The City

New York, New York!

A city so nice they named it twice!  

Well hello there old friend.  How I have missed the comfort of a bed!  We stayed at the Westin in Times Square.  Great hotel in an excellent location!  Thanks Jeffrey & hotels.com!

 

Out hotel is the one with aqua & purple windows.  

These are the views from our room. 

The kids took turns wearing the one bathrobe that came with the room.  We all enjoyed indoor showers! 

We hit the ground running the first day but quickly realized New York was still moving much much faster than we were! So much to see and do!  

We met Elmo, who wanted money from us.  

Got some candy.

And visited the Disney store!  

We walked over to Central Park and enjoyed some time off our feet.  

We Walked back towards our hotel ran down fifth Avenue.

The kids pretended to fire us as we walked by Trump Towers. Nice try kids.

We saw some cool New York City landmarks.

Day two we took the subway downtown to see the 9/11 memorial and the Statue of Liberty.  We were clearly newbies at Subway riding. New Yorkers around us smiled and gave each other knowing glances.  But surprisingly no mishaps on the subway! We took the correct trains to the correct spots even if we looked a little scared and confused.

The 9/11 memorial was breathtaking.  Getting to the memorial was another story. First you had to stand in line to get tickets.  Then you had to walk a block and a half to get to the Memorial. Then you stood in another line to validate your ticket. Then the security check. Then two more tickets validations and finally you get to view the memorial. This whole process took about an hour and a half. It's a stark contrast to the viewing of memorials in Washington DC.  

On a positive note, it was really special to view this Memorial with the kids. They asked us questions like "Where were you when this happened?" and "What were you thinking?" When we moved through the lines to get the tickets, there was a timeline museum as well as some videos playing. This helped the kids to understand what happened. It was all very moving and amazing to realize you lived through history.

The third picture is the new trade center being built now. It will replace the two buildings that were there before. The new building recently became the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere. It's 1776 feet tall which represents the year the Declaration of Independence was signed. Take that Al Qaeda. 

 It was crazy to see somebody working on the top of the building with a crane. The crane was hanging off the edge of the very top of the building and looked like a toy up in the sky. Everything in New York is larger-than-life!

After a full 24 hours in a rush rush go-go city, standing in line for an hour and a half in the hot sun, and walking until we developed blisters on the bottom of our feet, everyone was a little bit cranky and in need of a rest.  We set out for Battery Park to lounge in the shade and enjoy the sights of the Statue of Liberty. However when we got there the park was closed for renovations.   Fail.  Ellis Island also closed for renovations. Fail. Statue of Liberty also closed for renovations. Fail.  So instead we decided to ride the Staten Island ferry to Staten Island and back just so we could get a closer glimpse of the Statue of Liberty. This actually worked out really nicely as everyone needed to sit down for a while.  We enjoyed a free boat ride through the harbor and we could see New York from a whole different perspective.

After our ferry ride we headed back on the subway to our hotel room to grab a slice of New York pizza. Here is our favorite pizza place. Yes I know we've only been there one day but we'd already developed a love for this place. The pizza was so cheap and so delicious!!  French fries for a dollar!  Ice cream for a dollar! Everything was a dollar!  We ate here four times in in 48 hours (6 If you count ice cream visits too).  Each time we got the combo- 2 cheese slices & can drink or water for $2.75.  People say New York is expensive but I guess it depends on where you go and who you know.  Bigger city, more deals to be had!

We splurged on some five dollar you gyros from the food cart across the street. These were well worth it!

Here's the room service menu. Even the kids new this was crazy!

After a late afternoon nap and showers all around we went out for a fancy dinner on the town. We all brought special outfits to wear for this fancy dinner. We had tapas a few streets over from our hotel. They were delicious! But you know we had to in the night at our 99 Cents Pizza place for ice cream!

On the way home we had to grab some I love New York T-shirts. These were five for $10. We each got our own color! The kids loved them and so did the adults.

Sadly it was time to leave the big city. Nobody wanted to get moving but you know before we left we had to stop one more time at the pizza place.

Of course by this time the owner of the pizza place got accustomed to seeing us and asked if we lived in the city. We told him no we were just visiting on a very long trip all the way up to Maine.  We explained we were teachers and out of school for the summer so therefore had plenty of time to travel with the kids. He told us that he was actually a teacher  as well and that he used to teach high school in Bangladesh. He said he wouldn't teach in America because the kids are so bad. He said in Bangladesh teachers were allowed to spank children if they misbehave.  He wished us good luck on our trip and we promised to come back if we were ever in the city again.

Goodbye New York. Maybe we'll see you again someday.