The Bright Lights of New York

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We are up earlyish for our Madam Tussaud’s museum visit. Again, we are able to walk there taking in the sights and sounds of New York City. I love it, there is so many things going on that for a tourist there is no quick way of getting anywhere! The walk up Seventh Avenue holds almost as many of the label shops as Fifth Avenue, but not as pricey and then there are lots and lots of smaller shops mixed in to make your day interesting - and potentially expensive. Luckily we have somewhere to be so we hold ourselves back (that’s right, both of us, my Tim is a good little shopper himself!).

We pass through Times Square and it is breathtaking, we are coming back here tonight to see Jersey Boys on Broadway and can’t wait to see it night. Even during the day it’s buzzing, huge screens the size of buildings everywhere, lights flashing, even a little police station - right next to a Military Recruitment centre, don’t know if there is a message in that…

MADAM TUSSAUD’S NEW YORK

It’s our third, and last, Madam Tussaud’s. I actually thought we may be over them but they all have something different and the figurines still amaze us! We have a little bit of a wait (but nowhere near as long as the queue across the road for Planet Hollywood for breakfast!) and before we know it we are in.

It was as good as both London and Amsterdam, except without the ridiculous crowds at London, thank goodness! They have a lot of similar figures but with a few additions like Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian and Jessica Simpson, and yes, Tim had his photo with all of them - lucky girls - but also the closest I’d ever let him get to them, haha!

They didn’t have their cash registers open to have photos’ with anyone either, like Barrack Obama and the little lady. Although we didn’t have to pay, there was still a long queue so we just snuck a photo in between other people, the only thing it was missing was us…

There was also a really great dedication to 9/11 of the 3 firemen raising the American flag amongst the rubble. We had since seen quite a few posters of the same scene, so we assume at the time it was a popular picture of a very poignant moment.

We bypassed the scary section, we have so many excuses as to why where do I start….my ribs hurt, too many people, had already done it in Amsterdam, we were fraidee cats… all of the above!

They had a 4D show of Wizard of Oz shortened down into a 10 minute version of the original, Tim thought it ‘equally as boring’ and although I was surprised how 10 minutes of the movie is apparently all you need to perfectly tell the story, it didn’t translate well into 4D, so for different reasons we both didn’t care for it, oh well, you can’t win them all.

By now it’s close to lunchtime and it’s starting to get busy so we were lucky to get her early.

HARD ROCK CAFÉ

We nip over the road to Hard Rock Café for lunch, the menu and shop prices are a lot less here than Europe or Canada, even after you add on taxes. The food and service were both great, only complaint is that it’s below street level so no view and even though the atmosphere was still good, as a tourist it would have been good to watch the New York world go by as well.

We have a bit of a snoop around Times Square then head back to hotel for a Nana nap for Tim and some rib rest time for me before going out tonight.

MONK’S RESTAURANT aka SEINFIELD’S DINER

Since we have a little time to kill we decide to go in search of the Restaurant used in Seinfeld. The concierge prints everything out all the information we need and off we go to the Subway.

It’s at the other end of Central Park so it’s back to the subway. It doesn’t take us too long to find it and you can tell from the outside it’s the same building, but at the same time it’s definitely not the same inside. They have the windows pretty well covered with furniture and such so it’s pretty hard to see inside but we find a spot and peek in. We thought it would be a big ask that it was set up the same and it was far removed from what you see on TV, the inside scenes are obviously done on a set. The doors aren’t even in the right place! Although you would think they would be able to cash in on all the Seinfeld fans if they set it up the same.

There is actually a Seinfeld tour done by the real Kramer, but we didn’t find out about it until too late.

So we decide to walk back through Central Park, it’s not that far we figure. Well we figured wrong, Central Park is so big, so we get about half way through the park and jump back on the subway.

BROADWAY AND JERSEY BOYS

About 6pm we’re back walking down the street to go and see Jersey Boys. It tells the story of their career and being American they get the Jersey accent beautifully, I wonder how it would have been on Oz… I loved it, the music was great and the actors hit their characters to a tee. I already want to see it again back home!

Tim thought it was a good show and he knew some of the songs, but there was a lot that he didn’t. For him the story wasn’t as easy to follow as Mamma Mia.

The one thing we definitely agreed on was that the audience wasn’t as involved as it was with Mamma Mia. Then you could hear half the audience singing along (me included) and at the end, every single member of the audience were on their feet singing and dancing, although with the ribs, perhaps it was a good thing!

But still a great show with great music, that like I said, I’d love to see again.

The show finished about 9:30pm so we walked the 1km or so to the Empire State Building. Along the way we get dinner at a roadside cart, Tim got a chicken kebab in a roll and I got a pretzel. Everywhere you look in New York they are selling pretzels, probably more than donuts, so I figure there has to be something to them. Not so much, I thought they would be light and fluffy like a donut, but it was harder, like the crust of toasted bread. At least I can say I’ve tried one I guess. And to top it off, I ate it too fast so had indigestion on top of my damn ribs. Found a souvener store on the way so Tim and I used a little retail therapy for me to get over the indigestion and Tim to get over Jersey Boys!

EMPIRE STATE BUILDING

Once we got to the Empire State Building we were pleasantly surprised by the short queues, 10:30 at night I think may have helped but time is a little irrelevant in New York, that’s why it’s open until 2am.

Like all other tourist attraction these days, security is really tight and very thorough. We are going up to the 86th floor but have to switch elevators at the 80th floor, we have to wait only another 10 minutes here, so all up it was pretty good. The funny thing though, was that they hadn’t adjusted the security barriers for less people so you had to snake through a never ending barrier, it was funny to watch, and from above it would have looked like we were all playing Frogger!

Once outside there were a lot of people there, it was really windy and a bit on the fresh side since we were so high up. I was wearing a shortish VERY flowy dress so my challenge was only letting everyone up there see the dress, and not the under things! It took a lot of holding, Tim thought it quite funny!

The view was absolutely amazing, lights that went on forever and you could see a big blue glow where Times Square was. With all the tall buildings and the bridges all aglow, it was definitely a view not to be missed.

I wonder what it would look like during the day, no doubt it would look immense but I think the night view would have to be the best.

We hit the souvenir shop on the way down, it’s conveniently on the 80th floor where you have to change elevators - very clever! They took a photo of us before we went up so we bought this and included is a disc of lots of New York photos’, works out well because we could never have taken the night shots as good as those ones.

As I’m pretty sore now and Tim is tired we take a quick 10 minute taxi ride back to the hotel, getting back about midnight - whew, what a great day!

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