New York, New York
Trip Start
Feb 11, 2008
1
10
11
Trip End
Mar 24, 2008
New York City,
New York,
United States
Monday, March 17, 2008
On Thursday morning we ventured out & had breakfast followed by a bit of exploring to get our bearings. We walked to the Rockefeller Centre to buy our New York passes (a great idea if you're there for a few days) and proceeded to the "Top of the Rock". A fast elevator ride saw us again on top of a tall building. The visibility wasn't great but it gave us an idea of where things were in Manhattan.
We then had to transfer to the Bedford Hotel which we had originally booked in the West side. Manhattan is laid out in a very orderly fashion for such an old city. There is Uptown, Midtown & Downtown areas then there is the Village which is circular. The larger avenues (5th Ave, 7th Ave etc) are 2 way streets and wider than the numerical streets which cross them (42nd St) except for Broadway which seems to meander through sort of diagonally.
Central Park from The Rock
5th Ave is the dividing street between east & west and our hotel was on W 40th Street. Although the blocks are quite small between the streets, the Avenue blocks were longer & we did our fair share of walking for the first few days. This was good to move around after 2 weeks of sitting on our backsides in Nain, but created very sore feet & legs not to mention 2 tired kids.In the afternoon we went to Times Square to pick up bus tickets then visited Ripley's Believe it or Not museum. It is full of the odd & unusual things in life with excellent exhibits - some hands on too so the kids thoroughly enjoyed this stop.
Day 2 in NY we picked up the hop on - hop off bus & toured around the city's landmarks. We went to the top of the Empire State building and viewed the city again from another tall building. Visibility was very low so couldn't see much on or off the island. We went on through the Village and stopped at St Paul's right next to Ground Zero. The former site of the Twin Towers is now completely under construction with the memorial pools and new towers well underway. There will be a museum relating to the 9/11 story and the plans certainly look respectful. It interested us later when trying to buy postcards of NY that very few don't have some sort of ghosted image of the towers imprinted where they stood. Bizarre!
On top of the Rock
Finish date for the construction varied from Sept '09 to Sept 2012. St Paul's is known as the miracle church as it has withstood several catastrophic events over time. It was the base for exhausted rescue workers to grab a nap or a massage etc during the cleanup and rescue process and now houses many memorabilia and tributes to those involved and lost. Certainly an emotional place to visit and will be interesting to see how the development progresses.TC then decided we had to go investigate Cliff St which he had spied on the map. Another 15min walking much to kids disgust & we stopped there for a photo before rejoining the bus tour. We hopped off at the Waldorf Astoria to walk back to the hotel for a spell as we were meeting a friend for dinner in the evening.
Cindy (we met in Germany at a wedding in 1988) found us in M&M's World & we went on to Toy's R Us in Times Square (incidentally not square at all). The toy shop was 3 floors of delight for the kids although we didn't buy much at all. There is a life size dinosaur, ferris wheel with cute them cars as the carriages and a huge Barbie house. We finally got them out of there & enjoyed dinner at Planet Hollywood. Cruel as we are, we made the kids walk with us to catch the ferry to New Jersey with Cindy to see the Manhattan skyline at night. It was raining a little, but still gave us a good view of the lights.
Beleive it or not Museum
Cindy went on home & we returned on the next ferry back to the hotel (taxi from the boat!). Unfortunately this made for a very late night & exhausted kids.Saturday morning we met up with Marty & Laura whom we met on our Contiki tour to Europe in 1988. They & their daughters took us on a walk up to Central Park to Strawberry Fields then back again through the park. All the lawn is off limits for the season as it would get too damaged with people walking on it all winter. The kids did find some rocks to climb which made them happy though. We stopped at Jekyll & Hyde for lunch - a restaurant with a macabre theme and live performers along with mechanical beasts and people acting out storylines from the Jekyll & Hyde era. Kids loved it and it was a lot of fun although JJ wasn't too sure in the beginning.
We then walked back up to Times Square & Laura & I lined up for cheap theatre tickets while the others went back to Toys R Us & the Hershey's chocolate store. We managed to get tickets to Monty Python's Spamalot that evening & were all set for a good laugh. We had a few hours to fill in so went on the subway to catch the free Staten Island ferry. It went past the Statue of Liberty & Ellis Island & we made the return journey back on the next ferry. We dined on McDonald's for dinner then went off to have a good laugh at good old British humour. We said our goodbyes to the Wormsley's & managed to get back to the hotel before collapsing in a heap.
Sunday we decided that it was time for down time and had a very lazy morning. We went out in the afternoon & tackled Macy's for some retail therapy. The crowds were massive still & we managed to buy some clothes for the kids & not much else before it was 7pm. Macy's NY claim's to be the largest department store in the world (as do Harrods) so it was an amazing place - with some of the original wooden escalators still in operation
Beleive it or not Museum
. It was also the first day of their spring flower show which was a fantastic display of colourful spring flowers. The window displays were female mannequins dressed in flowers with all different themes. Certainly brightened up everything.On Monday we were up & packed early as we had to check out of the hotel by 11am & had plans well before that. We walked to the United Nations building to see all the flags flying & the Tibetan protesters peaceful protest across the road. It was also near to where a building crane had collapsed across 2 streets and killed 5 people the last news we heard. Although we didn't get close you could see where the fire trucks & police were blocking off all access to the area.
We then walked back to Grand Central Station (just a short walk from our hotel) and made our way to the harbour to catch a 90min cruise around Manhattan. They were running on a different timetable to the one we had been given which caused some frustration but we decided we could still fit it in okay.
It was cold but a nice view of the Manhattan skyline from the water & took in a close view of the Statue of Liberty & Ellis Island.
On return we taxied back across town with little delay - surprising seeing as it was St Patrick's day with a parade down 5th Ave which lasts from 11am - 4pm disrupting everything
NY parking
.We had a few minutes to spare before our white stretch limousine taking us to Newark International Airport. The kids were excited seeing as we had missed out on the limo experience in Toronto. Once checked in we had a fair wait (we were very early!!) so ate some dinner then boarded a small plane to Washington. It was a bit of a worry as they had only one runway open due to high winds & we felt them when we finally got off the ground running 1 hour late. We still arrived in Washington with plenty of time though & made our flight to London with no dramas.
Well that's the USA & Canada over with - on to the UK for a week before we head back down under.
Cheers
