Day 15 - Empire State Building, Street Vendors, Toronto Canada

This morning, our last in New York we get up early and head to the Empire State Building to the observation deck. At 8:30am there is no queue to be seen (by the time we walk out it is snaking through the foyer). The outdoor viewing deck is on the 86th floor with another higher indoor deck on the 102nd floor. The amount of buildings in New York is quite unbelievable, looking uptown Central Park is a large green oasis in the middle of a busy metropolis.

As we move around and look downtown to the financial district where the Statue of Liberty looks but a blip out on the water to the right hand side. We also note the absence of World Trade Centre which would have towered over the skyline of lower Manhattan until 2001.

Back at Times Square we sit down to relax and take in the view and it's quickly agreed that New York style hot dogs for lunch here sitting amongst the organised chaos of Times Square is the best way to farewell NYC.

Deliciously unhealthy.

As our departure times get closer, we head down to 34th street to a diner for lunch desert (could you imagine anything better). It is conveniently located near the bus stop for Tim, Enrique and Vanessa to head back to Boston and Penn Station for me to catch the train out to Newark Airport.

I researched flights from NY to Toronto and stumbled across an airline called Porter. They are a smaller carrier flying around Canada and a couple of cities in the USA close by including New York and Boston. The thing that attracted me was in Toronto they are the only ones that fly into the city airport which is a ferry ride across the water to the centre of town compared to the main international airport which is a train+bus journey out of town. View from the airport below.

The island with the airport isn't connected to the city via bridge, so you take the 1 minute ferry ride across the water.

On the other side, I meet up with Warren who's come down to the airport! We head back to his place via the train.

Warren is awesome, he even brought along a map of downtown and the trains for while I'm visiting! We discuss that Toronto is known as "the city of neighbourhoods" by its distinct areas and the strength of the communities built around them. From Warren's place We go for a bit of a walking tour and pass through 'Koreatown' and 'The Annex' where we stop for a coffee. I find out Toronto too has trams or 'Street Cars' as they are known here. I took the following picture and aside from being on the opposite side of the road, it could have just as easily been taken in Melbourne.

We end up down in Little Italy for dinner and pick a spot with a nice rooftop dining area.

Day 14 - Times Square, American Museum of Natural History, White Castle

Today was nice and relaxing, we meet up with Alev (Bryn has started orientation for his MBA at Columbia today) and head down to Times Square for breakfast at one of the local deli's, snapping a photo of one of the headlines scrolling through the Dow Jones ticker at Times Square on the way 'Australia faces political limbo as election result unclear'.

The weather outside isn't all that friendly so we're headed for the American Museum of Natural History.
After hopping on the train we arrive at our stop and find there is an entrance directly from the subway, score!

It is unanimous that we include getting a ticket to the planetarium in the museum and stop there first for a trip around the galaxy. The planetarium is housed in a giant globe in the middle of the museum.

The museum is very big but yet it is still full of people! There was some really interesting exhibits from the dinosaurs through to some examples of local cultures, although we found the following photo described as Sydney and I'm not sure you would see this anytime recently!

By now it is late afternoon and We make our way back to Times Square for some drinks.

After hanging out at the hostel we head out for dinner and before leaving New York need to try White Castle, known in Australia for a Harold and Kumar movie, we try their mini-size hamburgers and I note the place looks exactly like where you would go at 4am after a big night out. It had to be done.

Being the last night in NYC we head out for drinks in celebration of the fantastic trip and then head back at a reasonable hour for the early wake up tomorrow.

Day 13 - Central Park, Bryn & Alev's, Columbia Uni, Broadway

This morning we headed to Central park for breakfast by the lake. On a Sunday morning it looked like a large percentage of the park is closed to cars and there were two groups of people in and around the park, tourists and those doing their morning exercise.

Breakfast was delicious, the restaurant even had little appetisers like mini muffins and croissants which I combined with my omelette.

We walk back towards downtown and stopped at FAO Schwarz quite a famous toy store and pretended to be children for a while. They have a version of the piano from the movie Big. We manage to time it well and were there to see two performers play a number of songs on the piano 'Big style'. You can have your own at home for the low, low price of US$250,000.

Lunch today is at Tom's Restaurant made famous from the television show Seinfeld. But first, Bryn & Alev's apartment is conveniently located just across the road from the restaurant so we venture upstairs to take a look.

Bryn takes us to a local pizza restaurant down the street to see some of the biggest pizza slices known to man. I can't pass up the opportunity so indulge in some pre-lunch, lunch, which in itself really is lunch and dinner combined.

The healthy eating sure has gone out the window, food is part of the holiday experience, but I'll be getting back into the routine in Melbourne.

We then get back to Tom's for a now lighter lunch. Once finished we go for a quick walk around the nearby Columbia campus.

Late afternoon we arrive back at Times Square and head to the half price ticket outlets to see if we can watch a Broadway show tonight at a bargain basement price. We find several on sale for 50% off and quickly do some iPhone research on the options. After getting to the front of the line quicker than expected and still not having made up our mind we hastily decide on a show called 'Next to Normal'.

After getting the tickets we head to a close by pub and have dinner and a few drinks before the show.

The theatre is just off Times Square which was rather convenient with the weather looking a bit suspect. I walk into the show without knowing anything about what we are going to see other than it being a Broadway musical and it being fairly highly reviewed and winning some awards including a Tony. Well we were all blown away. The story and acting was amazing, I guess, what do we expect being on Broadway. It was a mix of serious storyline about keeping a family together and the mental health issues the mother experiences after losing a child. This combined with uplifting and rock music which left you confused as to what to feel. Amazing performance, highly recommended if it ever came to Australia!

Day 12 - Cupcakes, Yum Cha, Liberty Island, Brooklyn Bridge & Meatpacking District

We started the day by going for a leisurely walk to Magnolia Bakery which have some pretty famous cup cakes here in New York. They would certainly give the Cupcake shops that have popped up around the CBD in Melbourne a run for their money.

Just around the corner was Rockefeller Center where we took a quick look around the outside of the building housing the famous NBC studios.

With most people now commenting about food, what better way than Yum Cha to satisfy the hunger. We headed over to Chinatown and enjoyed a Yum Cha breakfast/lunch It was then down to Battery Park. The subway stations here around New York are not air-conditioned (The train cars are). Needless to say it is rather unbearable in the current hot summer weather.

 By virtue of pre-booking tickets we manage to avoid a line that looks to snake as far as I can see around the edge of the park to board a ferry over to Liberty Island where we can visit the Statue of Liberty.

We arrive at the Island and walk through an area dedicated to the history of the statue. I knew it was a gift from the French. I didn't realise that they actually made it over in Europe and then broke it up into pieces and shipped it over here to be re-assembled!

 After arriving back in Manhattan we went over to the Brooklyn Bridge and walked across for some fantastic views of the skyline and some exercise after all the food!

By now it is late afternoon and we decide the subway is definitely a better option than walking back across the bridge! We travel to the Meatpacking District to have a look around and dinner. We find a dis-used overhead rail line has been converted into a funky new park.

Known as New York's more 24-hour district this is definitely a newer and funky part of town. From the looks of it, also more affluent Vanessa again outdid herself with pick of the restaurant Spice Market which was simply delicious with impeccable service.

 After finishing dinner we head back to the hostel for a relaxing evening.

Day 11 - World Trade Centre, UN, MET

Can I firstly pay homage to our event organising extraordinaire Vanessa who has painstakingly put together our itinerary for New York. Today we started out with breakfast at Alice's Tea Cup for some fantastic scones and crepes.

We then took the subway down to World Trade Centre and looked through the 9/11 memorial. No words can really describe the feeling walking through there. I'll be the first to admit, I had to try hard not to get too emotional. I remember the day vividly in year 11 at high school, only a week later we were scheduled to go on a school trip to the USA which promptly was called off not least of which because all air traffic had been grounded. I can remember sitting glued to the television watching the news unfold. Being here at the site in person is a whole different experience. I took no photos inside the memorial, I couldn't physically bring myself to. Not that they would do it justice.

A short walk away from ground zero is Wall street where we looked around and saw the NYSE. The girls promptly found Tiffany & Co. while the boys stayed as far away as possible.

Next we were off to the United Nations Headquarters but stopped via Grand Central Station to look around and have lunch.

Tim and I went on a tour of the UN and got to see among other things the General Assembly and Security Council chambers as pictured below.

We then headed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art which was truly huge and had a broad range of interesting exhibits from Egyptian relics to a number of Monet and Van Gogh works which we saw.

Getting late in the afternoon with everyone feeling peckish we made the cross town journey to our dinner restaurant Serendipity 3. Walking wasn't an option because of time and because our legs were all about to fall off so we hitched a ride on some tricycles out the front of the MET for a leisurely ride through New York.

Famous for its deserts there would have been at least 20-30 people outside on the street waiting around trying to get a table with the staff saying it would be at least 1-1.5hrs. Thankfully we had a booking and went in relatively quickly.

I can safely say Vanessa is the queen at picking places to eat, the desert was in fact to die for.

Day 10 - Day in Philadelphia, NY Evening

Why did I schedule in a 5:45am start to the day, on a holiday, when I'm suppose to be relaxing! Today I'm leaving DC and heading up to New York to meet up with friends. We don't meet at the hostel until about 4pm so I've got the day to do some sightseeing. Taking the train up from DC there are two cities between Washington DC and New York that you go through, Baltimore and Philadelphia. It was really a coin toss but Philadelphia seemed to have some more interesting things.

I boarded an early morning train up to Philadelphia and arrived around 9:30am, left my luggage with Amtrak at 30th Street Station and ventured into the city. Having a couple of hours to explore a city isn't ideal so I'd researched and planned what to do in advance. I took a metro train to see the Liberty Bell which is a symbol of independence and was rung to commemorate the American Declaration of Independence.

Then I was off to Reading Terminal Market for some lunch and shopping before heading back to the station to continue on my journey to New York. While walking away from the Liberty Bell centre I saw some double-decker tour buses and given I was well ahead of schedule I thought I'd take a look. The bus did a hour drive around town pointing out the major land marks with a narrator so as a spur of the moment decision I took a bus tour around Philly!

I then headed to Reading Terminal Market for lunch which was already decided for me, the famous Philly Cheese Steak. It was just as good as it sounds and looks. Probably just as unhealthy too!

After some shopping I headed back to 30th Street station to continue my journey up to New York. I arrived at Penn Station around 3:30pm and walked the twelve blocks in Manhattan up to our hostel to meet up with Vanessa, Tim and Enrique! We soon headed out via Times Square to look around and then get some dinner.

With our stomachs full from dinner at Bubba Gumps we headed over to 2nd Stage Theatre to see a fantastic play called 'Trust' starring Zach Braff better known as Dr John Dorian on the TV show Scrubs. Only one of my favourite series.

With the night still young and being in the city that never sleeps we ventured to the top of the Marriott hotel at Times Square which has a revolving restaurant and bar for some drinks to celebrate our first night out.

Day 9 - National Archives, More Smithsonians and Chinatown

The amount of history here is fascinating. I was talking to a couple from New York standing in the line to visit the National Archives holding the original Constitution and the Declaration of Independence and they wondered if there was anything like this in Australia that I would go and see. I explained that being only discovered 200 years ago we didn't quite have the same scale of history to be explored but that they should come and visit none the less!

I took the metro over to the Smithsonian's and visited the American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery. I had initially thought this might not be as interesting as I've never really been a visual arts person but I lined up my times to take a tour through both museums which was actually really good and provided some insight and background to the things I was looking at.

For lunch I ventured to Chinatown and picked a random spot for lunch which was pretty tasty and just so happened to bump into some of the people I'd been on tour with at the Smithsonian!

After lunch I headed to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History which had some pretty amazing things inside including full steam trains and Julia Child's Kitchen.

Once finishing the museum I felt an early evening coming on for tomorrow will be a big day!

Day 8 - The Capitol, Smithsonians and Arlington

 I start the day by heading over to the Capitol building which holds Congress, made up of two groups, the first being the House of Representatives having numbers matching to the populations of states and the Senate where all states are equal and get two representatives not dis-similar to Australia.

I went on a tour of the building and as a foreigner had the chance to walk up and get a ticket to view the Senate chamber much to the dis-taste of the local next to me (Citizens have to contact their House member's office in advance).

Later in the morning I visited the Smithsonian Institute - National Museum of Natural History which was awesome and then headed to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum which was brutal and yet fascinating as I don't claim to know much about the history of Nazi Germany so before I knew it I'd spent several hours looking around.

Late afternoon I headed over to Arlington National Cemetery for a tour around the grounds.

The rows and rows of like white headstones are of those who were killed but the bodies not recovered so these are memorials to the individuals who gave the ultimate sacrifice but they are not buried here.

I had the chance to witness a changing of the guard. There is a member of the military here guarding Arlington at all times and they hold a change over ceremony every half hour 24 hours a day rain, hail or shine.