Monday was our first day to head out on our own, and we did ok! I think. My sister had us well versed on the amount of pushiness required to ride the subway. We had a pretty full schedule planned (we were going to take the subway to Times Square, walk to the River and get on the Water Taxi, take it to the 9/11 memorial, Brooklyn Bride, The South Street Seaport, etc...but somewhere between getting off the subway and making it to the Water Taxi, we were given a convincing sales pitch to buy tickets for the Hop-On-Hop-Off Bus Tour instead of the Water Taxi. And thus, we fell victim to the dog-eat-dog sales tactics the city is known for. But that's ok. It was fun!
Ah, the excitement of Times Square!
And the HOBBIT!! So exciting!
(we just saw that two nights ago!)
And WICKED!!
Which we were hoping to see, but alas it did not work out.
The sights on our bus tour:
On the top left, going clockwise: the Flat Iron Building, the city building, the Empire State Building, NYU, some protesters wanting to stop Obama from starting WWIII, building details, open air bus, random building and church, and Milo.
We hopped off at the World Trade Center stop and visited the St. Paul's Chapel, which is right next to the World Trade Center Site:
After walking around a little bit, trying to orient ourselves on which direction we needed to go to get to the World trade Center Site...we were lucky enough to notice a small store front where you pick up the free tickets for the 9-11 memorial, which was blocks away from the memorial. We ducked inside and waited in line for tickets, which did not take long...HOWEVER, the next available entry time for the memorial was an hour away! NOT quite enough time to see anything else before, and TOO MUCH time to stand around waiting! So we decided to walk across Lower Manhattan during that hour, through the Financial District and over the the South Street Seaport. A note of advice: you can reserve tickets over the phone or online, to save time. Wish I had thought of that before! Also- we were hoping to visit the African Burial Ground, across from The World Trade Center Site...but it is closed on Mondays. Bummer! We read several recommendations for that place.
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| OK, that picture on the top left is the only picture we took in the Financial District. It is a statue of George Washington, erected on the location where he was inagurated as the first president of the United States. Pretty BIG deal! The rest of the pics are at the Seaport. The middle pic on the bottom is the Titanic Memorial Lighthouse. |
A panorama of the Seaport and the Brooklyn Bridge in the background .
The World Trade Center, and 9-11 Memorial:
There are two huge fountains in the footprints of the original Twin Towers, with the victim's names engraved all around the outsides. The water is separated into individual streams before it cascades over the large drop off, where the individual streams once again become one with the water in the pond below...before it drops off into the square hole in the middle, of which onlookers cannot see the bottom. We were thinking the individual streams represented the individual lives lost in the tragedy. Once they were killed they became one with the rubble of the buildings and ashes of the other survivors. And the bottomless hole represents the finality of death.
It is a somber place.
Not only is it the location where the attacks took place, and many lives were lost...but it is essentially the final resting place and cemetery for their loved ones to visit. I know how sacred and special Elsa's final resting place is to me. This location held a great spiritual resonance.
a rainbow of hope. Yes, there is still hope, even here.
The lone tree that survived the attacks.
The One World Trade Center Tower that is being built to replace the Twin Towers.
After leaving the 9-11 Memorial, we had planned to walk across the Brooklyn Bride and get pizza at Grimaldi's (famous pizza), but instead we decided to take the Hop on Hop off Bus back uptown to visit the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art) before it closed for the day. We could always see the Brooklyn Bridge after museums are closes, after all. We had City Passes for the MOMA and wanted to make sure to use them!
Here are our pics from the ride back uptown:
Top left, going clockwise: Some tenement housing that immigrants would live in upon arriving to America, the details on a church, the Rockerfeller Center, a father back view of the church, a closeup of the statue, Brent and Kate with the Brooklyn Bridge in the background, a Gaudi building (very interesting architecture), Milo on the bus.
When I first saw this picture, I thought "what a dumb picture," but when I realized what it was I had to laugh. This is a picture of Brent (on the bus) looking at the United Nations Building. We were disappointed that none of the flags were up...thus the frowny look. I guess they only fly the flags when they're in session. Sad for us!
We got off at the Rockerfeller Center stop and ran over the the MOMA, with one hour to spare before they close for the day...and went straight up to the fifth floor, to see my absolute favorite art in creation:
Some of my favorites:
Clockwise from top left: Cezanne fruit, Cezanne trees, Van Gogh trees, Van Gogh Starry, Starry Night (the original!), two of my favorite Picasso's, Brent in front of a Mondrian, a Gaugain, a Mattise, a Monet, and to the right of the Monet is a detail of the brushstrokes in the Monet.
The Great Hall of Monet
Henri Mattise "The Dance" has been a favorite of mine since my sophomore year in college
The other floors had some cool more modern art, which I did not know much about, except for a few Matisse sketches and such, but it was fun to see!
We left the MOMA pretty hungry, having skipped lunch trying to pack everything in! We had heard the cafe at the MOMA was fantastic, and were hoping to eat there, but alas, it closes when the galleries do. We wanted to spend our precious hour there looking at the art, not eating. So we wandered around the city for a little bit, looking for a place to eat!
We passed "Jonny Utah's" which we thought was funny since Brent has a brother named Jonny who lives in Utah! We passed the Radio City Music Hall and the Library with the lion statues. And finally, just off 5th avenue, we stumbled upon a street sign that said "Little Brazil!" Yay!! How fun! Brent served his mission for our church in Brazil, so we walked down the street and found a restaurant. Brent said it was very authentic to the area he served his mission, in Bahia. We ordered a Fejuada (beans and meat), and a delicious fish stew (my favorite).
OUR FINAL STOP FOR THE EVENING:
When we stepped out on the observation deck, it was really windy. Milo really hated that, so we didn't get to spend much time up there, but quickly took pictures from every side.
Then we rode the subway back up to my sister's place. Milo did really great all day! In exception to the Empire State Building observation deck.
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