First Day:Manhattan

We took millions of photos on our trip and it is going to take me a while to edit them and show them to you, but here a few of the experiences we that were most exciting to me.

NYC was the most scary and exciting part of the trip for me. I checked out every book from the library, bought books and maps, studied every web site I could find, asked the peas (twopeasinabucket.com) and spent at least a month trying to learn everything I could about NYC and what we should do there. From all that advice, I made a list of the things I most wanted to do and we were able to do them all except one.

1. Three Hour Circle line boat tour of Manhattan Island

We saw 3 rivers, seven bridges, five boroughs and 25 renown landmarks. It was a very good choice and I'm glad we did this first.

2. Central Park
One thing I wanted to see in Central Park was dog walkers. I was thrilled to find these guys. They were just finishing their walk and were telling each other good bye when we found them.

We found everyone in NYC to be very friendly and helpful (including the taxi drivers) and every where we went we saw people gathered in the parks and outside their apartments visiting with neighbors and friends.

3. Top of the Rock

The advice I got was to go here instead of The Empire State Building, because it is easier to get there and you can see the same thing. (It is Rockefeller Center where the Today show is taped.) I took this with the cell phone so we could email it to everyone. We got there about 4:30 and stayed until dark taking photos in the daylight, sunset and dark.

4. Riding the subway

If Basil looks a little spooked here, it is because we were a little anxious about how to get back to our hotel in Brooklyn on the subway. We had printed instructions, but we still had to ask 2 people for help. They were very nice and we got back with no problems. I studied the subway more than any other thing about NYC and was assured that it was easy, but I found it very complicated.

The one thing on my list that we did not get to do was walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. We saw it several times and took lots of photos of it but there was a storm when we got to Brooklyn the first night so we did not get a chance to actually walk over it. We were going to try again before we left for home, but it was too complicated to manage with luggage.