New York, New York

This year we had a one week vacation to New York and got to stay in a hotel right on Broadway, in the middle of all the hustle and bustle of New York life (which, depending on if you like hustle and bustle, could be either good or bad). It was quite an experience, and one thing that struck me was the number of yellow cabs driving around; sometimes we could look out the hotel window, and the whole street would be filled with cabs...quite a different sight from here at home.

Since we didn't rent a car this time, we ended up getting a lot of exercise as we did quite a bit of walking. Of course we hit all the typical tourists areas: the Statue of Liberty, walking along Broadway, the Empire State building, a quick pass by Central Park, but we also spent a fair amount of time just wandering around, looking at the shops along the street. My photo album is now full of pictures from our vacation, but to spare you the agony of staring at so many pictures, I've taken out a few to show some of the highlights of the trip.

Our hotel room looked right out onto the huge Nasdaq screen that showed ads all day long. It was the first time I ever saw a whole front of a building made out of screens, and as much as it was really interesting, combined with all the other TV screens, lights and posters covering the sides of the street, it could be a bit hard on the eyes. All the same, it was fun to see, but no, we didn't actually get our picture splashed onto the real screen for everyone to see.

We were staying in the Mariott Marquis, which, if the cab driver hadn't pointed out to us, we probably would never have found since the whole street was covered with multi-storey high posters! Much to my delight, we had a room on the 42nd floor, and this picture was taken as the elevator whisked us down to the lobby.

Unfortunately, the observation tower was closed for maintenance when we went to the Empire State Building, so we could only go as high as the lower observation floor. Not as high up as I would have liked, but it was still a great view, and somewhere in the mass of buildings below us, I think I managed to find our hotel.

Intent on getting to go up to the crown of the Statue of Liberty, we woke up early and got onto the first ferry out at 8:30 in the morning. We were told it was a "strenuous 354 step" climb to get from the bottom, to the crown, but considering the stairs were completely full of people, it took us 1 1/2 hours to get all the way up, making the climb more restful than strenuous. This is a picture of Mom and Daddy as we made our way up the final leg of the journey to the crown; the last staircase was a narrow, coiling flight of stairs, with only enough width for people to climb up single file. Fortunately, the view was definitely worth it, and being among the only group of people lucky enough to get up to the crown that day, I was feeling quite pleased!

Here's Mom and Daddy again, this time at the top observation deck of the Statue of Liberty's pedestal. The World Trade Towers are in the background.

All over the city, we saw fiberglass cows painted or decorated in all sorts of ways, ranging from fairly normal, to outright odd. At first I was going to make it my goal to get a photo of each cow I saw, but after walking around a bit, I realized I'd never be able to do it, simply because there were too many cows, in too many places! These two were made to resemble the World Trade Towers, and you should be able to see that the cow on the right has a rod sticking out of its head. Other cows that I saw included: a cow dressed in Arabian attire; the film projector/cow mutant; an aquatic cow; the hot-dog venders cow; and, among the more normal kinds...a cow relaxing in the pool by Rockefeller center.

Chris really wanted to go to the Intrepid Sea, Air, and Space Museum, a place where they had de-commissioned aircraft carrier, submarine, and battleship on display and open for touring. This photo was taken as we were entering the museum. Admittedly, the background is blatantly fake, and the astroturf looks out of place, but it's still a neat souvenir to remind us that we were there.

...Fortunately, the real displays were much more impressive than the ship used for the background of the souvenir photo!