(Scranton, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.)

I continue to embrace the random travel that my sports competitions create. This time, I was heading to a competition in Skytop, Pennsylvania. I had never heard of it before, but decided to add a little bit of time to the trip so I could see the local sights.

When I looked at what we’d pass before getting to Skytop, I saw…Scranton, Pennsylvania. Not too many obvious sights came to mind. In such cases, I start with looking for interesting restaurants and record shops (I found a record shop in nearby Dickson City). And I remembered that Scranton earned a kind of fame by being the site of a TV cringe comedy called “The Office”.

For lunch, I found a highly rated Scranton institution called Abe’s Kosher Deli. It seemed like everybody knew everybody else. I had a BBQ beef brisket sandwich and it was very good. It was served with a pickle unlike any other I’ve had: it was very green, very crunchy, and very salty. There were a lot of interesting items on the menu; I would like to go back one day and try some more of them. But there’s also a nice Thai restaurant around the corner…

After lunch, we walked around downtown Scranton and snapped a few photos. Urban decay is a problem in many parts of North America, but downtown Scranton seemed to be OK. This may be because people still have a reason to go downtown. In addition to the Lackawanna County Courthouse, there was a mall…and there were sights from “The Office”!

The “cover photo” for today’s post is an actual mural in downtown Scranton. Apparently, it has been authorized by all of “The Office” actors portrayed on it. At City Hall, you can pick up a self-guided walking tour that visits many of the Scranton locations made famous on “The Office”. And I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I’m told that Brian Baumgartner (who played “Kevin” on “The Office”) has been known to appear at a couple of the local bars from time to time.

So Scranton, also known as the “Electric City”, does have something to offer the traveler. (In case you’re wondering, it was one of the first cities in North America to be electrified.) Stay tuned for more from our trip to Pennsylvania!