Our final day of our vacation left us until 4 pm to squeeze in every last item deemed most important on our agenda. Before we left Oregon, I got on Facebook and asked my friends what we HAD to see...and we got so many great answers, and did lots of research....so we had a huge list of things we wanted to see. I showed our list to my sister on the day we arrived, and she laughed, told us to pick the top 1/3 of the stuff on our list and said that was all we would be able to fit into a week. I can say that we got to see *almost* everything on our list. We did have to majorly fly through a few of those museums...but didn't feel too bad about that since we had a great discount with our city passes. But we did have to cross some crazy cool stuff off of our list, like the New York Botanical Garden, with the last remaining old growth forest from before Europeans. And going to see WICKED...or any Broadway show really. We tried one night to leave Milo with my sister, and we made it all the way to Times square, when she called us and Milo was screaming and wouldn't stop. So we came back to get him. It was our first attempt at leaving him with anyone besides Brent. And it was FAIL. Oh well! They're only babies for so long. We also really wanted to visit "New England," or anywhere out in the countryside...but we realized we had so much to see in the city that we might we wasting our time to leave. That will have to be another trip!
Anyway, we wrote out a very detailed agenda of where we wanted to go on our last day (down to the hours of when we needed to be where because our flight was leaving at 8:15 pm), and we struck out on our own to run a marathon around Manhattan, over to Brooklyn and back to Harlem...all by 4 pm.
We started by taking the subway to Times Square, and transferring over to Grand Central Station. It is a beautiful building, build by the same architect as the Ellis Island immigration building from the day before. I loved all the constellations painted on the ceiling. We looked in the shops for souvenirs for our children and babysitters. We bought a toy subway car and a dozen of Magnolia Bakery's famous cupcakes. And some real New York bagels and cream cheese. Then we got back on the subway (didn't even go outside) and headed down to Chinatown. The goal was to walk through Chinatown to pick up some cheap souvenirs, and navigate our way to the Brooklyn Bridge so we could walk over it.
The center picture on the bottom was a funeral procession. Brent wanted me to take a picture, but I was nervous about upsetting someone, so I had Brent stand in front so it looked like I was only taking a picture of Brent!
This collage is just a bunch of images on our way from Chinatown to the Brooklyn Bridge
FINALLY! For three days we had planned to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge and had ended up crossing it off our list for a museum that had limited hours, or because it was rainy or too dark, or my sister was with us and didn't want to go, etc, etc. I REALLY wanted to walk across the bridge. It's free! And it's SO cool and utterly worth it!!
I am in LOVE with this selfie that Brent took. Hahaha!
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| This is a really zoomed in view of the Statue of Liberty from the Brooklyn Bridge |
Once we got across we really wanted to go get lunch at Grimaldi's Pizza under the bridge! We didn't have much time, but we decided to go for it. We had the address, but did not have a smartphone, so we found some street maps and were able to navigate ourselves to the place where we could eat famous Brooklyn Pizza that you fold in half to eat.
Too bad when we got there, we found out that they only accept cash, AND you cannot buy pizza by the slice...only a whole pizza. Well, we didn't have enough cash, and didn't need a whole pizza, AND didn't have time to wait around for a pizza to bake. SO SAD. If anyone reading this ever wants to walk the Brooklyn Bridge and go to Grimaldi's, make sure you bring plenty of cash and have extra time. I guess they're so famous that they can do what they want, but I really think not selling pizza by the slice is hurting their business.
ANYWAY...we found our way to the nearest subway station and waited to take the subway under the East River and back over to Manhattan, where we would go all the way back up to the west side of Central Park. CRAZY! And sitting there thinking that we'll be passing through this same subway station later this evening on our way to the airport!
Here's Brent sitting in the Brooklyn station, looking young enough to be a teen parent.
We decided to get out by the Lincoln Center again, so we could stop at Le Pain again to buy some delicious hazelnut spreads to bring home with us. (They are still sitting in our pantry...being savored very slowly.) And we passed by the New York City LDS Temple again:
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| New York City LDS Temple |
We had been hoping to go and do a session at the temple together one morning too, but there was the whole leaving baby fail that made us decide against that plan (I had breastmilk pumped, but the {brand new Avent} bottle I brought had leaked the milk out everywhere {HATE the new design}).
Le Pain is right behind the temple. How nice.
We then walked several blocks to the final destination on our New York City Pass: the National Museaum of Natural History.
Haha! New York City problems...
We LOVE, LOVE museums.
museum pigeon
Brent was VERY delighted and VERY surprised to find the one and only "Willamette Meteorite" at this museum! WOW! The city we live in, in Oregon is right along the Willamette River, at the north end of the Willamette River Valley, which is the final destination of the ancient Missoula Floods. This meteorite is a chunk of space rock that landed somewhere in Southern Canada, and was violently transported down to Oregon by the Missoula Flood. Brent has been searching for glacial erratics carried by the flood for the 5 and a half years that we have lived here. He knew the meteorite was gone, but he thought it was at the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. So it was with great delight that we found it here, in New York City. You can see Brent in the top right picture of the collage looking very excited in front of the meteorite, and a descriptive plaque on the top left.
The Willamette Meteorite
More museum fun! There are 5 floors in this museum, and we had approximately 15 minutes to look at each floor. We also got free tickets to the space show there. Oh and don't forget lunch! We ate at the museum cafeteria, which was delicious and quick.
This museum is where the movie "Night at the Museum" takes place. It is one of our family's favorite movies, but the museum didn't look very much like the one in the movie.
Back underground, we had to get to my sister's apartment to pack up our stuff and get on a subway train to the JFK airport by 4:15, so we would have plenty of time.
more amazing subway art! I missed many great pictures of a butterfly and other animals because we were in such a rush!
We got back to my sister's place right on schedule and had to throw everything into our bags so fast that I forgot my dang glasses! But we made it. And we took a long subway ride back down Manhattan with all our bags, during rush hour (packed train!), through Brooklyn, and over to the airport in Queens...and I must say that by the time we were over there we were the ONLY tourists on the subway. It was quite strange. And we slept on and off in the plane for about 4 hours, in which Milo was a perfect angel who didn't make a peep. And Brent sat next to a drunk guy who asked all about our LDS faith for the first hour or two (while I half-slept)...and BELIEVE me when I say that he asked all the question that you would expect a drunk guy would ask about the LDS religion. Lol! But he was nice, and got some good closure from Brent's answers about the afterlife and how our loved ones are living after they die (his wife had died recently).
We made it back to Oregon where our lovely friends Tara and Tiana were there to pick us up and drive us home, well after midnight. Our lovely children were happy to see us in the morning...though they did have a great time having their Auntie and Uncle stay with them.
New York City. If you haven't been there, I highly recommend it. Going there, being there kind of feels like...it makes the world more relevant. When I hear about NYC, or watch a movie filmed there or see a landmark...now I have a map and a picture in my head. And I like that.
1 comments:
What a great trip! I've been to NYC several times since all of my extended family is in New Jersey, but you saw things I haven't seen yet. I'm so glad you got to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. My dad and I did that years ago, and it just felt iconic somehow. I'll always remember it.