Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Back from the Big Apple!

Hi all,  done with the semester and just arrived home from NYC this evening....had a fantastic trip!!!  It was five days action packed days to say the least!  I feel like I now need a vacation from my vacation!  lol.

So to sum up what I did in the city that never sleeps - EVERYTHING!!!  And 400 pictures later.....


DAY 1 (Saturday): We left Ohio at 6:30am and arrived at Laguardia at 8am.  We took a taxi to our hotel in midtown Manhattan near Central Park and walked like 8 MILES all around the city.  Yes, 8 MILES!!  I think I took about 300 pictures the first day, and used up my entire memory stick by day 2 and had to delete a lot!  We went to tons of stores (but didn't buy too much), and the New York Public Library, Grand Central, 30 Rock, Toys R Us (to ride the ferris wheel!), and Times Square.



Day 2 (Sunday): Finally got to sleep in!!!  We had the double decker sight-seeing bus for 48-hours, so we took a bus uptown (east side, west side, and Harlem) and then downtown to Wall Street, Chinatown, Soho, Greenwich Village, Ground Zero, Battery Park, and the Empire State Building.  We went to The Little Chapel that Stood and Ground Zero, and checked out Century 21.  We went to Ellen's Stardust Diner for dinner that night.



Day 3 (Monday): Woke up early and took the subway to Chinatown for some purse shopping....oh yeah, you know what I'm talking about!  It was so cool!!  We went all crammed into these vans to look at purses.  I got a really cute Coach.  It was definitely an experience. Later we went on Scott's Pizza Tour through Little Italy, Soho and Greenwich Village - walked a TON and got pizza at Lombardi's (first pizzaria in NYC, and my fav....super thin coal oven pizza with fresh tomatoes and a little fresh mozzarella -- mmmmm), Joe's (by the slice gas oven pizzaria that was good, but much greasier), and John's (yummy coal oven pizza).  That night did the night tour on the double decker bus through downtown, and over to Brooklyn.  It was soooooo cold!!!!  Thank god we snuck blankets from our hotel to keep us warm up on the open air top of the bus!


Day 4 (Tuesday): Woke up even earlier to catch the 8am bus to Battery Park to go to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.  Didn't get off at Lady Liberty, but got some really awesome pictures!  Ellis Island was great!  My sisters thought it was so stupid, so typical of them.  They also thought the library was stupid.  Anything educational sucks apparently....  So we got back from Ellis Island and got back on our double decker bus and went uptown to Central Park and Bloomingdales!  Then it was time for LION KING!!  OMG, I am still speechless.  It was THE MOST INCREDIBLE SHOW I HAVE EVER SEEN!!!!  I'm seriously still in awe.  If you ever go to NYC, you MUST go see this show.


Day 5 (Wednesday): Slept in on our last day.  Today was shopping day, but first we went to Rockefeller Center and did Top of the Rock.  Wow, you could see forever it seemed!  The city was amazing!  It was the first nice day of the entire trip!  No rain, and 80 degrees!!  Even got a bit rosy on my shoulders!  After the Rock we shopped until heading off to the airport.  



And now I'm home and I'm missing the city.  Oh well, I will just have to start planning my next trip......