Posts Tagged new york
Holiday NYC 3 Jan
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 03/01/2011
Because our tour tickets had expired we didn’t have any solid plans for our last full day. We took at walk back up to 42nd street and had an expensive but delicious lunch at Applebee’s, afterwards we just spent the afternoon walking around the Times Square are until our (my) feet were sore. Then we spend a couple of hours in the hotel before going to The Majestic Theatre to watch The Phantom of The Opera. Such a stunning show! Truly breathtaking and had me captivated from beginning to end!
NYC Holiday New Years Day
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 01/01/2011
We stayed in bed late and Pete procured nourishment from a local pizza shop. The biggest pizza I have ever seen! Had a nice afternoon relaxing in the hotel and taking a long jet bath. Finally got ready
and took a tour bus on the Downtown Route to China Town. We walked around a bit then stopped in a restaurant to eat some of the best beef and vegetable Chinese I have ever tasted. Caught a subway back to our hotel and relaxed some more. A very lazy day, but I think we needed a day off from all the walking!
NYC Holiday 31 Dec
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 31/12/2010
Decided to activate our 3 day travel ticket and take one of the bus tours and the boat cruise. Picked up our tickets in Madame Tussauds, then went for lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe. Had possibly the best burger and chips I’ve ever had, and surrounded by guitars and equipment previously owned by world famous rock legends. Brilliant. Afterwards we made our way to catch the tour bus for the uptown tour.It didn’t come after 20 minutes though so we decided to walk to the Rockerfeller Centre and go up to the observation deck. Being scares of heights I was incredibly nervous while we waited for the elevators but I soon got over it when I saw the amazing view! Truly breathtaking. We exited Rockerfeller Centre and viewed the famous massive Christmas tree and outdoor ice-skating.
Afterwards we walked to pier 83 for our 2 hour semi-circle cruise around the south of Manhattan Island and viewed the Statue of Liberty and Went underneath Brooklyn Bridge. The views of the city from the Hudson river are quiet spectacular. We then moved our luggage to our next Hotel in Madison Square Gardens. We relaxed and drank our Buds before heading out to drink and bring in the New Year. We sat at an Irish bar just around the corner from our hotel and drank a few cocktails and mixers. We headed onto 7th avenue Madison Square Garden to bring in the new year. We hoped to see the fireworks from Times Square, which we did but the view was pretty disappointing really so we just headed back to our hotel room.
NYC Holiday 30 Dec
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 30/12/2010
In the morning we booked a 3 day tour with the Concierge in the reception of our hotel, and also tickets for Phantom of the Opera. Hit the streets around 12 and went for lunch at Dallas BBQ on 42nd. A young guy cane to serve us and I detected a South African accent so asked and sure enough he was from Durban! Pinetown to he exact, we told him we were from Hillcrest and he said he actually went to Kearsney, the same School as Pete! What are the chances of that? Afterwards we took a walk up 5th Avenue to the Apple Store then into Central Park. Stunningly beautiful place especially covered in snow. I was completely in awe! We saw ice skating and drank some delicious hot apple cider with a foot long hotdog. Then continued to walk up through Central Park. We took the subway back down to our Hotel and enjoyed the free drinks again then chilled in our hotel room for the rest of the evening.
NYC Holiday 27 & 28 Dec
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 28/12/2010
So I should be blogging this from New York, but actually we are in Minneapolis!
Yesterday Pete and I were obviously apprehensive that we would actually even get off the ground in London. We’d been been following the weather firstly for London and then on Boxing Day for New York because of the massive storm they were expecting. London ended up very clear yesterday, and it seemed out Delta airlines flight was the only one leaving for New York that wasn’t affected by New Yor’ks weather. We kept checking the status of our flight and it was on schedule the whole was. Awesome! We were met by the valet parking service right at the front door of our terminal, and we managed to find our check in desk and check our luggage within 30 minutes! Awesome! So far our journey had been a piece of cake and Pete and I agreed that if we managed to get off the ground and get to New York the gods would have been smiling down on us. We found a Starbucks to leech the free wifi,
then moved to the viewing windows after a while. We waited patiently for our gate number to come up and when it did we realised we were already sitting at the correct gate. Awesome! Boarding started and we took our seats and set off on schedule. Awesome!! 
About 2 hours from landing the Captain comes on, oh no. Sure enough our flight is being diverted because JFK is now closed because of the snow. Oh no! We were diverted to Minneapolis, a good few hours inland! Thankfully Pete had world Atlas on his ipad so we could quickly look up where we were actually heading. Pretty much mid-America in my view. The fun didn’t stop there. Pete started getting sick. Not long after our diversion news, He started getting a stomach crap and had to go throw up within half an hour. The nausea continued for about an hour but thankfully subsided and he was feeling ok again by the time we started our descent. We’d really had visions of him being as sick as I’d been a few days before. We landed at 2am-ish London time and 9pm-ish local. Thankfully Delta had already arranged for everyone to be put up in a local hotel and a flight back to New York the next da. Phew! We waited in the freezing cold outside for our shuttle the the Hotel Inn Bloomington which eventually arrived and we finally managed to check in and get to bed around 11pm (4am for us! Tired!) and got some sleep, but not before watching some American TV adverts and a bit of The Late Show with David Letterman
It’s now just before 8 am so shower time and then get some breakfast with our Delta meal vouchers and maybe see a glimpse of Minneapolis before our flight to NYC (hopefully) at 2:30pm
Later…
Took a taxi from Hilton Bloomington Minneapolis to Mall of America, a huge mall with a theme park in the centre. Afterwards took a taxi to the airport at about 12:30 for our 2:30 flight to JFK. Flight kept getting delayed and we eventually boarded and too off at 8:30. We didn’t know if we’d have to circle JFK for a while waiting to land but it turned out there was a medical emergency on board so we were pushed up the queue and landed at 12am, same for being taxied to the terminal, It took 1hr for us but a plane the day before had made news for waiting nearly 12hrs on the tarmac! All because the airport had practically no staff because of the snow. Anyway we disembarked quite quickly after the ‘medical emergency woman’ and made our way to baggage collection where we all waited for over 3 hours for our luggage! It truly was travel hell. We queued in a long queue in the cold for a taxi to take us to the airport which cost $50, but was sell worth it because we were exhausted! We finally hit the sack at about 4:30 am!
New York!
Posted by Violetsteel in Journal on 19/09/2010
Pete and I are going to New York for news years! I’m so excited. I suggested it as a throw away-comment in email on Tuesday, and it now it’s booked. I’m already amasing a list of things to do, see and eat while we are there, and we are going for 8 nights and staying right in the centre of the city. I’m beyond excited for it
