~New York City~

 Since it was Sunday we decided to drive into New York City hoping that it would be a little quieter - ahh - NYC quiet - NOT!!  Also the prices for any type of transportation (bus/subway/parking) in NYC were absolutely ridiculous - esp....for 7 of us!   Anyhow....we had some lovely views of the city as we entered over the Brooklyn Bridge as well as some great shots of the famous NY sights.   We drove around for about an hour down VERY narrow alleys at times and between all the yellow cabs honking all around us until we finally found a parking (that the "bus" could actually fit into!) near the New York Public Library and beautiful Bryant Park.   FREE parking on Sunday - yay!   We walked over to the park which had cute little tables and chairs that the public could use, also a lovely green area (where people were lying, doing yoga and relaxing), a few ping pong tables, a reading section with free books, newspapers etc.....for borrowing etc....  We enjoyed our lunch there and then headed for the next 9 hrs to see all the sights!!   We had a GREAT day walking around.   The city was SO loud, there were SO many shops - all huge, restaurants, characters dressed up walking around, sidewalk cafes, protestors - you name it, NYC has it!!!

 This is Times Square.   They have a nice pedestrian only area.

 There are literally hundreds of yellow taxis all over NYC that enjoy honking very much!   Apparently many of them don't even have insurance if they hit you!!  They drive SO fast and get SO close to you it's actually quite scary at times.   This is in front of Madison Square Gardens.

 This is the best we could get of the Statue of Liberty.   The ferry across to see it was SO full, it was getting dark, the ocean was very rough and the prices were very expensive so we took the photo from Battery Park.

 It was hard to get a good photo of the Empire State Building as it was SO high.   There are "ticket sellers" on every corner trying to get you to go up to the observation deck - NO thank you!!!  A tad high!!

 The building on the right is one of 4 new ones the city is building as the new "World Trade Centre".   The black building as massive as it is was a 1/3 of the size of the Twin Towers - just incredible the size of all the buildings in downtown Manhattan.

 This is the site of the 9-11 Memorial.   It has only been open for one year and security is very strict.   We had to get tickets to go and see it (2hrs in advance).  The whole area around where the Twin Towers used to be is SO sad and quite eerie.  We were there on the 9th of September and even we felt a bit nervous and looked up every time we saw a plane flying over us.   The memorial is beautifully done with 2 large pools where the Twin Towers originally stood.  Thirty foot waterfalls cascade into the pools, each then descending into a centre void.   All the victims names are inscribed in bronze around the pools.

 This iron statue used to be in the entrance of the World Trade Centre.   It stood there for 30 years.   After the attacks this is what remained of it.   They had it moved to Battery Park where it is now a memorial.

Statue of Liberty in the background.