New York City With a 16 Month old

5-15-15 – New York City, NY

When I tell people we went to New York City for a vacation I get a variety of responses; most of which are not “sounds great”   Response 1. Why?  Response 2.  Who did Sydney stay with?  Response 3.  Why?  Response 4. Did you get mugged/ was it dirty / scarry.  Did you brave the subway?  You get the idea.  It seems to be one of those places you either want to see or really do not want anything to do with.  How you can want nothing to do with it, while still never having seen it, is a little  beyond me but to each their own.  It also seems to be a place, very similar to Mexico, that has not been able to shake it’s negative reputations.  Also like Mexico, I’m sure you could find a way to get into some sketchy situations if you tried, or were generally clueless.

 

So yes we went to NYC just because we have never been there.  E always wanted to go and I held out firmly while living in Nevada, but it seemed a reasonable request now that we are in Ohio.  It is a place that we will probably not have an opportunity to get back to for a while (more on that later!)  We like wandering around new places and it just seemed like an adventure.  Even if it was only for 6 days.  And yes we took Sydney, she loved it and learned a lot.

Playground in Central Park

I’ll spare you an account of seeing the standard stuff.  The Statue of Liberty is smaller than you think, 1 World Trade Center is bigger, you’re not an American if the 9/11 memorial doesn’t make you pause and think about that day and how it would have felt to be there that day, Times Square is, well, Times Square.  Central Park is impressive, there are people everywhere and tere are about three trillion places to eat most of which looked good.  Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge is worth doing.  To that account, be prepared to walk.  We did 13 miles one day.

FAO Schwartz was Sydney's favorite.  Yes we now
own that monkey!

1 World Trade Center from St. Paul's Chapel

What's so interesting about this anyway

Looking back at the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan 

There are two places on the bull that are shiny because everyone touches
them.  The Nose and the .... E chose the nose to rub.

We even took Syd with us.  Why not, I’m not much of a Broadway show kind of guy, museums are boring and who wants to go out to dinner in New York City.  So that last one was a bit of a bummer, but we did get some great food, just fast and a lot of it was eaten in Central Park or one of the many other parks around town.  I mean we did spend $50 on takout one night for me and E.  So that was pretty fancy. 

Hints. Parking sucks.  We ditched the car immediately where it was stacked up 5 cars high for the week and brought back down when we left.  At $30/Day that seemed ok, remember its NewYork.  The subway is awesome, cheap and pretty easy to use especially if you read and speak English.  Even syd made friends on it.  It may be underground, but don’t be scared just take your time and figure out what train to catch.  No one waits for the cross walk to turn green.  J walking is an art form and if you aren’t doing it, you are obviously a tourist.

Family selfie on the subway.

I could go on forever about the quirky nuances of the city.  But in the end you just need to check it out.  That was one adventure, now on to the next.  See Final Picture for Details!! 

Coming soon, our next adventure!