Road Trip to Elmo’s House

For the last few weeks we’ve been preparing Austen for our Memorial Day excursion. We decided to take him to what we’ve been calling “Elmo’s House” but is really Sesame Street Place or Sesame Place as they call it. It’s an amusement park, water park, playground and theater all rolled into one just north of Philadelphia.

So Friday, we picked him up from school early and started our trek toward Philly with Adler in toe. For dinner we had a picnic at a rest area with Adler (too hot to leave her in the car while we ate inside) and Austen fell asleep to his Merry Music Makers CD while Tom and I drove on for a few hours more.

We decided to stop in Pittsburgh – mostly because it was about the amount of time we wanted to be on the road and also because we found a decent pet friendly hotel there. Despite the very confusing signs that you couldn’t see we managed to arrive at Station Square in Pittsburgh about midnight eastern time. While we were impressed by Pittsburgh and maybe would have wanted to spend more time exploring the city than just what we drove past, the next morning we had another five hour drive to Sesame Street Place and we wanted to be sure to have enough time at the park that day so we were up and off early.

Austen did great in the car on Friday and most of Saturday even letting us know when he had to go to the bathroom so we could pull over and he could pee on the side of the road (a definite advantage of having a boy) when we couldn’t make it until the next rest stop. But his impressive behavior was marred when he refused to take a nap. Knowing this was going to be a very long day for him, I was adamant in my request that he lie back and go to sleep. This was met by about a 45-minute temper tantrum where he tried to extract himself from his car seat. Needless to say about 30 minutes prior to our arrival at Sesame Street Place, he fell asleep.

As well rested as could be, and after we checked Adler into our hotel (where she was grateful for more than her 5x5 space, we headed over to see Elmo. Austen liked the amusement rides but what he really loved were the water rides. Now keep in mind, Sesame Street Place is catered to those under 5 so he could go on almost every ride. He did a tube slide and went down a big water slide on a raft for 8 people (with a life jacket on both times). He also loved the water play area where he could go down the slides you’d find at the playground and careen into the two feet of water at the bottom. He couldn’t stop laughing. He even liked when the big bucket of water was poured over everyone’s heads! I was amazed. We ended the evening with a live show featuring Elmo, Mr. Noodle and his goldfish Dorothy and before we could leave the park, Austen had to take his dad climbing through the rope course that was suspended high above the park. Talk about no fear.

I think Austen enjoyed himself. And, while he was a trooper, I would be remiss if I did not mention Adler. Perfect, perfect dog that she is – rode beautifully the whole way, adapted to two hotel rooms and did whatever we asked of her. She’s so easy. If only raising kids could be as easy!