We'll Take Manhattan

When I started out with this blog, I had intended to write about our US trip in 'real time'. However, I underestimated how tired I would be at the end of each very busy day! For someone who is used to very little sleep at night, that was quite surprising--I have literally fallen into bed most nights. Another problem has been getting wireless Internet access on my PC in our room. Every hotel so far has offered wireless connection, but I can't make use of it without some special configuration--a Ethernet port or cable? Don't fully understand it, but some hotels have provided me with various cords and doo-dackies and I could get connected, while others have nothing to lend out and just tell me the whole hotel is 'wireless'. Seems my PC needs some help to recognize this. So, some nights I've been reduced to using the PC in a hotel lobby, but while this is fine for checking email, it isn't a very conducive environment for writing one's blog. But, here we are in Nashville and I have managed to log on and so can do a little blogging...Backtracking:

It has been 11 years since I lasted visited New York City. On that occasion, we came to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade with our two-year-old son. The time before that, I had a baby with me, so I can remember a lot of walking with the stroller. With three ambulatory children in tow this time, I was rather surprised at just how spread out the city is! We made use of a lot of taxis to get from A to B. Even if the older members of our party could manage the walking, Miss 7's little legs just couldn't handle it all. There was so much we could have seen and done, but we stuck to the basics. A good start was the Circle Line cruise around the island of Manhattan, with an extremely detailed commentary from our guide. A two-hour semi-circle cruise would probably have sufficed, as the three-hour full cruise was too long for the kids. Once we'd gone past the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge, they sort of tuned out and just enjoyed the breeze from the river. I learned a lot, though! We also went up the Empire State Building and around the wonderful Museum of Natural History. The kids clamoured for Madame Tussuad's as well, where the line to get in rivalled that at the Empire State Building. (For my girls, the highlight there was posing with Mylie Cyrus aka Hannah Montana.) Central Park is a must with kids and we did it justice with a full day there. The place is huge and could do with a few more maps and signs around to help people like us avoid getting hopelessly lost! You could walk for miles in that place and still not get to where you want to go. The simple pleasures of the past were not lost on my modern kids--they loved rowing on the lake and climbing all over the Alice in Wonderland sculpture near the model boat pond. The model boats, as featured in the 'Stuart Little' movie, were a big hit with my three. (We did try to hire bicycles as well, but could never get one of the small children's bikes for Miss 7 to ride. According to the surly operators, there are only three small bikes in all, which seems ludicrous in a park which attracts so many families.)

We rounded out our stay with 'Mary Poppins' on Broadway (lots of fun, if slightly different from the beloved movie), and the US Idols Top 10 concert in Newark, NJ (more on that in another posting).

I've heard a number of people say that New York is much safer these days and certainly, I got that impression. The only time I felt unsafe was riding in a taxi with a driver who seemed to have a death wish. (This same guy, before handing me back my change, took the liberty of taking out his own tip in advance. It backfired on him, though, as I would have given him a dollar or two more if he had done things the right way and left the tip up to my discretion.) The people in New York were, by and large, fairly friendly. The rudest folk were other foreigners, particularly those working in Central Park (rowboat attendants, bicycle rental jerks, and various vendors around the place). In comparison, several natives went well out of their way to help us, such as the kind gent on his way home through Central Park, who walked 15 mins with us to make sure we got out of the park OK. Another Good Samaritan was the lady at the Port Authority bus station who directed us to the right exit on our first morning, and gave us a valuable tip: Use the bathrooms at the station before leaving, as they might be the last clean ones you find for awhile. She was right!