Days 40 & 41 - Museums, Memorials and Times Square

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Due to our lack of wifi in the room, we didn't upload a blog yesterday and so will be combining yesterday and today's events in this blog. Again, we still can't upload any pictures just yet; we may have to wait until we get to Philadelphia on Friday and then upload all of the New York pictures in one go (like we did for Vegas).

Yesterday we were up at around 9:30, with no particular plans for the day. We had some of our cereal for breakfast, then got showered and ready to go out. We decided that we would go to Ground Zero today, although we knew that we wouldn't get into the new 9/11 memorial, after checking on the internet and finding that advanced reservations were all fully booked until at least November. We caught the subway down to the Financial District, and followed the signs to the 9/11 memorial. As we got closer, we could see a large tower in the process of being built that we recognised as the new World Trade Centre. We had read on the internet that they were building this, but we didn't quite expect it to be as tall as it already is, towering above most of the buildings around it. Apparently it will eventually be the tallest building in the world once construction has finished.

We continued to follow the signs to the memorial, hoping that we might at least be able to get a glimpse of the large fountains that they have put in place of the footprints of the twin towers. As we walked, we could hear drums beating in the distance, and we soon realised that we had walked into the middle of one of the 'Occupy Wall Street' protests, as we were right in the middle of the Financial District. Thankfully, it all seemed fairly peaceful, mainly just people standing around holding signs and banners (although some had a slightly more menacing tone, such as "killing and eating the rich" :S ).

We eventually reached the entrance to the memorial, which we knew that we couldn't go into. We could see the large open space where the twin towers once stood, and there was more construction work going on behind large screens, which also blocked any views of the memorial, which we assumed was just behind the construction work. We went into the reservation building, which had pictures of the memorial, but was also a sort of memorial in itself. On one of the walls was an American flag with the names of all of the victims of the attacks written on them. There were also pictures of the attacks on the walls; a time-line of the events that took place that day; various other pictures, such as a fireman with a large memorial tattoo; and a model of the Statue of Liberty covered in photos of victims, American flags and messages of both grief and hope.

We left the building and noticed some steps leading to a bridge which crossed the road next to some of the screens. However, as we walked up, we realised that the bridge was more of an opaque tunnel, with no windows to look out of. We followed the tunnel into the World Financial Centre, which stood opposite the World Trade Centre site. From here, we could just about see the memorial through the windows, although it was mainly the people in there that we could see, standing around what we assumed were the fountains.

We then headed back the way we came, past Ground Zero and into the financial district. We were a little hungry, so had a bite to eat from a local cafe, before finding our way to the nearest subway station. It was feeling really hot and muggy today (we later found out that it reached around 28 degrees - not really normal for October in New York!) and so we decided to try and find somewhere to spend a few hours inside, where there would be some air conditioning to keep cool. We had a look through the CityPass booklet and decided to go to the Museum of Modern Art, hoping that it would be better than the one in San Francisco! It looked fairly promising on the ticket - it seemed to have more 'traditional' art work by more famous names such as van Gogh, Monet, Picasso and Dali.

Once there, we handed over our tickets, then were told that we would have to leave Craig's backpack in the cloakroom, as bags were not allowed inside. We took the camera out (and they also made us take out the netbook for some reason, giving us a small plastic bag to carry it around in) and gave us a bit of plastic with a number on to retrieve our belongings later. We picked up a floor plan, had a browse through, then decided to go to the top floor and work our way down. We reached the top floor, which was where the 'special exhibits' were. After a quick glance round and noticing that one of these consisted of a load of pretty rubbish-looking paintings from one particular unknown artist, and another being a more contemporary walk-through piece, which was basically some huge white sheets hanging from the ceiling that you walk around - neither of these really took our fancy so we swiftly moved down the stairs to the next floor.

We had seen on the map that this was the floor where most of the more famous artists' work was. We looked through the different galleries, taking photos of artworks such as van Gogh's 'Starry Nights', Monet's 'Waterlilies', and some of Dali and Picasso's paintings. We went down another floor, where we found Andy Warhol's paintings of Marilyn Monroe and Elvis. We wandered through the other galleries, taking pictures of some of the more random pieces (one being a blank wall that had been "pitted by a single air rifle shot" - after inspecting the wall for the bullet hole, one of the staff members leaned over and informed us with a smile that the rifle was empty and that nothing but air had actually touched the wall!).

We had soon had enough of looking at "art" (again, I don't think that we quite understood some of the more contemporary pieces!) and after seeing that there was another whole floor of contemporary art, we decided to leave the art gallery and go back to Times Square. We picked up our belongings from the cloakroom, then checked on the map to find the nearest subway station that would allow us to reach Times Square. As we made our way towards it, we could hear music from what sounded like a parade, so we followed the sounds to a street corner, where we saw people dancing in bright costumes and a marching band playing. We're not too sure what the parade was for, but the people in it seemed to be of Latin American/Mexican origins, and the music also seemed to be from that genre. We watched for a little while as they went past, then continued our journey to the subway station, where we caught a train to 42nd Street, just having to walk a couple of blocks to reach the middle of Times Square. As it was a Sunday (and also another Bank Holiday weekend here for Columbus Day), it was incredibly busy, compared to when we came on Friday.

We noticed on some signs that you could get free wifi in Times Square, so we headed over to the large red steps (that people basically use as seats) right in the centre. We walked up them and found a spot right at the back, where we turned on the netbook and connected to the wifi. We signed into Skype, wondering if anyone would be online, and found that Emma's family were online, so we chatted to them for a while, turning the netbook around so that they could see where we were! Craig messaged his Mom on facebook to see if she could go on, but unfortunately, she didn't read the message until the following day.

We sat there for a while, and decided to stay there until it got dark, as we had not yet seen Times Square at night. We were there for a few hours, taking pictures, browsing the internet and taking in the sights of all of the bright lights around us. We also got a bit of a show as the parade that we saw earlier reached Times Square, where they stopped and played some music for a while.

We left to go back to the hostel at around 7:30pm, catching the subway back to Cathedral Parkway. We stopped in the supermarket to pick up something for tea (we both just had a microwave meal), then went back to our room, eventually going to bed at around 11pm.

Today, we again woke up at around 9:30am, eating a bowl of cereal for breakfast before getting ready to go out. We had another flick through our CityPasses and decided to visit the Museum of Natural History. We left the hostel at around 11:30 and caught the subway down towards Central Park, where the museum stood just to the side of it. We found the entrance and handed over our CityPasses in exchange for entrance to the museum, and also admission for the Planetarium show at 1:00pm.

We grabbed a map and had a look over the different exhibits on the various floors of the museum. We went down to the 'Space' area, knowing that we would have to be at the planetarium in around 45 minutes time, so we didn't want to wander too far. We had a look around the exhibits, many of which contained large rocks, ores and natural minerals dug up from the earth's crust, and meteorites that had fallen over the years - one of the rocks even contained a large diamond. There were also areas explaining earthquakes, volcanoes, and climate change, and how all of these are recorded. Basically, in a nutshell, it consisted of anything you could ever want to know about what helps create - or is a by-product of - the natural elements of a planet and the planet itself.

Once we had explored the entire exhibit, it was just after half past 12. Since there was no point heading off in another direction, only to come back in 10 minutes time, we walked towards the entrance of the planetarium and waited for a while. we pulled out the netbook and made use of the free wifi inside the museum for 10 minutes or so, before finally getting to our feet and joining the queue that was now forming. After a minute or so, we were allowed into the elevator that would take us up to the 'dark room' - a dark room...(obviously) that they bundle you into to before the show to let your eyes adjust to the low lighting. There were a few screens mounted in the room that we a sort of prelogue to the real show, and soon enough, the doors were opened and we were let into the room to take a
seat.

The planetarium was much like the one we had visited in San Francisco, a large, domed structure with a 360-panorama made up of hundreds of screens on the walls/ceiling. Once everybody was inside and seated, the film began. It started explaining the creation of elemental life, from the dark matter that existed long before the universe, all the way to how much of the original building blocks of life still exist within humans today (a teaspoon full, apparently!) - what really made it cool was that due to the way you were positioned, and the way the room was shaped, you literally flew through space! It was all very geeky, but we loved it!

After it had finished, we went on to explore the rest of the museum. We figured the best way to approach it, would be to start at the top (the more exciting bit, filled with dinosaurs and extinct animals), then work our way down to the regular exhibits of dead/stuffed animals (really, America, why are they so interesting to you?!). As we expected, the top floor was pretty cool, filled with skeletons of dinosaurs big and small - including one of the only complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeletons on public display in the world, and also the first ever discovered full skull of Tyrannosaurus Rex, complete with huge teeth still intact! We wandered around, taking pictures of the different dinosaurs, and also of the other animals from that era, such as mammoths, massive giant turtles, bears, a HUGE rhino (although this was just a skull), saber-toothed tigers and various birds, crocodiles and fish.

We didn't spend too much time in the rest of the museum (it was kind of like a depressing zoo where all of the animals were dead and lifeless), and we left at around 3:30pm. We were both hungry by this point, so we bought a couple of gyros from a stall right outside the museum, before making our way to the subway. Craig had messaged his mom earlier to arrange to go on Skype at about 4pm, so we headed over to Times Square again, knowing that the free wifi there would suffice for the job at hand. Once there, we made our way over to the steps once again - it was a little quieter there than the previous day, thankfully! - and got out the netbook. As we were just connecting to the internet, some folks dressed in 80's flashdance-style costumes proceeded to stand up, one-by-one, clapping and cheering, as if to start a flash-mob (like the ones that you see in T-Mobile adverts). However, it seemed a little unrehearsed, was without any form of music, and faded about as quickly as it appeared, with them skulking off into the street when it became apparent that nobody was interested in what they were doing!

We chatted on Skype to Craig's family for a while, showing them the awe-inspiring cityscape surrounding us. Once we were done, we decided to stay around for a little while, taking in the sights, Emma browsing the internet while Craig read a few more chapters of the book that he's reading (The Green Mile). Finally, we decided to call it a day, knowing that we had to get up fairly early in the morning, and headed back to the subway station at around 6:30pm.

We popped in the supermarket on our way back for something to eat for our tea (and also some more cereal and milk for breakfast), brought it back to the room, ate it and have since spent a few hours just relaxing before another long day tomorrow, when we shall visit the Statue of Liberty.

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