A long day in the hot sun

Apologies for the infrequency of the posts. We left the hotel at 9am yesterday and didn't return until midnight. It's now 9am and we are struggling to wake up and get moving.

We drove into town and went for a walk around the Meatpackers District. As the name suggests, this is where al the butchers congregated. Even though they have been gone over 30 years, the place still smells heavily of meat. The architecture is very industrial. This is now a trendy place to live and has many designer stores.

From there we walked to the Highline. This was an old elevated railway line which had been decommissioned a long time ago. It has been turned into a lovely walkway with gardens and pleasant places to sit. All around there are highrise apartment buildings and you can see right into the rooms.One building had claw foot baths which overlooked the walkway!

We had lunch in a typical New York Deli. It was full of construction workers.

After lunch we caught a taxi to the wharf. Poppy has been most impressed by Andrew who just steps out into the road and hails a cab. It was her turn and she was pleased to flag one down.

We took a cruise around Manhattan Island. This was a great way to see the city from the outside. We saw lots of famous buildings and our tour guide was excellent. We understood most of his jokes. For me, the best bit was when we sailed up to the Statue of Liberty. She was an awesome sight and something I had been wanting to see. The cruise was 2.5 hours and went right around the island. It was a great trip.

After the ride, we went for a walk to see the Rockerfeller Centre. I always thought this was one building but it turned out to be 12. We also visited St Patrick's church which was pretty spectacular.

Finally we made it to Times Square. It was full of people and very loud - both aurally and visually. There were huge screens everywhere you looked an it was quite dizzying to see. It reminded me a lot of Las Vegas as you could have your photo taken with characters - eg Mickey Mouse, Statue of Liberty etc. It was a great place to sit and watch the people go by although I did feel quite dizzy as there was way too much going on.

Andrew and Mercina went off to get Oliver and Eva while Poppy and I wandered around. We found a Starbucks and sat outside using their free wi fi. We also visited a souvenir shop and Poppy is now the proud owner of a sparkly New York cap!

Going to have breakfast now. Will finish this story laterRead more