New York, New York

Since moving to the East coast of the USA, less than 5 hours away from the much touted New York City I've been wanting to go and check it out, but for some reason I've never actually gotten there. But finally, this week, my time has come.  Andy had a work meeting down in  New York that he had to go to so I pestered him and pestered him until he finally agreed to take us with him.  We had originally planned to leave early Thursday morning so Andy could be there for his Thursday afternoon apointment, but when Lexie Josh and I got home on Tuesday night we were greeted by Andy with the news that his appointment had been moved forward to Thursday morning so we now had to go down Wednesday.  We figured that since we had some extra time up our sleeves we could head down around New York to New Jersey for Wednesday night, then just hop across the Hudson in the morning so we spent hours finding just the right place to stay in New Jersey and how to get there avoiding the George Washington Bridge which has road works at the moment.

We set out on Wednesday afternoon (I had to go to meals on wheels first so we didn't get on the road till about 1:30pm).  We had a pretty good run, however about 3/4 of the way there we realised that despite all our planning and plotting the night before, the GPS had decided this morning to change the route on us and was in fact taking us straight down to the George Washington bridge......And of course by the time we realised this it was too late to do anything but just go with it........all that work for northing.  Lucily the kids were being absolutely fantastic in the car and we managed the entire trip (4 or more hours) in one go without stopping.  We arrived in New Jersey (Holiday Inn North Bergen) about 5:30 - 6pm, then headed out to the nearest Pizza Hut for dinner.  After eating waayyyy to much we headed back to the hotel and then Lexie Josh and I left Andy to get ready for his meeting the next morning and we went and jumped in the pool.  Yeah it was 8:30 pm by this time, but Lex and Josh loved it (And I'll admit it, I loved the night time dip in the dark too).

A VERY late night for the kids, well after 10 pm before everyone settled down.

Unfortuntely both kids were awake at 6 am the next morning.  There was no way I was having that so I climbed into bed with them and finally managed to get them both back to sleep till about 8.  We then all got up dressed and ready to go.  Breakfast was provided at the hotel but as there was no room in the breakfast room we just grabbed some stuff and took it back to the room.  The run in to Manhatten was really not too bad.  There was definitely plenty of traffic through the Lincoln tunnel, but at least it was pretty much moving the entire time (even if it was only 5 miles an hour, at least it was moving).  Got to the hotel (Intercontinental Times Square) at 10:30 and after checking in Andy headed straight downtown for his meeting and the kids and I were left to our own devices. 

I had decided that the best way to get a overview of the city with two young kids was to use the red double decker hop on hop off buses. so our first port of call was the Grayline headquaters about 3 blocks up 8th Ave.  We picked up our tickets then jumped straight on the first bus heading for the downtown loop.

It was actually a good way to get an inital overview, we went through all the different districts, got to see all the important buildings (Lexie excitedly crossed each of her landmarks off her booklet as we went). 

Times Square

Empire State Building

Flat Iron building

SoHo

The only problem was that it was quite slow going with the New york traffic.  By the time we got to the tip of the island the kids were getting restless so we jumped off at Battery Park for a bit of a run around.  We checked out the Statue of Liberty, though she was a bit hard to see through the haze.

Then found a fountain to play in whilst enjoying an icecream.

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We wandered around to the Staten Island Ferry terminal but decided that with the haze it probably wasn't worth the time to take the ferry out so I headed for the next bus stop for the hop on hop off bus.  However I misjudged the distances on the map and by the time I made it to the next stop Josh was asleep in the stroller and Lexie was just about asleep on my back, I was hot and buggered from carrying Lexie, and of course I could not find the bus stop........So for a good 10 mins I wandered around the South St. Seaport getting totally fed up before I finally saw a beautiful bus turn up and managed to get on, not an easy task in itself with two sleepy kids and a stroller.

We finised the downtown loop of the bus tour through the lower east side and back to times square before heading back to the hotel to meet up with Andy.

We had a rest back at the hotel for an hour or so whilst Andy finished off his work then headed out to dinner.  We decided on the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. which was just 1 block away, ufortunately we arrived there just at 6:30pm so it was already crowded and we had to wait almost 1/2 hour for a table.  That doesn't sound so, bad but when you're waiting with two tired hungry kids, even 10 minutes can be painful.  We finally managed to get in and the food was definitely yummy.  I got the steamed seafood basket of lobster clas, crab legs, mussels, clams and shrimp, so yum, and Andy had the fried seafood basket, the kids of course chose Mac and Cheese...go figure.....but I did get Lexie to try a clam and she said she really liked it...I think the best bit was the actual shell which she insisted on bringing home with her.

After dinner we wandered around times square and checked it all out, before heading back to the hotel via Hershey World and the MM store..

As you can see Lexie was very excited by the MM store.


It was another late night for the kids, not in bed before 10pm again.  Thankfully this time they slept in and we all slept through to 8 am the next morning.

We got up and headed out to breakfast.  We found a little market store a couple of blocks away called PAX where we got some pancakes (sausage and egg muffin for Andy) fruit salad and juice to share.  Andy then had to head back to the hotel to finish his work and the kids and I decided to try the uptown loop of the hop on hop off bus.

Unfortunately the guide on this bus was quite rude and very grating which was not so fun, but at least the scenery was good.  I really liked the look of the upper west side and would love to check it out in more detail some day.  We stayed on board till we got to the Guggenheim museum then I couldn't take it any more and we jumped off and headed into Central Park.   We wandered down past the obelisk and found a cute little playground with a good sand pit and fountain to play in and just played for about 1/2 hour.  The kids would probably have stayed all day but I wanted to see more of course so I hearded them along to the Alice in Wonderland statue which Lexie really liked (after having watched the movie last week).

And the boat pond where they watched all the sailing boats before heading to the Bethesda fountain and down along the mall.

We then found the carousel and had to have a ride on that.

And finally ended up the Heckscher Playground.  This place had a great water playground built like a fort that backed onto the fantastic rock pile, so once the kids had played themsleves out I suggested a rock climbing expedition which both the kids loved.

Both Kids were buggered by this stage so we headed back to the hotel to meet up with Daddy.  Josh crashed on my back this time so it was a fun walk back to the hotel with Lex in the stroller and Josh on my back - boy was I glad to get home.

We spent some time relaxing - or in Josh's case playing Kaboom with the bolster off the bed.  He created a game using the bolster as a machine gun and shooting up everything he could find.

We went out for a early dinner tonight, headed down into the Hells Kitchen area where we found a little BBQ place.  Then had another wander around the area ending up in times square yet again where the kids discovered the Toys R Us shop with the ferris wheel.

Had a relatively early night (kids in bed by 8:30pm).  I was afraid we were going to get another 6 am wake up but thankfully both kids slept through till 8 am again.

We tried a little diner called with Westway diner back down in Hells Kitchen for breakfast.  I finally got my bagel with cream cheese and Lox which I had been craving.  We then headed for Grand Central station. 

Can you find Andy Lexie and Josh????

On the way back to the hotel we found that they had shut down 6th Avenue to set up some markets so had a browse through them, took a quick stop back at the MM store for a top up then headed back to the hotel.

Checked out at about 12:30 and hit the road.  I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to get out of town driving, it was really quite painless, not to mention it was actually a very pleasant view driving back up the hudson river.  We headed pretty much straight north to Danbury where we stopped at a little winery called McLaughlin Vineyards and had a taste, picked up a couple of bottles of really nice red and rose, then headed across to Wallingford ct.  I wasn't so impressed by the wineries here.  The first one we stopped at Gouveia Vineyards was just soo busy that we decided not to bother waiting and the second one (Paradise Hills) - Well I just plain didn't like their wines...so that was a bit dissapointing.  So since it was now pouring with rain we jumped on the 91 and headed home.