After I left Philadelphia I got the bus to Wilmington, Delaware and stopped there for a walk around and a bit of lunch. It was a dead town because everything shuts down on Sundays. I found an ice cream shop that was open so I could relax with a coffee. The lady that worked there was really nice and confessed to being fed up with Delaware. I can understand why if my brief stop was representative. I was particularly impressed by their advertising for a local radio station that went something like "Fed up with the 9-2-5? Then tune in to 9-3-7 for WABC". Tenuous at best. But that stop ticked Delaware off the 50-state list.

Not a lot to say about Baltimore. The hostel was nice, recently remodelled and in an 1857 house, which included a grand piano that I had a little tinkle on. The surrounding area was pleasant. I had only one day in Baltimore, which was just as well. I liked the Inner Harbor area but it rained for the whole day which but a damper on it.

I went on board the USS Constellation, which was the last all-sail ship built for the US Navy. The self-guided audio tour was interesting, if slightly marred by the two guys sanding and drilling on the top deck and the guy vacuuming on the berth deck. That made it a little hard to hear but I struggled valiantly through.

On the harbour is a mini-mall of shops and food outlets. I chose to have my lunch at Johnny Rocket's, which is a 50's style diner so sickeningly sweet I left with diabetes. The burger and fries were good though.

After lunch I used the National Aquarium at Baltimore to get out of the rain. I spent about three hours in there and it had a good collection. I especially liked the sharks because they went by right next to the glass and you could see perfectly the rows of razor-sharp teeth.

By a stroke of good fortune I also walked back down the small stretch of the red light district on my way back to the hostel. There were many blacked-out clubs including one by Larry Flynt. Sadly I'm on a budget trip and couldn't afford to go in to any of them.

Next stop DC.