On our third day in the city, Dave and I took the "divide and conquer" approach. Davey and I got up early-ish and headed uptown to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We both quickly discovered that there would be no way we'd see everything we wanted to during this trip! What a huge, and wonderful place to get lost inside!! I think my son took a million pictures, ran his camera battery down to nothing, then took my iPhone to take more pictures--running my battery down to nil! It was a definite "hit" with my little historian.
That same morning Joey wanted to go to the Toys R Us located in Times Square, because they have an indoor ferris wheel! What fun! Dave and Joe did the toy store thing and then met up with Davey and I at Serendipity 3 for lunch and dessert.
Ok, Dave and I had lunch. The kids, being on vacation mode, decided that life was way too short to NOT have dessert first! Each of them had a huge sundae for lunch-- I know, bad parenting!! But, yeah, you DO only live once!
Very full tummies and the *obvious addition of triptophan to the ice cream products, caused us to head back to the hotel for a little while to rest and digest. Then we were off again for the Statue of Liberty. Or so we thought!
I had bought tickets online and read the fine print incorrectly. Thinking the last ferry left Battery Park at 6:15, we just took our time walking downtown until we felt we could get a cab for the remainder of the trip. It was 4:30... in New York. Dumb, dumb, dumb move! Why is it when you're on vacation, it seems like everyone else in the world MUST also be on vacation? Well, surprise---these people who weren't on vacation were getting out of work, and taking cabs. All of them!
When we finally got a cab, he took us the "long way" to battery park. "Because of the traffic", he said. Yeaaahhhh...okkkay?!
We went via the East River and were nicely surprised to be able to show the kids the Brooklyn Bridge, which really is a beautifully designed bridge! But still in bumper to bumper traffic, all we wanted to do was just get to Battery Park!
Upon arriving to the Park, we were pleasantly surprised that there were absolutely no lines to get on to the ferry to the Statue! SCORE!! We knew if we timed things correctly, we could beat these insane crowds! As we power walked our way to the dock area, where we assumed a security check would occur, we found no one. Not a soul.
Come on! It's only 5:15 and the last boat leaves at 6:15!!
No. I was totally wrong. The last boat leaves the Statue at 6:15. The last boat leaving Battery Park was at 4:30. Oh man!! We were all so disappointed!
We decided to walk a couple blocks up the street to Ground Zero and look at the progress being made through the windows of the Financial Center. While there we met and spoke to a security guard whose re-telling of the events from a personal perspective brought tears to our eyes. He also told us that the Marriott, which Davey and I would have been asleep in that morning was actually crushed when WTC2 fell. A new set of chills came over Dave and I!
The Freedom Tower is going to be amazing! They are already over 70 stories into its completion, and the 9-11 museum is almost ready for the September 11 opening this year. So many emotions came over us during this visit. While the Statue of Liberty is an important symbol of the freedoms we Americans are blessed to have, seeing this area where terrorists attempted to steal our freedom from us was even more meaningful in many ways.
That night we headed back to midtown, and decided to take in the Empire State Building. It was 8:30, and the building was open until 2am. How long could this take? Maybe 30 minutes, right? OH>>>MAN!!
(to be continued)
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