin………..
Wednesday
1st November.
Amber and I got up at 4am and set off in the car.
Stopping at Stanstead services for coffee, we arrived at Heathrow at
approx. 7.45am and managed to find our pre-booked car park space. Five
minutes on the shuttle bus and we were there.
We did the quick check in thing via the computer touch screens, which was
really easy. But had our seats changed at the baggage drop point though so
we could sit together (as we have different surnames the computer didn’t
think we were talking or something!). Security was very straight forward
too.
As we were technically going to be working in America, I treated us to the
executive lounge to wait our three hours. Very pleasant with complimentary
drinks etc. (and comfy chairs)
We flew British Airways and had window seats on the way out. Fascinating
spotting stuff on the way. Very comfy, very good food and seat back
screens. Had wine with my lunch and watched about four films on the way
over (nice to have a rest after the last few weeks!)
Outskirts of London
Little fluffy clouds...
Hey, look it's America!
Security
at Philadelphia Airport was very courteous (including electronic
fingerprinting and retinal scans) and we had no problems with customs
either (transporting our trade samples!).
The luggage managed to arrive safely so we went out and caught our first
American Cab to the hotel. We didn’t realise until later that the
apparently grotty interior was actually of quite a high standard (only a
couple of bits of gaffer tape holding the seat together, and only one
strange clunking sound from the suspension!)
Yellow cab (poster on back of driver's seat)
The Crowne Plaza is one of a big chain (just to
confuse us it was actually a Hilton Hotel when I booked, but it changed
hands), but with pretty high standards of décor and service (look, we are
used to UK Travelodges, so we are probably easily impressed, but even so
we felt very welcome right away).
I had posted a couple of boxes of stock out and they were waiting for me
in reception, as I went back down to collect them a slightly jet-lagged
looking Tony Knott was just arriving.
Crowne Plaza Hotel
....Reception!
We had a room service meal that evening and tried to
stay up as late as possible to beat the jet-lag. We managed until
about 9.30pm (so we had been up for around 22 hours at that point!)
First sunset
Room Service
Thursday 2nd.
Woke up at about 4am (surprise, surprise), managed to
stay in bed till 7.30 and then had pre-ordered room service breakfast
(fruit, Danish and coffee…mmmm…could really get used to this!)
We had a quick explore round the hotel and a peek at some of the workshops
taking place.( I am hoping to do a workshop next year, just need to work
out what to do about an oven…spotted James Carrington walking round with
one under his arm at one point, I’ll have to pick his brains)
We then took a taxi (er, Cab) into the Museum district of Philadelphia
(more gaffer tape and clunking noises) and managed to explain to the driver
where we wanted to go using single words and sign language.
Nearly made it to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (well the Science Museum
was only about half a mile away and it was a very pleasant walk!).
Science Museum
The Streets of Philadelphia
Spotted a lot of places on the way that we shall try
and get to next year, but finally found those famous steps (as featured in
the first Rocky movie apparently).
Intellectual Tourist
Real American school bus!
Moose!
Statue (?)
Unfortunately as it was officially the start of winter
all the fountains about the town were dry, the displays of Autumn leaves made up for
it though. We spent the day in the museum, including a lunch break in the
café (the food is so good, and seemed so cheap to us, not so keen on the
coffee though! And as for tea…. Well I did do the English thing and took
teabags with me to make tea in the room…and yes, you can make tea in a
coffee percolator…..). Amber is doing History of Art at the moment, so I
had my own guide round a lot of the exhibits!
Cultural highlight
Cultural jelly (jello)
Gave up due to exhaustion in the end and picked up a
cab outside the back of the museum. This driver spoke quite good
American English (although it wasn't his first language), but unfortunately didn’t know the way to the hotel!!
Had quite a scenic tour around the back streets of Cherry Hill! We got
back eventually though, despite at one point going past it in the wrong
direction on a dual carriageway ! He didn’t charge us what was on the
meter and was very polite and profusely apologetic so we didn’t mind too
much. It was quite nice to see real houses and people!
We managed to get down to the restaurant for our evening meal (we ate for
about £10 each) and then crashed in our room watching more junk American
TV!
Friday 3rd.
Yes I woke at 4am again, but managed to get back sleep
for a while. Had a late breakfast in the restaurant (must have eaten the
equivalent of a whole melon from the buffet!) then dragged everything
downstairs to set up the stall (actually we used the lift, as we were on
the fifth floor!).
Setting up
Finished stall (with charming lampshades)
I
borrowed some amazing slot-together card display stands from Sue Thwaite
(Ladybug) and we managed to put together a fairly presentable display. I
also borrowed some light bulbs from the hotel maintenance department (of
the correct rating for the US electrical system) and some foil from the
catering department to make some very attractive lampshade extensions to
shield them (something I shall have to sort out properly before I go
back!). Our block of tables had a lot of problems with the lights going
out (no it wasn’t my fault!), but this was sorted out before the preview
opened.
We were in a very attractive pavilion room, set off from the side of the
hotel. The light during the day was fabulous, but unfortunately the very
ornate chandeliers didn’t really pass muster in the evening (I was very
glad of my oversized bulbs!).
The lovely Pavilion ...
...and inside
Loads of space...
...very dim, but attractive, lights
What we didn’t realise at the time was, that this room
had not been used before and the organisers had real trouble getting
people to come down to see us over the weekend.
The preview evening ran from 6 till 9pm. There was a buffet and drinks in
the main area which we didn’t see much, if anything, of and at the end of
the evening there were people peering in at us as we were packing up for
the night saying ‘oh, we didn’t know you were down here’.
At the time I wasn’t too bothered as I don’t think I could have dealt with
too many people as by the time we finished my body thought it was 3 am!! I
did take as much money that evening as I would hope to during a moderate
weekend fair in the UK, but that was mainly due to one customer collecting
a load of reserved and commissioned items. Ho,hum…time for bed said
Zebedee !
Saturday 4th.
Managed to sleep until 4.30am!! Phoned home (at vast
expense, but what the heck!), everyone seemed to be surviving without us!
Opened up the stall at 10 am (very civilised ) More people found us during
the day (due to extra signage) but still pretty quiet.
Had a very good day though. Met up with a few familiar faces and loads of
new ones. Seemed to go down very well, with everyone ‘getting’ the humour.
Sold a few biggish pieces , but I was glad I had made all the extra little
things (fossils, rats in tin cans, hatching baby dragons, etc) as I sold a
lot of these. Handed out cards all day too, so hopefully there will be
some follow up.
I had put one of my mouse infested chairs in the charity auction and late
in the afternoon a lady ran into the room and asked if I had got another
one as she just missed out in the auction and was desperate!! Luckily I
had thought to make another one the same for this reason and she went away
happy!
I was told that I should look out for a particular advert on the TV with
the tag-line ‘Your Dreams miss you…’, I spotted it later that evening,
it’s for sleeping tablets and consists of a man in his kitchen talking to
Abe Lincoln with a chess set, a talking beaver eating bacon at the table
and ignoring a man wandering about in a deep sea diving suit in the
background!!! I think I go for the comparison, but I am not entirely
sure……
There was a social event for traders in the evening, but we felt a bit out
of place and as there appeared to be someone having a wedding party (I
think it was one of the traders, but we never did find out) in the same
room as well, we decided to retreat back to our room in exhausted
confusion!
Sunday 5th.
OK this was the quietest day I have ever had at a
fair!! I made exactly three sales!!! Though one was my large dragon, so
that helped.
The stall holders were virtually having their own party, the group behind
us had sent out for a vast amount of sushi and seemed to be having a good
time (they also had a kettle and were making tea I noticed!) There was a
great deal of muttering about the room being too out of the way, so I
think I did OK compared to some. One trader admitted to only taking 20% of
what he took the year before!!! (so I could have come home rich!!)
Packing up was rather stressful due to the low light levels and the
extreme cold due to people loading directly to cars outside! Managed to
get everything up to the room and then re-packed the cases in a more
sensible fashion.
Room service saved the day again and we felt pretty good by the time we
went to bed.
Monday 6th.
Managed to have a bit of a lay-in, then finished
packing after breakfast. Checked out of the hotel at mid-day, then left
the bags in storage and went out for a walk round the adjacent lake.
Amber floating on the lake
Rather startled looking tourist
The
really beautiful autumn trees (apparently we were lucky
to see them as the season was later than usual this year), made us feel
like tourists briefly.
Real Autumn colours (sorry, colors)
Er, we were not quite sure about this
...or this..
Though this speaks for itself!
(click to enlarge)
Native American
Teenage tourist
We bought
a takeout lunch at the hotel and went outside to eat it in the sun as we
watched some sort of eagle (that we had previously seen over the lake)
soaring in the thermals above the hotel, which seemed to be a good ending
for our stay.
Finally we bought a few things from the hotel shop for the boys and then
got a taxi back to the airport. (Only one major clunking noise in the boot
this time) The driver had spent the morning ferrying miniaturists, so we
had good chat with him about the business. He confirmed a rumour that I
had heard over the weekend, that, yes one trader did get all his goods
held up in customs, only to arrive in the hotel on the Monday morning,
just in time to take them home again (perhaps our show wasn’t too bad
after all!).
Ours was the only BA flight out that evening, so security etc was very
quick (though we did get our shoes x-rayed this time) and we had to do our
own finger print and retina scans at a sort of self-service booth (to
prove we had left the country!). We had to wait a while which was OK apart
from the fact that the airport was so hot that I wasn’t sure if we would
survive!
Amber got her seat upgraded to Business class on the way back due to a
grumpy man with very large knees in the seat behind her!! (I was allowed
to visit through the curtain during the flight!)
We both slept for most of the way home and were woken at 6am UK time for
breakfast (bleh!)
The only hold up was waiting for the luggage which was delayed due some
malfunctioning equipment (I imagine that one of my suitcases got jammed in
the works or run over at some point judging by the large split in it!- no
I haven’t checked all the contents yet but on first glance everything
seems to be remarkably intact)
Got back to the car to find that I had left the lights on!! Ha,ha!
Actually the AA were there within 20 minutes so we were not delayed long.
We had to stop at Stanstead again so that I could have a brief sleep.
Other than that the journey was fine and we arrived home at 12.30pm.
There was already an order waiting on the computer for me when I looked
and only one credit card payment wouldn’t process through the system, as
this was from a friend (and very good customer) I wasn’t too concerned and
she has since sorted it out with her card company. This can happen when
the card is being used in the US at the same time as a payment is being
processed in the UK (something to do with the card company not believing
that you can be in two places at once!!)
Other than that, although the fair was not the financial extravaganza it
could have been, we covered all our costs, with some over and had a really
good time. We can’t wait to go back and are certainly looking forward to
going to Chicago in March (and not just because some new found friends
have promised to take us out to a Greek restaurant while we are there!)
As a final thought, there were a few organisational
problems this year, but our thoughts are with the mainstay of the fair,
Pat Bauder, and her family, as she copes with the effects of a brain
tumour. It was good to see her there and we hope all her wonderful plans
become reality in the future.
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