New York New York

DAY ONE

We arrived in New York at 4pm on Sunday afternoon after an impressive flight on American Airlines, $8 for a blanket, $2 for head phones, $8 for a sandwich . . .  We were surprised that they didn't charge for water!

After some trouble with the airport shuttle pick up we eventually got a ride to our accommodation at the Latham Hotel.  Stepping into our room for the first time was a little traumatic after such a nice room with a view in Vegas this was . . . . . well a matchbox with no view at all! In fact a white curtain covered the window and without the light on the room was pitch black.

We decided we should venture out that evening to pick up our “New York passes”, these passes gave us access to all the New York tourist attractions which we had arranged from New Zealand.  Picking these up involved a trip on the subway (while in New York do as they do in New York), and for two country bumpkins this was an experience.  Stepping down into the hot and smelling subway was something but then to decipher the map of the subway system and which way was which was quite something else.

Once we had spoken with a local we were on our way and never looked back, well we did board a couple of the wrong trains and ended up going ways we didn’t really want to go – all part of the fun!  After making it up to Times Square (this place was amazing, lots of lights and a buzzing atmosphere) and getting our passes we tackled the subway again and headed back to our Hotel room.

A local Pizza place we walked passed, such an appropriate name for Mike

Times Square  

Grand Central                  

DAY TWO

Today started with a trip to the top of the Empire State Building, this is were we got our first taste of the realisation of how the Twin Tower Terrorist attack really affected New York. 

View from the Empire State Building

After visiting the Empire State Building we moved onto the Intrepid Museum, this had a retired aircraft carrier, retired submarine and the Concorde all of which you could go inside and walk around, it was a pretty amazing museum. 

Next we lined up for “the Beast”, this was like taking a wet and wild roller coaster ride out to the State of Liberty and back.  We ended up getting extremely wet – no one on the boat came back dry!

Statue of Liberty

We took a visit to B&H photo (this is the biggest camera, computer and electronic store in New York and one of the cheapest in the world).  To shop in this store was an experience.  We went up to the counter and asked if we could buy a couple of new lenses for our camera.  (Mike had already done the research and knew his wish list off by heart).

Once we had ordered the lenses and other bits and pieces the sales consultant sent the order out the back were it was put together and then travel via a conveyer to our counter.  Once we had checked this it was then sent down to the payment desk.  It was a bit like being in Santa’s workshop.

Once the sun had set we headed up to the Top of the Rock (Rockafeller Centre), this is the view of New York from the top.

Seen as this was our last night in New York we decided to head back to Time Square for one last look.  Here we also went and saw the Madam Tussons, its amazing how real these wax statues can look, we had to double take on more than one occasion.

DAY THREE

We rose early on day three in New York and headed to Central Park.  We signed ourselves up for a biking tour around the park, oh what a mistake this was!  We ended up with a tour leader who was what we would describe as the geek of the class, he knew all dates, history and movies of the park in far to much detail and every stop point we had a “presentation” which involved huge amounts of detail.

After a long two hours we were eventually freed!

 

We caught the subway downtown to China town, where it decided to piss down with rain.  The streets flooded instantly and the price of umbrellas went up exponentially.

We walked up Brooklyn Bridge, this is such a cool bridge!

Then we headed to over the Twin Towers memorial site, it was crazy how huge they were.

We headed back to the hotel for an early night, all ready for a 4am start!