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Published: February 4th 2015
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Late start this morning so we headed down to the dinner for brunch. Stuart had waffles and I had what was described on the menu as two eggs (your choice) plus bacon. What came out was three (menu definitely said two!) eggs, a pile of bacon, two pieces of toast and potato. I managed to eat the two eggs which were more yellow than they really should be or by what I consider to be normal.
From there it was the subway down to the Natural History Museum. Being a Saturday it was slightly chaotic, people everywhere. We checked out the animal exhibition briefly and then the dinosaur display which had considerably more dinosaurs, and greater variety of dinosaurs than the Natural History Museum in Washington.
We then decided to head back to the hotel so Stuart could watch a soccer game and I went for a walk to find some postcards and New York cheesecake which ended up forming lunch.
In the mid afternoon it was time for some shopping and window shopping.
For dinner we headed to a cute little Thai place not far from the hotel where we got a tasty dinner. Apparently their
curry puffs stack up with some of the best. Except that they had chicken mince in them which was slightly different.
After dinner we caught the subway downtown where we had a reservation at the Comedy Cellar. Joined the reservation line in the cold and wind and waited half an hour before slowly getting entry into the venue. Pretty intimate venue, they crowded people into it pretty tight.
Unfortunately we ended up being in one of the front tables with quite a few other couples and I had read reviews online that suggested that wasn't a great place to be. Thankfully though we were sufficiently off centre not to end up being the butt of any jokes but the others to our right weren't quite as lucky. Most of that came from our MC for the evening though.
We saw about four or five comedians, one of which opened for the Louis CK gigs, another couple who appeared regularly on Comedy Central. Even one female comedian among the midst.
Ended up being another very funny evening though, after which time we jumped the subway back home in the cold.
Next morning we grabbed a bagel
for breakfast before heading out to the Intrepid Sea. Air and Space Museum. It is essentially a military and maritime history museum based on and around the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid.
It also features the submarine USS Growler, a Concorde SST (which unfortunately we couldn't get into), a Lockheed A-12 supersonic reconnaissance place and the Space Shuttle Enterprise. The Intrepid itself seemed quite large although not in the best of repair, but given it was first commissioned into service in 1944 I guess that is no surprise.
The line for the Growler was long and neither of us fancied joining the hundreds of other people lined up to crawl through small spaces in the sub so we skipped that component but did spend a little time checking out the other displays and exhibits in the museums attached to everything.
From there we walked down to the Chelsea High Line.
Grabbed a giant pretzel on the walk and no sooner did I hold it did I have a pigeon swooping down trying to get it from my hand. Scary... I really don't like pigeons. Anyway, the 34th entrance was closed due to ice and snow so we
had to continue down to the 30th street entrance, and ended up walking quite a few blocks.
It is almost two and a half kilometers long and is a park built on an elevated section of a disused New York Central Railroad spur called the West Side Line. It is usually an 'aerial greenway' although with it being water and snow remnants from earlier in the week still around it was more like a snowy, dead tree park.
Still pretty though and I could imagine why it would be pretty and popular in summer. After grabbing a snack for lunch we headed back to the hotel for an hour or so before heading out for some more shopping.
Then it was back to the Theatre, this time to see The Book of Mormon which was an entertaining and quite funny take on religion, following two Mormon trainees who go to Africa on a mission. Great seats again, very crowded and cold theatre but very good show, with original music and he advantage of us not knowing the storyline either!
The next morning it was back for a breakfast bagel before we headed down to Battery Park
and south wharf to get a Statue Cruise out to Liberty Island and to see the Statue of Liberty. We had timed it pretty perfectly, allowing sufficient time to get lost and go through what had been described as airport-style security measures.
Got to South Ferry station where we were supposed to depart and as it was the end of the line we took our time getting off. And the doors closed. Whole lot of people standing on the platform too. And we listened to a few messages before finally they said there was a problem and they would have to go back a stop.
This meant a longer walk where we didn't really know where we were going through a snow-covered park slipping and sliding in water and getting our feet wet.
Made it through the first lot of security and on to the ferry with about five minutes to spare. Ten minutes later we were on Liberty Island, home of the Statue of Liberty.
It is only small, visibility was pretty average and it was freezing. Raining and windy and pretty disgusting. We had tickets to climb up to the crown but given how
poor visibility from the pedestal was opted not to bother with the climb. Instead we walked around the island as much as we could stand and checked out the museum.
Then it was back on the ferry, where we also didn't bother visiting Ellis Island for the same reason. While we were downtown we grabbed a bite to eat before heading to the 9/11 memorial. Only the south tower was open/ not fenced off, I think because they hadn't yet cleaned the sleet, ice and snow from the north tower. Due to the winds and weather the waterfalls were also turned off but it was still nice to see.
We also stopped by the 9/11 Tribute Centre which tells the story of that day through people who were there, like the fire fighters and so on. Interesting but small and not the 'official museum'. Interestingly, and trust me to notice this, there wasn't actually a single description of what '9/11' is and/or what occurred on that day. There were snippets of the information through the story and guessing given the recently of the event and who would be likely to visit they don't feel it is needed but
I still found that interesting.
Then it was on to Wall Street to check it out. Saw the bull. That was all.
And then it was back to the hotel for the final holiday load of washing, which always takes too much time. Had dinner at Shake Shack in Times Square which was manic, massive line, had to stalk people for a table to sit and eat.
Also did a little shopping while we were there although I still didn't buy anything for myself. This was followed by a visit to the Empire State Building in the freezing cold.
No lines though which fantastic as I can see why it would be terrible during peak season, lines around every single corner. The visit to the Observation Deck ended up lasting about 10 minutes outside, stunning views of the lights over Manhattan but icy icy wind. On the ground the wind was ok, but 86 floors up it felt like it would push you off the top of the building, or make you lose your beanie.
From there it was home to bed.
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