NYC

Last week C and I traveled to New York City.  My cousin was getting married and C was on break from school so I decided to take her with me. We arrived midday on Thursday and took the train from Newark airport into Penn Station.  From there we hailed a cab to take us to my Aunt's apartment. 

After settling in, we walked a couple of blocks to John's Pizzeria, the BEST pizza in all of NYC.  It was so good that between the two of us we almost finished the whole thing. The ambiance was perfect too...Frank Sinatra piped in over the stereo.  
We had tickets to see Annie on broadway so after dinner we caught the subway to Times Square.  On our way to the subway we walked down a very festive block of brownstones all done up for halloween.  You don't see anything like this in the UK.

At the show we had 2nd row seats and no one sitting in front of us.  It was nice to be so close - the only drawback is that it was hard to see Sandy the dog unless she jumped up.

At intermission C was still awake and the ladies next to us commented on how well behaved and attentive she was.  But about halfway through the second act the time zones finally caught up to her (it was 1:30am in London!) and she fell asleep.  I hope the actors weren't too offended.  It had started raining when we got out of the theatre so we took the train back to the east side and walked back to the apartment.

On Friday, we woke up to a lovely sunrise over the east river. 
My aunt has a dog, Sherman, who C was in love with and wanted to play with constantly.  I expect there to be a request for our own dog in the very near future.

I had planned for us to spend the day strolling around Central Park but about a block away from my aunt's apartment C spotted the tram to Randall's Island.  Since we didn't really have any firm plans, we hopped aboard for a round trip.

After the tram we walked up to the park.  Our first stop was the Central Park Zoo.  It's pretty small and there's not a ton to see but we watched the seals in the main pool for quite some time.  Before venturing on we stayed to watch the hourly show at Delacourt Clock.

From there we spent quite awhile climbing on all the big rocks.  I never realized how rock-filled central park is until I saw it from a 5-year olds perspective. 

We could have spent the rest of the day climbing but I happened to mention the carousel so C would hear of nothing else until we reached it.

From the carousel we walked to a playground in the southwest corner of the park.  On our way, we walked through a tunnel where there was a man singing and playing his guitar.  Both C and I walked right by but then kept turning our heads so we decided to go back and listen to him sing.  When he finished the song he thanked us for listening and said that we were the first people who stopped all day.  How heartbreaking.  He put his guitar down and did a couple of magic tricks for C. C wanted to stay to listen some more so he sang Kermit's "Rainbow Song" just for us.  It was a special moment, my favorite of the day. 

We made it to the playground which was humongous.  It's funny to think about how many times I must have walked by this place when I lived here but never seemed to noticed.

Not only was there the traditional swings, slides and sand but there was a whole climbing/walkway/tunnel area built into the side of a rock.  It was very cool and C was off in a jiffy.  I was a little nervous because it was hard to see her the whole time.  I finally caught up with her on the top of the rock.

That night was my cousins wedding, held on the rooftop of a club on the westside.  What a view!

It was a lovely wedding, capped off by the arrival of 15 pizzas towards the end of the evening.  Oh New York...you will always be special to me.