New York, New York!!!

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‘Start spreading the news’ this place is AWESOME! We’ve just spent our last 5 days of the ‘moon in New York and loved every minute. It has to be the highlight of the trip. We arrived on Sat afternoon after catching the train from Washington DC. Prior to DC we had been traveling through South & North Carolina and Virginia - on the way pulling up at a rest stop and coming across a 1969 Shelby Mustang - Kent was so excited he took photos with the owner asleep, just inside it. We got into DC Fri lunchtime and checked out the American Museum of History one of the many Smithsonian buildings. It was interesting to know more of America’s history - particularly some of their impressions of themselves as a nation in relation to other countries. We then hit the Irish bar in our hotel and met a local guy who we chatted to all night. Woke shabby and caught the train into NY which was a smooth, uncomplicated way of getting into the city. We got a cab and quickly came to understand the stereotype of the NY taxis as being crazy - we nearly crashed into 300 + other cabs and cars while he and every other car on the road honked every 2 secs. We arrived at our hotel white faced but excited. We checked into the Waldorf and found our small but plush hotel room on the 12th floor. The view was gorgeous (not), but that’s just New York we came to realize. Walking around downstairs we did see our first and only celeb - William Defoe. We then stepped out into the high rise cluster…..had an Indian meal the first night…and I was just so happy to have some food that wasn’t bland and full of cheese (it’s traveling on the road that’s tough - lots of choice, but lots the same). The next day we hit a NY hop-on-hop-off tour on a double decker with no roof - it was fantastic because you got to see everything, but FREEEZING. I stopped and bought a wooly hat, and gloves, but kent said he didn’t like any of the hats…so him and his ears nearly froze off. Then it started to rain so he ended up putting one of the plastic ponchos on that the tour provided (sooooo much better than a hat, huh?!). We didn’t mind once we got off, had a drink in a bar and warmed up then we went out in our hotel for our (yes, it’s unbelievable - our one month wedding anniversary). I made us lug our wedding gear over, knowing that we’d have the perfect place, the Waldorf for an elegant, romantic night. We had a great time, though we were self conscious being so dressed up before our first couple of drinks kicked in. I wore the top of my wedding dress, with a black skirt and wrap and it went down well - after dinner we had drinks and met a scotish couple who live in Dubai - well 5 hours later we’d found out that they are probably millionaires, have NINE kids - from 19 to 4 months have lived in Dubai for 20+ years and come to NY once a year. They were lovely though and we’d like to keep in touch with them. I chatted about Tarzi and Megan and Brenton etc in Dubai and Andrea is keen to meet them, to welcome them to Dubai (pls remind me Lady xx). The next day once Kent got my hungover ass out of the hotel room we got back on the tour and went to see downtown - the Brooklyn Bridge, Ground Zero, The Statue of Liberty etc. We really liked that part of the city - Greenwich, Soho, the meatpacking district, Little Italy and Chinatown…..it had a more relaxed buzz to it. We had dinner at the oldest wood oven pizza place in NY in Little Italy - it’s been voted the best in the states and we have to agree…it was huge, but a really thin base with not too much topping. They call them pizza pies - hey…that’s amore’…ding a ling ling 😊….I couldn’t get the song out of my head - thanks Lee!! x Then we headed up to Times Square - checked out the lights (like Vegas) and had drinks at the Hard Rock Café. On the Tues we took off to Queens to look at a Harley and Yamaha dealer….Kent got a spiffy watch for his belated bday present and checked out a few bike jackets. Headed back over the river to Manhattan and the Rockefeller Centre - we went up the top and saw the city…amazing and a bit scary looking over the edge - eek. Downstairs they had the famous ice skating rink still going, with heaps of people whizzing around. We then walked to central park and had a horse and carriage ride around the park - I thought it was lovely, Kent said it didn’t do much for him because it lacked an engine…there was another ice rink in the park and lots of people just strolling around - fabulous!! Caught a cab down to Chinatown and walked around for ages - until we stumbled upon a bar called the fat black cat in Greenwich Village and it was happy hour - ½ price drinks….so we stayed. Around the corner there was a comedy club where Robin Williams and Jerry Seinfeld sometimes perform as it was one of the first places they started….we didn’t see either of them, but we did see some brilliant comedians over a space of 3 hours. Some of the stuff was ROUGH, but hilarious….we were in tears laughing for most of it.
Our last day full day in NY we went straight to MoMA - Modern museum of Art…it was amazing to see Andy Warhol pieces and the gift shop was fabulous!! After buying up, we headed my most anticipated tour we’d booked - a sex in the city tour!! The whole time we were in NY I had been relating parts of it to the series…this is where Carrie might have been etc. I dragged Kent along and we went on a 3 hour tour of some of sex in the city filming locations. The tour guide was fantastic - she just knew her stuff and talked about various episodes, and characters along the way…they even had tv monitors in the bus to show cuts of scenes to refresh your memory after she pointed out the actual location. We stopped into the adult shop where Charlotte bought her ‘rabbit’ and I got a sex in the city board game - yes folks I did keep it above board! We also stopped and had a famous cupcake and then walked to Carrie’s apartment’s stoop for photos (apparently Sarah Jessica only lives around the corner). The last stop we had cosmos in Aidan and Steve’s bar ‘Scout’….it was a great tour, except for a teenage couple who were loudly sucking face the whole time behind us on the bus - gross (yep, we are officially and old married couple). Check out some of the photos from the tour anyway. We then caught the subway to Times Square again and then headed back to the hotel to pack and get some sleep. We managed about 2 ½ hours sleep before we had to leave to get to JFK airport…and after the trouble we had in Vegas airport we gave ourselves plenty of time to check in (got there at 3.30am!!). The flights were ok, first to LA, then to Sydney but as Kent warned me, people start getting real stinky after 20 hours….I was glad to get some fresh air. A quick stop in Sydney - 3 more hours sleep and back into Adelaide on Sat morn the 1st of April. It is so good to be home, but weird and now we have to get back to normal life and lo and behold look after ourselves instead of having someone cook, clean etc for you!!
The trip and honeymoon was an incredible experience for us …and no doubt we’ll bore you silly with stories and photos from it. Thank you to all that helped contribute to our honeymoon…we’ll appreciate it with fond memories of a loving, magical journey together that we’ll hold close to our hearts forever. We have missed you all so much and can’t wait to see you soon. I’m not back at work until Mon the 10th, so I will hopefully see some of you this coming week. Call us - let’s do coffee/drinks/dinner/lunch whatever!!!
Much Love always,
Ailsa and Kent (the no longer honeymooners - just the married couple 😊)
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