I thought that was a clever-ish title? Anyway, the first couple of days went someting like this -
Thurs 21 (sounds like months ago!)
We took the subway into town, and the 7-train terminates in Times Square. Whilst I was impressed at the buildings, and the artificial light beaming down on top of us from the advertising, I managed to keep my jaw, and the back of my head off the ground. So we went to find our first NYC breakfast, and found it in the form of some french toast (mmmm - french toast was to feature heavily throughout this trip) and an egg roll.
Views, naturally, are fantastic - but it's kinda hard to keep interested! It ends up looking so similar from each compass point, but that's not to diminish the impact. It genuinely is a cool view, and such an iconic building too.
So we queued to get back down, and wandered around the ground (first) floor a little, amazed at the number of tenants in a single building, and fell back out onto 5th Avenue. Lunched in one of those fantastic lunch shops that abound in NYC, where you can get sushi from one counter, a sandwich from another, and anything in between! We don't like Cherry Coke.
Our next stop was Saks, on 5th. Brown Thomas has nothing on this place. This is the Department Store to have a bag from, but we wouldn't afford anything in there - a single shirt was $450 and they had a domino set for $175. We didn't stay long in there, needless to say. Wandered on Downtown along Broadway, whereupon we found ourselves at Ground Zero (via Chinatown and a café).
Turning the corner 2 blocks away, it's immediately apparent that there's a huge gap in the city. You can see too far. It's too bright. Now, I think I finally have some tiny inkling of the loss and damage that New York suffered in 2001.
We wandered on, through Battery Park (near the Hudson) watched lucky people going out to learn to sail, and saw the sunset behind the buildings across the river in New Jersey, I think. Headed back to Broadway, and got something to eat in a nice restaurant. Made our way back to the subway, and our feet thanked us for finally giving them a break!
To be continued....
So there we were, walking down the street, when all of a sudden I spied a large gorilla atop a building, swatting away some pesky airplanes. Wonder of wonders, if it wasn't the Empire State Building! The sign said only 15 - 20 minute queues, so we subjected ourselves to the search, repetitive sales pitch for the audio tour (ignore it, just enjoy the view) and queuing. What a lift. 82 stories in about the same time that you'd get up 6 or 7 in the multi-storey.
Views, naturally, are fantastic - but it's kinda hard to keep interested! It ends up looking so similar from each compass point, but that's not to diminish the impact. It genuinely is a cool view, and such an iconic building too.
So we queued to get back down, and wandered around the ground (first) floor a little, amazed at the number of tenants in a single building, and fell back out onto 5th Avenue. Lunched in one of those fantastic lunch shops that abound in NYC, where you can get sushi from one counter, a sandwich from another, and anything in between! We don't like Cherry Coke.
Our next stop was Saks, on 5th. Brown Thomas has nothing on this place. This is the Department Store to have a bag from, but we wouldn't afford anything in there - a single shirt was $450 and they had a domino set for $175. We didn't stay long in there, needless to say. Wandered on Downtown along Broadway, whereupon we found ourselves at Ground Zero (via Chinatown and a café).
Turning the corner 2 blocks away, it's immediately apparent that there's a huge gap in the city. You can see too far. It's too bright. Now, I think I finally have some tiny inkling of the loss and damage that New York suffered in 2001.
We wandered on, through Battery Park (near the Hudson) watched lucky people going out to learn to sail, and saw the sunset behind the buildings across the river in New Jersey, I think. Headed back to Broadway, and got something to eat in a nice restaurant. Made our way back to the subway, and our feet thanked us for finally giving them a break!
To be continued....
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