Speaking of our Hotel - WOW what a beautiful, modern place it was. We stayed at the Grand Hyatt www.grandnewyork.hyatt.com on 42nd Street one block away from Grand Central Station. We choose the Hotel based on a recommendation from our friend Brenda who had stayed there before and said it was in mid-town Manhattan and centrally located. She was right and the place was AWESOME! From the moment we pulled up in front of the place we were greeted warmly by everyone we met. The lobby was beautiful and our room was clean, modern and very comfortable. What a nice way to start our adventure in New York City.
That first afternoon which was Thursday we went to the New York Public Library and went on a free tour of it. What a beautiful building. It's been in movies like Day After Tomorrow and others I'm sure. Then that night the Hotel Concierge directed us to a little pizza joint a couple of blocks down the street. That was something we both wanted to do in New York because we always hear about how good New York pizza is. It was good, but we've had pizza other places just as good a this was so nothing special. Its all a matter of taste I'm sure.
The next day Friday we went on an all day tour of the City and saw all the touristy sites like, Rockefeller Plaza (30 Rock), Empire State building (didn't go up), Central Park and Strawberry Fields memorial to John Lennon also the Dakota Building where Yoko still lives on the entire 7th floor! Cruised Park Avenue, and went to the Port to board a ferry for a cruise around the Statue of Liberty as well as Ellis Island and Governors Island. I actually got tears in my eyes when we were at the Statue of Liberty and they played the song by Neil Diamond "Coming to America". Because if you think about it almost all of our ancestors got here from other countries, it was very inspiring. We also cruised right under the Brooklyn Bridge then back to dry land. Oh we also saw Little Italy, Times Square, The Chrysler Building and went to Wall Street. BTW did you know how Wall Street got its name? Well, there use to actually be a wall around the area that the Dutch put up in the mid 1600's to keep their colony of New Amsterdam protected against English colonial encroachment or incursions by native Americans. The history is really quite interesting and the actual wooden posts are still in the ground where they had the fence. It's amazing sometimes to find out how things get their names.
The last site we saw was The World Trade Center and ground zero. We didn't actually go into the site but we were as close as I wanted to be. Very depressing and sad. Our tour guide was actually in building seven that was destroyed by building number two when it fell and got out of there just in time to save his life and the lives of his co-workers. That bit of the tour was a bummer but I'm glad we saw it.
After the tour we went back to the Hotel and got ready to go see the musical Jersey Boys! What a great time we had and a great musical. If you remember Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, this is a trip down musical memory lane! Great fun, also our first ride in a New York City taxi because I wasn't walking anywhere in my high heels :-) Speaking of taxi's, we mostly walked the entire time we were there. It is definitely a walking City and our feet and legs were definitely feeling their non use.
Saturday we got up and caught a taxi to the Museum of Natural History and as Glen likes to say "no we didn't spend the night" Night at the Museum - get it? Anyway . . . we did however spend the better part of the day touring it and checking out all the neat artifacts. By the time the day was over we got back to the hotel and just vegged that evening. We were exhausted!
The next morning Sunday we eased into the day , did some more sightseeing and then met my Brother In-law Steve's Mom Joan. She lives in the City part time and has a little studio apartment on 42nd Street right next to the Hudson River and the United Nations! She recommended a nice little Tuscan Restaurant called Cibo www.cibonyc.com that we went to and had dinner and drinks and talked about our adventures. She grew up in the City so it was her old stomping grounds. It was fun to listen to her stories about how the City use to be. The area she lives in is called Tudor City and is really a beautiful little area right at the end of 42nd street. I forgot to ask her why they called it Tudor City - oh well. It was a beautiful evening that ended with hugs and kisses and plans to meet again which I'm sure we will do. Glen and I walked back to the Hotel and that was the end of our NYC visit. Next morning we were up and out and off to another adventure - upper New York wine country!
We drove about half a day and ended up in a quint little town called Hammondsport,
New York which describes itself as "The Coolest Little Town in America" www.hammondsport.org at the south end of Keuka Lake one of the finger lakes as they are called. We happened upon a beautiful little B&B called The Blushing Rose www.BlushingRoseInn.com and stayed the evening. It was a gorgeous place and Marianne and Sam the proprietors treated us like royalty. We were the only guests in the house which consists of 4 bedrooms for guests so we had the run of the place. They recommended a couple of wineries and we were off before they closed. We have neighbors that are new to Michigan like us and they recommended a little artisan winery called Keuka Lake Vineyards www.klvineyards.com which we found and did some sampling which ended up with us buying a couple of bottles of wine. One white and one red. I'm having trouble getting into some of the wine in Michigan because the whites they make here are mostly sweet and I'm a dry Chardonnay kind of gal. We visited one more winery called Bully Hill www.bullyhillvineyards.com and sampled their wines, bought one bottle, then headed back to town for dinner. Next morning Marianne made us a beautiful breakfast all organic and fresh ingredients then back on the road to home.
It was a beautiful trip and one that we will remember always. Here are a few pictures we took along the way. Cheers everyone!
