We awoke today much more refreshed because we'd broken away from the large group last night, checked into the Sheraton NYC Times Square, had a good night's sleep and woke up on our own time instead of the group's time.
Additionally, it was Kim's 60th birthday, and we had a fun day planned for it doing two things especially for him -- lunch in the Hell's Kitchen area and a night game at Yankee Stadium!
Knowing that 9th Avenue between West 54th Street and West 42nd Street was the main strip of restaurants in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, we headed over there to check them out. It was a warm morning, so we stuck to the shady side of the street and crossed over whenever a restaurant caught our eye.
After walking most of the blocks, we decided on a place called Dalton's Bar and Grill, and we're really glad we did. Our waitress was a very nice young lady, and since the place wasn't busy yet, she was able to be even more attentive to us, and we asked her about her favorite parts of the city. She said she was from New Jersey originally, but that she lived in Queens now, so that meant her commute was 40 minutes by subway. She couldn't believe it when I told her my commute was about 2 minutes by car! We discussed prices, and she said that a few Midwesterners she's met have been surprised by the cost of a single beer in a NYC bar -- 6 dollars -- and asked us what the cost was back in Nebraska. When we said anywhere from 2-3 dollars, she was amazed. We were pleasantly surprised by her and her friendliness and wondered if she were an anomaly, but as the remainder of our time in NYC showed us, most of the people there are actually very nice.
We ate very excellent cheese steak sandwiches and flatbread pizza, and Kim and my son had Bloody Marys to celebrate his milestone birthday. I love a good Bloody Mary, but not at 11:15 in the morning, so I passed -- naturally, I had a sip. Yummy.
After lunch, we walked over to the Times Square area to hit up the Modell's Sporting Goods store and the Yankees Store which are directly across from one another. We were looking to buy apparel for the game that evening, and we ended up finding everything we wanted in the Yankees Store even though Modell's had great stuff to offer as well. I bought a t-shirt because I'm just a t-shirt kind of gal, I got Kim a nice polo as part of his birthday gift, Trevor got a baseball cap, and Sam got a jacket with patches of all the Yankee championships sewed all over it.
Then we headed back to the hotel, rested a bit and changed for the game. We had decided to head over to the stadium early because we wanted to beat the rush, and we wanted a little extra time to figure out the subway system on our own. It really wasn't very complicated, especially to get there from the subway stop that was right next to the hotel. From there, it was a straight shot up to the Yankee Stadium subway stop, so we were there in twenty minutes, if that.
The new stadium is quite impressive, even to a non-sports' lover like me. A bit over the top, but pretty darn nice. We walked around most of the outside of it, and then we had to wait a little before they would actually let us in, so we went into the attached Hard Rock Cafe and had some appetizers.
Once they let us in the stadium, we still had to wait a bit longer before they opened the seating areas. A man took our photo, and I've looked at it online, but I'm not inclined to purchase it. I got more of a kick out of watching my son, the sports' nut, look around in awe and make comments about everything.
We finally headed to our seats -- seats we'd purchased tickets to months ago based on an hour of comparing views of the field from various available seats throughout the stadium. Ours were up from first base in the second level of the stadium. We liked them a lot.
Since we were there so early, we were able to sit back and watch the place fill up, see the players warm up, and even see ourselves on the big screen pre-game!
The Yankees were playing the Orioles that day, and the Yankees kicked their ass 16-3. As I said, I'm not into sports at all, so to me, the score didn't matter for that reason, but since we'd gone through the trouble to buy Yankee apparel, and since my son, daughter and boyfriend were rooting for the Yankees, I'm awfully glad they won that day.
Leaving the stadium and getting back onto the subway turned out to be quite easy, too. It was just a bit more crowded this time. We had a late supper at the Stagecoach Irish Pub right across the street from the hotel, and we were served by an actual Irish waitress. Pretty cool. I slipped a little when I asked her what kind of pop they had, and when I saw the confusion go across her face, I quickly switched to the word soda. Turns out that word still confuses her because in Ireland they call them soft drinks!
So, our first day in NYC on our own was a great day, and the remaining ones turned out to be, too.
The following day, we had brunch reservations at Tavern on the Green in Central Park.
Like every meal we had in NYC, it was pricey -- for the four of us, it was one of only two meals we had that was under 100 dollars, and this one barely made the cut at 99 dollars -- but we knew that going in, and we had planned for it.
The brioche french toast I had was to die for! The menu said it came with strawberries, but it was my lucky day, and it came with blueberries that morning. I love blueberries!
I'd been really looking forward to a day in Central Park. This day was a bit on the hot side, but we didn't let that deter us. However, first I'd promised my daughter, who plans to be a paleontologist, a visit to the Museum of Natural History.
We walked along Central Park West until we arrived at the famed museum. It is a massive place.
We had made arrangements to meet up with Jakub, our Czech exchange student from two years ago, at the museum, so we were excited about that. He would be spending some time with us in the city, and then he'd be traveling to Nebraska to spend more time with us at home.
After he arrived, we stayed in the museum for a couple hours and took in a 3-D Imax show about hump-back whales, too. My daughter was a bit disappointed in some of the exhibits, feeling that their information was not up-to-date with modern theories on dinosaurs, but she was still very impressed with the place as a whole and would love a chance to work or study there someday.
When we left, we just walked across the street and were in the park. Central Park is a half mile wide and two and a half miles long. They pack a lot into that space, just as all of Manhattan packs a whole lots of stuff into a space that is a mere two miles wide and thirteen miles long.
There are lovely winding trails that take you into densely wooded areas and up and down some pretty steep hills. It gave us a work out! We had specific places we wanted to see, and we also just wanted to take our time and soak in the place.
We did manage to see Bow Bridge, Belvedere Castle, the Bethesda Fountain, the Mall, and the Balto statue -- however, for that one we had to be escorted to it for a photo only because a massive Puerto Rico parade had just finished on that side of the park, and they were still clearing and cleaning the area. Crazy! The statue had been high on my daughter's list since she had loved that movie as a child, so fortunately we at least got to see it.
We stopped often in our stroll through the park to get some shade from the intense heat, to get something to drink from the vendors and to just people watch. We were in the park for hours, and we didn't come close to seeing even one-fourth of it! I can't wait to go back someday. Here are just a few of my photos of Central Park. I really enjoyed seeing in person these places that I've seen in so many movies.
That evening we revisited the Hell's Kitchen area and ate at Southern Hospitality, a BBQ restaurant owned by Justin Timberlake. My son said his baby back ribs were the best he'd ever eaten in his life. He was in rib heaven!
We strolled over to the Hudson River which was just a couple blocks away, and we viewed the Intrepid all lit up. It's a massive battleship that is now a museum. We'll save seeing the interior for another trip.
Thus ended our second, and perhaps my favorite, day in NYC. If you can, go to NYC. It's really an amazing place.
What a day we had! Our morning began with a ferry ride from Liberty Island to Ellis Island and to the Statue of Liberty.
While both of these places were wonderful, since we were still with our large group, we actually spent far more time waiting in lines for the ferry rides (and the bathrooms!) than we did seeing and appreciating the sites.
When you are part of a group tour, sticking to a schedule is the most important thing. Because of that, we literally were given 10 minutes to see the Statue of Liberty, so that meant that all we could do was hustle over to the front side of it, take a bunch of photos and hustle back.
If you ever get the chance to visit, take as long as you can to really savor the place. We discussed perhaps revisiting it when we were on our own for the next five days, but we ended up seeing so many other places, that we just didn't have time for a repeat visit, but if I get back to NYC, I will definitely make the time to spend a while on both Ellis Island and on all sides (and inside) of the Statue of Liberty.
We rode another ferry across to Manhattan and got off at Battery Park. From there we walked up Wall Street to take a gander at the famous bull statue. Ha! Good luck with that. There were so many people crowded around it that the best I could do was simply raise my phone above people's heads, aim it in the direction of the bull and snap a photo of whatever I could.
I did this mostly to show just how many people truly were crowded around it and that I wasn't exaggerating in the least.
At this point, we were a little worried that this was how all of NYC was going to be! Fortunately, though, we soon learned that while it is a busy and populated city, this crazy scene around the bull was not the norm for other areas of Manhattan. Thank goodness! I think my son thought I was crazy for planning to stay another five days in that madness.
From there we walked to Zuccoti Park and partook of a lunch from the various food vendors selling everything imaginable all around the square. While a bit pricey, the food was delicious -- we'd been just a little wary after our horrible experience with food truck vendors in Washington D.C. Thankfully, the vendors in Zuccoti Park were phenomenal.
We were given a good hour to sit and rest which we did, but we also strolled around the area and saw the brass statue of a businessman that survived the events of 9/11 and has become memorialized in a famous photo of it covered in ash. We also stepped into a massive Eataly store straight across the street from there.
Once we were back with the group we walked down to the Ground Zero memorial park and museum. We spent some time walking around each of the infinity pools that now exist where the two towers once stood.
These have the names of all the victims etched into them. It is a somber yet life-affirming place.
We went into the museum. You can take photos in much of it, but there is one main exhibit where photography is not allowed, as it should not be. The memorabilia collected there has to be seen in person to appreciate it, and even then, you can hardly wrap your head around the tragic events that unfolded right where you are now standing. I shed quite a few tears while I was in that exhibit, and even these 16 years later, I have a hard time believing that all those people were killed so horribly in such a short amount of time.
After we left the museum, we walked over to the nearest subway station and boarded our first NYC subway ride! We were on at a fairly busy time of day, but we still managed to get all 43 members of our group into one car!
Once we got off at 49th street and started up the stairs, my students got their first glimpse of a homeless person sleeping in the stairwell. Frankly, we were all a little surprised to see him there because the stairway was narrow and poorly lit. Afterwards, during our extra five days, we rode the subway a few times, but we never encountered another homeless person sleeping on the steps in any of the stations.
Our supper was at the Buffalo Wild Wings in Times Square where many of the group also had to change into their Broadway Theater attire before the show. We watched "Charlie and The Chocolate Factory," and we all loved it.
What great effects they managed for that show. I was enthralled the whole time, and even my 23 year old son was so impressed by the show that he put on his glasses to better see everything.
The way they managed the Oompa Loompas was especially neat. The actors were dressed in all black with their faces made up and inserted into what were essentially large puppets that they manipulated with their hands by moving the Oompa Loompas' arms and legs into positions. They were able to create the illusion that the Oompa Loompas were walking, dancing, working, etc. It was really amazing and very mesmerizing to watch.
Just a few days after this show, the Tony Awards took place a couple blocks away from our hotel, and we saw the main actor of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," Christian Borle, on TV. It was kind of surreal having just watched him on stage, knowing he was mere blocks away from us, yet watching him on TV in our hotel room.
After the show, we wandered around Times Square for a while. It's a crazy uber-lit up place, that's for sure.
It looked like the middle of the day, yet it was almost midnight! We ended up spending quite a lot of time in and around Times Square over the following days because our hotel was only a few blocks away, so we took our leave of the group and checked into our hotel.
The best was yet to come! I'll tell you all about it in my next posts.
As we prepared to set out on our last morning in Washington D.C., I had to stop and check to see what the day of the week was. I'd only been gone from home three days, and I'd already lost track of time -- crazy. That was mostly due to how completely jam-packed our days had been on a group tour where you manage to put more into a single day than you normally manage to accomplish in a week or more back home.
By this time, everyone's feet and legs were very sore from all the walking we'd been doing, but I was really excited because this was the day that we'd be heading to New York City! Woohoo! Unfortunately, we got a later start out from the hotel than we were supposed to because one member of our large group decided to sleep in despite numerous others attempting to wake him up. We were not happy with that particular individual, and since he was a student, I let him know it throughout the day. You just don't do that when 42 other people are waiting for you.
When we finally rolled out of the parking lot, we headed back to Washington D.C. for two final stops. The first was at the Marine Corps monument of the replica of the famous Iwo Jima flag-raising photo. We were fortunate enough to arrive at the same time that two Marines were climbing onto the monument carrying a large bag.
We watched them lower the large flag and replace it with a smaller one. They then raised that flag, saluted it, lowered it, and then they repeated the process with another flag. I think they had many more to do because the bag they'd carried up was large, but we didn't stay to watch the entire proceedings. I am sure that the families for whom those flags were intended will appreciate what those two men were doing that morning.
As a Legion Rider, I've seen those flags draping caskets and then given to grieving families in cemeteries. They become cherished tokens of loved ones that can be passed on down the road.
From this monument, we walked over to Arlington Cemetery. This was my second visit, but the place still filled me with awe. It was the first visit for my boyfriend, who is also a Legion Rider, and I could see that it impacted him greatly.
We stayed to watch the Changing of the Guard twice from two different vantage points. Since both times I've been there have been on school tours during high-tourist time, I would really like to return during a time when the viewing area isn't packed with people. While most of them were appropriately quiet and well-behaved, there were still those who just don't get that they need to show their proper respect to the whole area.
While standing by my son in Arlington as we watched, I heard "Taps" played twice, and every time I hear that, I remember him playing it in high school at military funerals and during the Memorial Day ceremony. I was always so proud of him for doing that, and when I attend funerals as a Legion Rider, I'm always a little bit disappointed in the dressed soldiers who show up only to hold a bugle with a recording to their lips. Nothing beats the real thing, even if the person squeaks on a few notes -- it's the sentiment behind those real notes that matter, to me. Anyway, those are just some thoughts I had while standing and watching the Changing of the Guard next to my grown son who used to play the trumpet in high school.
After stopping to see the Eternal Flame, the memorial to the Challenger victims, and the view from Robert E. Lee's house, we left both Arlington Cemetery and Washington D.C. and headed for New York City.
As we drove along I-95 and the New Jersey Turnpike, I was actually quite surprised at how lush the vegetation was.
I guess I was expecting it to be stripped and full of buildings or something. I'm not really sure; I just know that I was surprised by it -- as I'm sure visitors to Nebraska are surprised to encounter rolling hills in certain parts of the state that they were otherwise told is completely flat and full of cows and/or corn.
Of course, once we got closer to New York City, that vegetation quickly turned to a gridlock of cars that better met my preconceived notions of what driving into New York City would be like! Ha, ha.
From this point on, it became a game of creep forward a little, wait a while. This gave me a lot of time to peek down into other driver's cars from my elevated vantage point in a charter bus. Let's just say that about 99 per cent of the drivers were scrolling through their phones while they, too, played the game of creep forward a little, wait a while. I shook my head, but I can understand the need to fill the long minutes with activity to keep yourself from screaming at the other drivers.
I wouldn't want to drive in that every day. This bottle-neck was completely due to the number of people wanting to go through the Lincoln Tunnel into Manhattan, but what was strange was that once we actually got through the tunnel, the traffic virtually disappeared!
After waiting an hour to get through the tunnel, it only took us minutes to arrive at the Empire State Building. However, once inside there we were in for another long, long wait in lines before we could get to the observation deck.
And to our disbelief, the first elevator only takes you to the 80th floor. From there, you have to either get in more long lines to wait for another elevator to take you to the 86th floor where the observation deck actually is, or you can do what we did -- take the stairs! The first four flights I managed all right, but for the last two, I was definitely sucking air!
But when we finally stepped out onto the observation deck, it was all worth it!
If only I could have stayed up there for hours! However, when you are with a group, you have to stick to a schedule, so we exited and then split up anyway for supper.
My family ate at Heartland Brewery, a restaurant/pub that is located on the corner of the block that houses the Empire State Building. We were led downstairs into a very nice room with real NYC ambiance where we ate our very first NYC meal. I had a delicious pulled pork sandwich with onion chips right in the sandwich. Yummy.
After we got back on the bus and went back through the Lincoln Tunnel, our great bus driver named Steve took us into Weehawken to JFK Boulevard and pulled over, so we could all exit and take in the amazing views of the nighttime Manhattan skyline.
We were truly blown away by the view, and I immediately envied the people who lived in the houses on that street and who had that incredible view everyday. But then I thought about the cost of living there, and my envy dissipated.
We drove to our hotel in Clark, New Jersey for our final night with the group because, even though we'd be spending the next day with them, we'd be leaving them that night to forge on for ourselves for five days in NYC.
More to come.
This was my second visit to the nation's capital -- both trips were school ones, and both were taken with my son. The first was five years ago right after he graduated high school. This more recent time I went again to commemorate my daughter's high school graduation, and since we were also slated to visit NYC, I decided to make a real vacation of the experience by tacking on extra days in NYC for us and by including my son and my boyfriend on the trip. It was to be one last family vacation before my two kids started down their separate paths as a teacher/coach (my son) and as a college freshman (my daughter).
For that reason it made the trip both extra-special and extra-sad. I doubt we'll ever have another opportunity like this, so I'm so glad we took advantage of the school's trip to make a memorable one of our own.
One of the problems, though, with traveling with 42 other people is that you have to cater to a set schedule to accommodate all those people. This meant meeting at the school at 12:30 a.m. to depart for the airport in Omaha by 1:00 a.m. which meant absolutely no sleep for us on June 5th. Ugh.
After arriving at Eppley and checking in all 43 passengers' bags, we then awaited our 6:20 a.m. flight to St. Louis where we had a short layover before proceeding on to Washington D.C. We were there by noon. Crazy how you can get halfway across the entire country in a matter of hours!
For my son and me, most of the D.C. experience was a repeat of what we had done five years ago, but it's always good to revisit places to get a fresh perspective. We began our visit to D.C. at the Holocaust Museum, a very somber start to our time there.
Just like five years ago, though, we didn't have enough time in the museum to really absorb and read much of the wealth of information, images and items on display; however, I got just as choked up this time as I did before. Honestly, if I can ever get there a third time, it will be during the winter when there aren't so many tourists and other student groups like our own because that is a place that deserves both my time and my focus.
My boyfriend was shocked by the film footage showing the Nazis bulldozing emaciated, dead bodies into pits for mass burial. I was shocked that he'd never seen that footage before because it made a huge impression on me in a junior high history class I took -- it's an image that you can never forget. Sadly, more people should visit places like this museum and learn from our past because I continue to see atrocities being carried out all over the world. One should gain insight and wisdom and empathy from places like the Holocaust Museum, and one should realize that we should treat each other with humanity.
Our next stop was a Smithsonian Museum. There are many to choose from, so we chose the Natural History one because my daughter plans to be a paleontologist. It's a massive building with many displays, and once again we didn't have near enough time to really soak it all in, so we hurried to the dinosaur fossil hall. I could really see her working in a place like that someday, and she was captivated by the people working in the small lab which was visible to visitors. In the gift shop she gravitated right to a book about Quantum stuff -- I'll leave that to her understanding and enjoyment.
With a group tour always comes lots and lots of walking, and we hit the ground running from that point on. We walked to the White House for a photo op, we walked to our bus which involved retracing our steps a few times until we caught up with it, then we walked all around the Korean, Vietnam and Lincoln Memorials.
I'd told my students about how the spot where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream" speech is marked, so many of them went to find that as did my family and I. Unfortunately, by this time it was quite dark, which makes for the monuments looking quite pretty all lit up but doesn't make for seeing the marker of his speech the best especially when some other tourist has disrespectfully poured a beverage of some sort all over it. We did our best, though. My boyfriend and I also managed to locate the name of a Vietnam soldier we know by association with his sister, and we were honored to snap a quick photo of it to prove we'd found him.
Finally, June 6th came to an end for us as we rode our bus into Virginia to the hotel where we were staying a couple nights.
June 7th began with a visit to the Capitol.
Again, it was rush, rush, rush to get there on time for our scheduled group visit. The tour only allows visitors to see a small part of the building, but it's still worth your time to go.
For me, though, seeing part of the Library of Congress for a second time was the highlight of the visit.
That beautiful main visitor room almost brings me to tears, and looking down into the reading room makes me want to skip out on the rest of the tour, get a library card and roam the stacks for the rest of eternity. Sigh. Naturally, my kids were looking down into the reading room imagining Nicholas Cage as Benjamin Gates roaming the stacks looking for the President's secret book! Ha. (O.K., I was too, a little.)
While at the Library of Congress, I finally got to see something I hadn't seen five years ago -- Jefferson's library. He and I are of the same mind-set as one of his well-known quotes is "I cannot live without books." Nor can I, Mr. President, nor can I.
After this, we went to have lunch from a variety of food trucks. Take it from me, when you are in D.C. do NOT eat from those food trucks. Horrible, horrible food. I wasn't really hungry, so I just had an ice cream bar, but I watched most of the other 42 travelers throw away their food because it was mostly inedible. Just a word of caution from one traveler to another.
That afternoon we ventured on to Mount Vernon. Five years ago, this place had left a great impression on me, so I was excited to revisit it. It didn't disappoint. The only thing that did was that once again there were so many large tours there that day that we couldn't really get close to the Washingtons' burial site without waiting in a long line, so we chose not to see that particular piece of history.
We walked down to the river and all around the grounds of our first President's special home. The flower garden caught my attention five years ago, and it wowed me again.
And we all sat on the expansive porch and took in the grand view from there.
If you've never gone to Mount Vernon, it should be on your list of places to see in the U.S.A. before you die.
From there we rode to Alexandria, Virginia -- mere days before the unfortunate shooting took place. We were given some time to walk around the main streets of this old city, and the four of us visited a delicious chocolate shop called Kilwins. Yummy fudge but we each bought one special treat for later.
After supper at The Fish Market, we broke up our large group into two smaller gender-based ones and went on walking ghost tours of the city. The ladies' group had a lively male presenter who really got into his stories, and our tour ended in a small cemetery.
We passed back through D.C. and stopped at the Jefferson Memorial. We then walked over to the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial which is better viewed in the daytime to be able to clearly read all the engravings.
Back at our hotel, we met up with a young lady who was an exchange student in my town and who briefly stayed with us during that time. She and I have kept in touch over the years, and she has been visiting a friend in Alexandria for a couple of months before she heads back to Mongolia. While Asia has never been high on my places to travel list, I would like to go to Ulaanbaatar to see her in her native land someday.
Next up will be a post about our last half-day in D.C. and our first NYC experience! Read, ride and roam every chance you get!
We ate very excellent cheese steak sandwiches and flatbread pizza, and Kim and my son had Bloody Marys to celebrate his milestone birthday. I love a good Bloody Mary, but not at 11:15 in the morning, so I passed -- naturally, I had a sip. Yummy. 
