Well, our trip to NYC did not go as planned.
We joined a group from our church on a bus to go to NYC for the day. I had found a great walking tour of Central Park for us to do. Alas, it was not meant to be. The weather did not cooperate, and neither did my planning skills. We settled for being dropped off in Times Square. The only thing we knew for sure was that we had tickets for the Empire State Building at some point.
We did get some goodies at Carlos's Bakery, then walked to the Nintendo Store. We were all in good spirits at this point. We then decided we could walk to Central Park and go to the museum that was on the walking tour that was free. This is where the wheels came off.
First of all, it's a long walk. I'm ok with that, but kids with empty stomach.... not so much. Second, I had the wrong museum in mind. So we walked up Madison Ave., up the length of Central Park, to the MET, which is not free. And would take a long time to see adequately to feel like we got our money's worth. We didn't feel like the hour and a half we had to spend were worth the cost. So we ate street food outside the MET and proceeded to try to figure out how to get to the Empire State Building from there. We should take the subway right? Of course! But the stations are also a long walk away.
Then Lyla had to use the restroom. Guess what? There aren't any. Anywhere we could find. And you can't use the restroom at the MET without buying a ticket to get in. So, accidents do happen. And we avoided getting arrested for urinating in the street. But Lyla got some new pants out of it in the end.
We did make it to the subway station. And we did figure out how to buy tickets and get near the Empire State Building. Then some of the stations were closed and we had to get off and get on a different line. The ladies at that station were totally unhelpful, but somehow I deciphered their mumbling answers to my requests for directions and we got on another train.
At long last, we did make it to the Empire State Building. The attendants were cautioning people that there was 0 visibility, so we could use our tickets another day if we wanted. Um, no. We are only here this one day so up we're going.
I have to say that this was the highlight. The Empire State Building is amazing. The elevator alone is crazy. To go up for far so fast, then get on a different elevator to go up even farther is mind boggling to me. And because of the low visibility, the place was almost empty. We basically had it to ourselves and about 5 other people. Other than one rude employee, the people inside were really nice too. We got to meander through the exhibits and listen to the audio tours. I suspect this would usually be a good way to kill time in line, but we go to go at whatever pace we wanted. The exhibits are really amazing and I just kept being in awe of how the building was made and what it took to complete it.
And finally we emerged at the observatory in a cloud. This was a really surreal experience. You could tell that we were crazy high up, but we couldn't see anything so it was a little disorienting. Every once in a while there would be a hole in the cloud that you could peer through and see the city below. There were the pictures on the audio tour to show you what you could see from each vantage point if it was a clear day. It was a crazy sort of end to a crazy day.
Once we came down (which by the way caused Gwyn extreme ear pain), we gave up on the subway and decided to get a cab back to the World Trade Center Memorial where we were to meet the tour bus to go home. We could not "catch a cab" though. I guess we don't really know how to do that unless you call for one. But an UBER driver did stop for us, so that worked out. Except that then the charge was four times as much as a cab calculator told us cab fare should have been. What 'cha gonna do? At this point we were all done, and it didn't matter.
We did have a little time to spare before the bus arrived so we were able to walk around the World Trade Center Memorial. The girls knew what happened on Sept. 11th, but this really gave them a perspective. The huge holes where the buildings stood is a very poignant reminder of loss. And the size of the space and the number of names displayed really made them realize the magnitude destruction on that day.
So I feel like we did go to NYC. We almost got to see cool things. We were next to cool things. We did go underneath, even though that was the point in the day that Jason and I came closest to an argument. But I don't really feel like we experienced NYC very well. To top it off, two of the three girls ended up with Strep Throat the next day, so they weren't feeling their best the whole day to begin with. All the girls said they never want to go to NY again, which is really unfortunate. I don't think this day should be representative of a trip to NYC. So I will take them there again, preferably on a day with good weather and a better plan of action.
