Manhattan, NY (January 9, 2015)

Our daughter was feeling much better the following morning, so our trip home should be good. We had breakfast at the hotel, and packed our belongings for the trip home. We would be traveling for most of the day, so we decided to pick up some food on our way to Penn Station. The girls found a little place called Sergimmo Salumeria that sounded delicious, so we walked a little bit out of our way to swing by and pick up some sandwiches for the ride. Our youngest daughter ordered a salami sandwich and our oldest daughter and I both had prosciutto. This was a true New York Deli. I had to watch other people to figure out how to order, and then I had to watch again to figure out how to pick up our order and pay. It was a very crowded, fast paced little deli, but I did it, and we had lunch; a big accomplishment.

Now off to Penn Station. As we walked into Penn Station, it looked very different than when we were there last. There was a big electronic board in the middle of the station (I’m sure it was here last time, but we sure didn’t notice it), and hundreds of people just standing around (they were definitely not here last time). We looked at the electronic board, thinking it would tell us how to get to the Newark airport, but for all we knew, it could have been in some other language. We had no idea how to read the board. 

Everything was so abbreviated, that we couldn't figure it out

We finally found a wonderful Amtrak employee who told us how to read the board, but she spoke with such a thick accent that we weren’t sure she was speaking English, and we definitely still weren’t sure how to read the board. 

So we went over and studied the board for a few minutes, and finally figured out which train would be ours. About 10 minutes before our trains arrival the track number appeared on the board. Our train would arrive at gate 7E. Now we knew exactly what we were doing. We looked like pros. We headed over to the sign for gate 7E, but when we got there, it felt like we were in the Harry Potter books trying to get to platform 9 ½. Gate 7E had one escalator, and it was coming up toward us, full of people. There had to be a down escalator somewhere and we were going to find it. We kept looking around, but there was no down escalator. And when we asked people where the down escalator was, they looked at us like we were crazy.   How were we supposed to get to our train? Finally, as we started to panic, thinking we were going to miss our train, a little bell sounded, and the escalator switched directions and started going down. We had never in our lives seen such a thing. Now as I’ve said before, there is a lot of open space in Colorado, so we have big hotels, and we have escalators that go up and down next to each other. We had never imagined that they would just reverse the escalator; what an ingenious idea! When you send small town girls to the big city, they are intrigued by the simplest of things! 

We got on our train, and experienced the most amazing sandwiches we have ever eaten. If I had known how good these were going to be, I would have ordered enough for a week. We will definitely go back to the salumeria if we are ever in New York City again. When the conductor came around, she checked our tickets and returned them to us. Since I had explained to the girls about the round trip tickets on our way into the city, I didn’t think I needed to explain it again, so I didn’t, but I probably should have. It was only by chance that they brought their tickets off the train with them. They had completely forgotten that they needed them for the air train. We took the air train all the way to the concourse for our gate, and went through security there. None of us remember the flight home; we had too many great memories going through our minds. The moral of this story…We Loved New York City! What an incredible experience for three small town girls.

Manhattan, NY (January 8, 2015)

Another early morning because today we will go see the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the World Trade Center Memorial and the Empire State Building. As we finished up breakfast, we headed toward the elevators, only to find a huge line of people waiting. When we asked what was happening, they said one of the elevators was stuck and the fire department had turned off both of them to work on the one that was stuck. Unfortunately for us, all of our stuff for the day was in our room, and we had a ferry to catch, but fortunately for us, we weren’t stuck in the elevator. So up the stairs we went. It wouldn’t have been too bad, but both of the girls kept getting tired, and then getting the giggles, so we kept stopping every 9 floors or so to recompose ourselves. Then off we would go again. We finally got to the 29th floor, got our things, and headed back down the stairs to catch our taxi. Now even this wouldn’t have been too bad, except that we weren’t just going to the Statue of Liberty, we had tickets to the crown; which meant many, many more flights of stairs in just a little while. It was going to be a good workout day. 

With the help of our taxi driver, we made it to Battery Park, through rush hour traffic, in time to catch our ferry. That taxi ride was $27.20. Not bad for rush hour. Through security, into the ferry terminal and onto the ferry we went. Inside seating was a must because it was 6 degrees and about 100 percent humidity outside. Not a good day for an outside ferry ride. It was crowded, but a nice ride. 

The ferry ride to the statue.  Photo-bombed by a NYC stalker ; )

Approaching the statue of liberty from the bay was quite a sight; so pretty. We could walk around the grounds, gift shop and cafeteria, but in order to get into the statue itself, we had to have a ticket and go through security again. Once we were through security, we were allowed into the pedestal area of the statue. Even the pedestal is quite high and gives you nice views of Manhattan. 

View from the island

The bolts that hold the statue in place.  Wow, kind of big!

Replica of Lady Liberty's foot

We're on the pedestal, looking up at Lady Liberty

View from the pedestal of Lady Liberty

Another view from the pedestal of Lady Liberty

As we proceeded to the stairway to the crown, our oldest daughter, became very quiet. She has a fear of heights and was really not looking forward to this part. The stairs to the crown are very interesting. They are very short, steep steps with a metal railing. It is almost like climbing up construction scaffolding, through the center of the statue. There are no walls, you look out and just see the inside of the statue. 

Starting to climb.  The stairs are steep, but not too high yet.

Climbing these is a little tricky

Looking out from the steps, you can see the frame of Lady Liberty.

Our oldest daughter had a really tough time with the climb, but she made it.  I was so proud of her!  In the crown, there is only room for about 10 people at a time. It is very small and doesn’t have a lot of head room. If you’re tall like us, you have to duck to avoid hitting your head. The views out the window of the crown were beautiful, and the inside of the crown itself was very interesting. 

Close quarters in the crown!

There are two park rangers that call the crown their office. They greet each guest that comes up, and make sure that everyone is respectful of the statue. They could tell that our oldest daughter was struggling, so they starting talking and joking with her. In no time at all, they had her laughing and really enjoying herself. They showed us the best spots for getting good pictures, and talked to us for a long time before we descended back down to island level. 

Park ranger stands on this piece of metal.  The drop below him is hundreds of feet.

And...the other ranger

 We grabbed some lunch and hot coffee in the cafeteria and then went outside to wait for the Ellis Island Ferry.   The prices in the cafeteria were very fair, and the food was good.

Both of the girls had an event in elementary school, called “Immigration Day”, which simulated what an immigrant went through at Ellis Island. Although many of the kids would have difficulties like quarantines, missing paperwork, etc. They all eventually made it through and got to enjoy a fun snack at the end. Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case for many who attempted to immigrate to the U.S. through the real Ellis Island. Many made it all the way to New York, only to die in quarantine or be sent back home. We all really enjoyed our day at the immigration museum, and gained a lot of respect for our ancestors who made it possible for us to live in this great country. 

The registration hall on Ellis Island.  Now part of the Museum.

The registry of immigrants.  Many people are able to find the names of their ancestors here.

A display in the Ellis Island museum

The ferry from Ellis Island returned us to Battery Park on the east end of the island. From there we started walking toward the World Trade Center Memorial. It was nice to see a completely different part of the city, and it actually felt quite warm compared to the ferry rides and islands. I think the buildings blocked a lot of the wind, making it a very pleasant walk. We were amazed by the beauty of the 911 memorial. It is very sobering to realize how many names there are from that tragic day. We reflected at the waterfalls for a few minutes and then paid our admission and went inside the museum. 

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The museum is gorgeous from every angle, which makes it hard to believe it is a tribute to such a sorrowful day. We watched a movie about 9/11 and then started through the museum. The details in the building are amazing and heart-wrenching.  Many of the displays are actual remnants of the building and ladder truck 3 from September 11th, 2001.

Part way through the museum, our youngest daughter got sick, and we ended up leaving before finishing our day. We caught a taxi outside the museum and for a small fee of $18.35 we arrived safely at the curb of our hotel. We got everyone up to the room and let sick girl sleep for a while. Our older daughter and I didn’t want to leave our daughter to go get dinner, so we ordered take-out from a Thai restaurant across the street. They delivered our food to the lobby, and it was some of the best Thai we have ever eaten. We all watched a little TV and called it a night.  What an amazing day in NYC.

Manhattan, NY (January 7, 2105)

One of the reasons I love Holiday Inn Express is that they have a free continental breakfast every morning. I’m not a huge breakfast lover, but I am always starving when I wake up, so breakfast is important to me. This hotel had the usual fair of eggs, bacon or sausage, varieties of breads, waffles and cereal, beverages and of course, their famous cinnamon rolls. It was simple, quick and easy and filled us up, and the staff is always so nice. Their dining room was an add-on to the building, and wasn’t heated at night. It was a bit chilly in the morning, so we would eat breakfast with our coats on. Not perfect, but it kept us from having to go out and scrounge up breakfast in the bitter cold. 

The icy view out our window of the hotel in the morning.  It's COLD!

Wednesday was “see the city” day. So early in the morning, we set out on foot toward Central Park. The city was a little bit quieter this time of day, but there were still lots of people getting coffees and heading to work. We made our way through the city slowly, enjoying all of the sights along the way, and ducking in, to warm up whenever we needed to. There weren’t as many stores open this time of the morning, so we couldn’t be as selective as we were the night before. 

The set of Good Morning America

We finally reached Central Park. It was a lot different than we expected. I don’t know why, but we thought it would have a lot of grass. It was natural landscape with lots of trees and concrete paths running through it. It was beautiful! As we left the buildings behind and entered Central Park, it was so relaxing. There was a little snow on the ground, so we tried to stick mostly to the paths so our feet wouldn’t be wet and be frozen all day. 

As we got into the park, we noticed an ice skating rink off to our right. There were probably about two dozen people skating, so we stopped and watched them for a while. 

As we continued on through the park, we saw a few horse drawn carriages taking tourists through the park. We probably could have seen more of the park that way, but we preferred the exercise. As we stood in the park and looked around, it was crazy to be in such a serene place, with sky scrapers visible above the tree tops on three sides around us. I’m sure that other parts of the park are much different than what we were able to see, but we truly enjoyed our short visit.

Our plan was to have lunch at Carnegie Deli for one of their huge, famous sandwiches. Steve has always talked about eating there when he visited NY.  But as we approached the deli, a storm was moving in, and we were chilled to the bone. 

You can see the yellow sign for Carnegie Deli behind the girls.

We decided to stop and get a sandwich to go, and just eat it when we got back to the hotel. It was quite a walk back, so by then we would be hungry, and we could warm up while we ate. Well, that was a big mistake. If you go to Carnegie Deli, go in and enjoy your humongous sandwich while it’s still hot, and let them keep bringing you bread as you eat. You won’t regret it. Although our sandwich was cold and a little soggy by the time we got back to the hotel, it was still delicious! Our one sandwich was $20.00, and was plenty for the three of us to share for lunch. And we were really glad we got back to the hotel before the cold wind came up too badly. We needed a little time to de-ice.

We had a reservation at Tony’s Di Napoli for dinner, a restaurant that the girls collectively chose, and tickets for the Lion King on Broadway for that evening. Tony’s was right on our way to the theater, and was a charming Italian restaurant. Since we didn’t have a refrigerator in our tiny room for leftovers, we tried to order small, although that was difficult because the menu had so many amazing options for numerous courses. We ended up ordering Sangria, salad and bread to start, and then finished with a wonderful mushroom pasta dish. We were hoping for dessert, but were stuffed and had to pass. I would love to go back to Tony’s when I could order everything I wanted and take the leftover’s home for later. A nice meal at Tony’s gave us plenty of time to warm up before venturing out again to find the Meincoff Theatre. 

We got to the theatre, and I was surprised at how few people were dressed up for the evening. I think it was probably because of the extremely cold weather, but that was a bit disappointing to us. The play was mind blowing! The costumes and props were unbelievable. If in New York, definitely make time to go to a Broadway play. 

Waiting for the Lion King to start

If you are going to be in New York for a week or so, you can even get discount tickets in Times Square. Any of the performances that are not sold out for that night will go on sale in the morning. You will have to wait in line to get them, but if you have enough time in NYC, I think it would be worth it. 

It had snowed pretty hard while we were in the theatre, and the walk back was quite brisk. We saw a city worker shoveling the sidewalks, and putting the snow into large trash cans on wheels. We thought that was odd, but then realized that we couldn't find any sewers for ti to melt into, so that made sense.  I assume they must take the snow somewhere and melt it down to get rid of it. Back at the hotel hot coffee and cocoa were waiting for us in the lobby to warm us up before bed.

Manhattan, NY (January 6, 2015)

Steve has been to New York City on business many times, and has always wanted to take me, but time just hasn’t allowed. So my Christmas present from Steve was a trip to the Big Apple with our girls. Steve had to work, but the girls would still be on their Christmas break, so the timing was great. Now I have to confess, I am not a big city girl, so the thought of taking our two young cubs (they’re only 18 and 21), into the big city all by myself, and feeding them to the wolves on purpose, was just a little bit daunting to me. I fretted over the trip for quite some time, but somewhere deep down inside, I was super excited too. My biggest fear was transportation from the Newark Airport into the City, and back out again. We really don’t do trains in Denver, so this was going to be a new experience for me. After a lot of research, we headed out into the great unknown. We flew Southwest from Denver to the Newark airport, where we then had to look for the NJTransit machines to purchase our train tickets. 

My research told me that I would need to purchase round trip tickets at the airport, so that upon our return trip, we could use our tickets for the air train as well as the NJTransit. I told the girls why we were buying the round trip tickets, even though I didn’t really understand it myself, but I did as I was told; Three round trip tickets from Newark to Penn Station, New York. We used our credit card to purchase the tickets, $75.00 for all three tickets. A bargain. We headed down the hall, and there was a terminal with tracks and glass doors on both sides. 

Ahh, so this must be the air train they were talking about. As our air train approached, it was a series of small cars. Only about 6-8 people could fit in each little car, so we had to make sure that we could all get in one together. Success, we were on the air train, now we just had to figure out where to get off. I can’t remember exactly, because I was kind of freaking out, but it seems like it went to the main airport terminal, and a few parking garage stops, and finally, the last stop (I think) was the NJTransit. We got off of the air train, and started looking for the right tracks for the train to Penn Station, NY. You know, if you ask enough people, and they keep pointing you in the right direction, it’s amazing how you can eventually find where you are going. We found our tracks, and waited for our train.  

The train was very nice, very clean, and pretty fast. From my research, I was pretty sure that Penn Station, NY was the last stop on this train, but of course, as any small town girl would do, I continued freaking out. There are two Penn Station stops on the train route, one in Newark, and one in NYC. We had to make sure to get off at the right one. It was now dark on the east coast, and I knew that we would still have to find our hotel once we got to the city. 

Probably five or six stops later, we finally made it to our destination. We got off the train and entered Penn Station, NYC. Penn Station wasn’t as huge as I expected, but it sure was crowded, even at 9:00 at night. It took up a full city block, and had signs at each exit for the cross streets you would be approaching from those doors. We originally thought that we would just walk to our hotel, about 11 blocks from Penn Station, which seemed reasonable, but now that it’s so dark, is that still a good idea? We headed out the doors that our little map told us to use, and to our surprise, the streets were full of people. All of the businesses were lit up and open for business. Yes, we would definitely walk to our hotel. This is great! Of course, never having been in Manhattan before, we had to take in the sights on the way to our hotel, so it took a little while to get there. We finally found our hotel, Holiday Inn Express Times Square. The hotel front was very tiny, and the building went straight up. We got checked in to our room and headed up on the elevator to check it out. We got off on the 29th floor, and were amazed to see that there were only 6 rooms per floor, three to the left of the elevators and three to the right. In Colorado there is room to spread out, so there are usually 20-30 rooms per floor. This was interesting. Our room was tiny, with two queen sized beds, and very little else. It was difficult to find a place for three suitcases, but we managed. If we wanted to sit down, it would have to be on the bed. But we knew that we wouldn’t be spending much time in our room anyway. And besides, the view was incredible! Our room overlooked the New Yorker, and the expanse of city that lay beyond it. 

Gorgeous view from the 29th floor!

We got settled in a little bit, and headed out to see Times Square. It was a 15 minute walk, with very crowded streets. It was very cold, so we kept ducking into stores to warm up. Times Square is near the garment and theatre districts, with so much shopping right at your fingertips. We had fun taking a cursory look at stores like H&M, M&M World, Fossil, etc. 

As we headed back to our hotel, we stopped at a burger place called the Shake Shack. Since we hadn’t had much to eat all day, we happily ordered burgers, fries and shakes. It tasted great, or maybe we were all just really hungry, but either way it was a fun, crowded, standing room only diner. 

 

Waiting for our order.  Standing room only.

So yummy!  Definitely worth the wait, and we actually found a little table.

To our delight, when we got back to our hotel, they had carafes of hot cocoa and coffee waiting in the lobby for us cold weary travelers.