Video Update #1 - Subway Dancers

For the followers of our blog, I've uploaded a video on YouTube of the dancers we saw in the NYC Subway 34th St station (as mentioned here http://pkintheusa.blogspot.com/2011/11/day-6-nyc-baby.html).

FYI, when the lead dancer gets up and close to the camera, he was directing it all to KN (lol).

Enjoy, will post a couple more of them breaking it down a little.  Here's the first clip for now...

Vegas - Finale!

So our final day in Vegas, final day in the US.  The previous day's road trip was a great way to wind things up for us, so on our final day we were happy, relaxed and ready to go home I guess.  We had no set agenda, apart from my usual cravings for food!

Naturally, breakfast was in order and the one thing I had in mind, was a dish I had seen (yet again) from Man vs Food.  It was this massive Chicken/Eggs Benedict concoction.  The place to get it is "Hash House a go go".  There's a few of these stores in Vegas, the one we visited was located in the Imperial Palace.

I wasn't disappointed when our dishes came out.  KN ordered an omelet of some kind, and even that was huge in proportion.

KN's dish

My beast of a breakfast!

The pictures never seem to do it justice, but you get the gist.  To keep mine together, it's stabbed in the middle with a knife and a twig of rosemary.  Inside was a juicy chicken breast, scrambled eggs, smashed potato (not quite mashed), biscuits, other bits and pieces I can't remember, topped off with 'griddled' mozeralla cheese and chipotle sauce.  No I couldn't finish it, but I did a pretty good job trying!

Full as usual, we ventured back to our hotel room, along the way KN did a bit of shopping while I drifted off to do some gambling at Caesars Palace.  Didn't win a thing.  I never gamble to be honest, and the most I spent gambling at this point in Vegas, was maybe $80...give or take.  I tried a few slot machines, tried black jack, tried roulette.  I'd win a bit, lose a bit, as to be expected.

The one thing I definitely wanted as a souvenir, was decks of used Casino cards from each Casino we visited.  All the ones we had visited, were sold out!  Except for Caesars, I managed to pick up a deck from there.

On my way back to the hotel room, I couldn't resist but try one of those crepes from that fancy schmancy cafe/chocolate store I mentioned earlier.  I ordered one of the chocolate fudge crepe's and a latte.

Of course, I failed to pick up a set of plastic cutlery.  All I had was the plastic swizzle stick thing-a-me-jig you use to stir sugar in the coffee.  That sufficed till room service brought up a set of proper cutlery :).

Checked out of the hotel room, we had a few hours to kill before heading to the airport, so we tried our luck gambling.  Well I did anyway.  Now you might remember that 'magic' and 'lucky' tiger eye necklace I mentioned earlier, I believe it to be a good luck charm...it helped me win nearly $300 on a 'roulette' slot machine in the Aria casino.

Not in one hit, at first around $190.  Then about $90 again afterwards.  After that we bailed while I was ahead!!

Lucky money, woo hoo!

On a money high (lol), we decided to grab some lunch.  Yes, there was room in our stomach's.  There was one last fast food chain we had to try (recommended by some folks back home), called "In n Out Burger".  Since we arrived in Vegas, I could see it from our hotel room at night.  It was bugging me, so being our last day, and such high rollers, we cabbed it to the nearest In n Out burger joint.

We made our way down there, I had a 'double-double' and KN had the regular cheeseburger.  They were nice.. quite a bit of salad in them (lettuce, tomato), but yeah nice.  I say nice, because hands down I still think "Five Guys" in NYC/Jersey makes it to the top of my burger list for this trip.

After buying more souvenirs from the In n Out Burger merchandise store, we headed back to the hotel.  While waiting at the hotel, I received notification from Delta Airlines that our flight had been delayed.  Had we stayed on that flight, we would have missed our connecting flight to Brisbane from LAX.

Organized an earlier flight with Delta to avoid this, so we ended up leaving earlier than expected!  It was an abrupt end to our trip, but we were ready to go home.  I am writing this on Wednesday the 16th November (Brisbane time), and I am ready to go back to the US!

The flight home from LAX to BNE was a breeze, because we left late in the evening, it wasn't hard to sleep.

So many memories and experiences in such a short couple of weeks, it felt like we were in the US for much longer - and it's a great feeling.

Hope you all enjoyed the blog, I will have a few more posts in the coming days, mainly video compilations for some of the things I have blogged the past few weeks.  Stay tuned for some more, till then, safe and happy travels!!

Paul & Kaye-Ann

Mohawk pigeon from In n Out Burger (had to add that in there!)

Vegas Part II

Today was our last full day/night in Vegas and we had our hearts set on a day trip to the Grand Canyon.  Now the TripAdvisor forums has been a valuable source of information, particularly with the planning/preparation of our trip and I’ve read all the tips on the doing tours of the Canyon.  When it comes to options and time needed for a Grand Canyon tour, there’s no one way to do it.

At the end of the day, it comes down to what you want out of a visit to the Canyon.  For us it was simply the experience of doing a day trip by driving on the highway, soaking in the scenery and fresh air.  We’ve been lucky our entire trip weather-wise, couldn’t have asked for nicer weather.  We booked a Ford Mustang convertible for the day and it was a nice choice!  Sure the brand new Lamborghini or Ferrari would have been nice, but the convertible Mustang was perfect.

We left Vegas at around 8.30am.  Traffic was fine; weather was perfect, but at this point too cold to put the top down!  As soon as we hit the highway, we were taken away by the views that surrounded us.

Prior to jumping in the driver seat, I wasn’t so sure how I’d manage driving with everything in the reverse (right hand side of the road, left hand side driver seat, etc).  But as soon as you sit in the driver’s seat, it’s not bad at all.  Drivers instinct probably kicks in or something.  Only thing I was doing, was reaching for the left hand side when changing into Drive/Reverse whenever we’d stop.

Those of you that have been following this blog, will know how influenced we are by everything American.  Mainly TV and movies.  When you see so much of this on TV and movies growing up, being here first hand and experiencing it is something else.

The drive was awesome and everything we pictured it to be plus more.

Back to the drive, about an hour into it, we stopped at a scenic lookout of the mountain ranges.  There was also a couple of native american’s selling some handmade jewellery.  Had a bit of a laugh as we left, noticing the sign after buying a necklace (see pic below).  I bought a necklace made of hematite beads and a tiger eye stone. I believe this necklace has given us nothing but good luck, more on that later ;-).

The sign we noticed 'after' buying a tiger eye necklace. lol

Space missing = my lucky tiger eye necklace!

After a couple of touristy shots with the camera, we went back in the Mustang and we headed on our way.

As you drive along route 93, to get to the Grand Canyon west rim (sky walk), you turn into Pierce Ferry road.  Just as you turn into this road, you pass through a small town in Dolan Springs.  We stopped into a cafe, noticing the “cappuccino” sign, but were turned away as they were closed and weren’t opening till 11am.  (we stopped on the way back, still no go!)

Coffee shop that never opened for us!  Nice people though.

We went on our merry way without caffeine.  Based on the directions we were given and also after some research on a few websites for the skywalk - we were aware that we’d have to stop somewhere and catch a shuttle bus as the pavement on the road stops at some point. 

Being in a rental car, we weren’t supposed to be ‘off-road’ at all.  As these things go sometimes, we ended up on a dirt road. This then turned into a heavily corrugated road with loose rocks.  About 5-10 minutes on the road, we pulled up into the “Grand Canyon Ranch” to seek some directions in case we’d end up on this road for too long.

It was a nice little ranch that offered lunch, tours and horse-back riding.  Horse-back riding was actually another thing we wanted to do, so after asking the nice lady there for directions, we thought about doing this on our way back if time permits.  So we were told there was only another 7 miles of dirt road and then another 7 miles on a normal road till we reach our destination.

Tents at the ranch

Jail at the ranch.  Yes that's someone hung up there.  No it's not real, KN kept telling me it was...

Hung prisoner.

There was no point turning around, so we pushed through for those last 7 miles of dirt road.  Those 7 miles turned out to be more like 9 miles, but felt like 100 miles of painful driving.  The road got worse, only because we were driving a Ford Mustang rental that was fairly low.  I’m used to driving a Toyota Prado 4x4, so driving the mustang on this road – as tame as it might be for an ‘off-road’ track, felt like the toughest road I have ever driven.

Every turn I was cussing, praying the car wouldn’t fall to bits.  Poor KN had to put up with this for 9 miles, when we finally reached that paved road it was like heaven.  Only I was still regretting the drive back.

Another 7 miles we reached the entry point for the skywalk.  A cool set up, the tourist centre is in this complex inside a giant dome tent.

Inside was a store selling touristy gifts, and also the desk for buying the skywalk/tour tickets.  One thing I didn’t realise, was that you had to buy a ticket with a package that contained the skywalk.  I assumed you could simply just do the skywalk, and take whatever time you like on it.  What you are offered instead, are a few packages that include visits to some native American reservations, a few different view points of the canyon, and then the skywalk.

At a minimum you’d need to spend about 2 hours for the tour, so unfortunately we didn’t do the actual skywalk/tour.  Instead, we opted to head back and go to the ranch, and do the horse-back ride with lunch afterwards.

So we made our way back after buying some momento’s, back on that dirt road that I was dreading.  Pulling over on the side, I had to check the car out and found something that made my paranoia worse.  The bottom plastic fender was broken off (not by me), obviously by someone else and they had zip ties to hold it together.  I suspect this isn’t the first time this car has travelled this path!

While we pulled over, we had to check out this snow scattered all over the place to see if it was real.  Of course it was real.  Being the easily amused person I am, I also found some snow on top of some poo!

Snow in the desert!?!

Poo snow!

We finally reached the ranch and booked a horse-back ride, what an awesome idea.  It only goes for half an hour, but it’s at a nice walking pace and the views of Spirit Mountain and the ranch were really cool.  My horse’s name was Ranger, KN’s was Pinball.  A dog named Taco also followed us on our trip, and we had a nice tour guide who gave us the background to the ranch and surrounding area.  I love how much personality horses have, it’s been years since I’ve been on a horse and I always seemed to get ones that ‘have a thing’.  Ranger’s thing was eating.  And just stopping for no reason.  Funny thing, after a while he got used to me talking to him and giving him a bit of a prompt to keep moving.

Pinball and Ranger

Taco!

Spirit Mountain.  In person, you can view faces on the mountain.

After our horsey ride, we went back to the ranch and got some grub.  The whole ranch was like a movie set.  I ordered the ribs with mash, beans and corn.  KN had the pulled pork sliders with chips.  Full on lunch, we bought a few things in the store and headed back to the hotel.

Damn good food.

The drive back to Vegas was just as nice.  We stopped into town to pick up a few things from WalMart (peanut butter supplies we lost in baggage claims).  Afterwards we drove through the strip at night, then dropped off the car at the rental place.

Actually before all that, we went through a drive-thru car wash. All the dirt from that road to the canyon collected on the back of the car, in the end we returned it in one piece, shiny and clean!!

Next up, our last day and final post.  Man vs Food breakfast, chocolate satisfaction, burger satisfaction, early flight back home...

Vegas Baby! Part 1

We made it to Vegas!  Only a short stay here (3 days and 3 nights), so I’ll sum up this blog in only a couple of posts.  

Prelude

So why Vegas?  This was really my thing and something I planned to do years ago, when I was in my early twenties and still heavily into partying, drinking, going out clubbing, gambling, etc.  Over the years I guess it remained on my to do list if I was ever to travel, but now that I’m 30 and over a lot of that partying, when we finally arrived, we were a bit perplexed about what to do! 

Especially as a couple (no we didn’t get married, you have no idea how many times we’ve been asked this).  So the only plan we had was to see as much as possible, and so here it is....

Arrival and Day 1

We arrived that Sunday night from JFK.  The flight wasn’t too bad, over 4 hours.  It’s amazing how this city is smack bang in the middle of the desert, seeing it from a plan at night is awesome.  The flight itself was interesting, there was a couple fighting that nearly had us grounded/turned around.  Didn't hear what the lady was yelling about, but she was upsetting others on the plane.  We got there in the end anyhow.

As soon as we arrived at the airport you can immediately tell you’re in Vegas.  For example, the placement of pokie machines (slot machines as they call them here) inside the airport!  To get to the baggage claim/pick up area, you have to catch a tram to the other side of the airport.  We did that, picked up our bags and called the shuttle service that we had a voucher for (courtesy of Flight Centre, thanks Carol!).

One thing I didn’t realise is how close the airport is to the strip, so the ride didn’t take long at all.  We had a room booked at the Vdara hotel, a nice place located in the City Centre directly opposite to the Aria in the same complex.

This whole area of the strip (City Centre) is new.  Nearby is the Bellagio and the City Centre shopping mall “Crystal” I think it was called?  We were immediately schooled on a number of things here, being Vegas newbie’s and naive tourists, but more on that later.

We took a stroll through the strip, not knowing our way around, we didn’t get very far.  We had a look through the Aria casino, outside on Las Vegas Boulevard and bought dinner (McDonalds...for a McRib).  Walked further up and found the first overpass for pedestrians, and walked back through the city centre shops (all flashy and upscale big brand shops like Louis Vuitton, Gucci, etc).

Had to have another one.  The one I had in Jersey was made with a cheeseburger bun.

Tired from the day, flight and walk – we ventured back to our hotel and fell asleep.

View from our room at the Vdara.  They also had remote controlled curtains here!

Up and early (body clocks still in tune with the east coast), we decided to try out breakfast at the famous Bellagio buffet.  Through each casino, you find connecting walkways to the next one.  A scenic alternative to walking outside on the Las Vegas boulevard footpath.  Walking into the Bellagio walkways, you’re immediately hit with sensory overload.  Naturally the first thing that catches our attention, is a cafe with a massive chocolate fountain thing, with liquid chocolate flowing from the ceiling and down through this contraption like rivers of chocolate gold.  I thought of this fountain the entire time we were in Vegas.  I daydreamed about opening the glass panel and drinking from it daily.

You can't see in this pic, but up higher the chocolate flows down from the ceiling!

That was just the beginning, we didn’t even enter the actual casino yet.  Just near the Bellagio Casino lobby, was this garden area displaying different plants, tree’s, bushes.  Reading this you’re probably thinking, boring!  But check out the pics, another example of how they take things to another level here.

So much work went into that garden display, with maintenance staff always touching it up, could only imagine how much money goes into that place.  After leaving the magical fancy garden, we ended up in the lobby area of Bellagio.  Again, another display of wowness.

Directly to our left was the Casino, we strolled right in and made our way to the buffet.  There was a pretty big line up for the buffet, but it was always moving.  Didn’t take too long till we got in, considering how long the line was.  Breakfast buffet was around $15 each (cheap), considering how much food there was to choose from and all you can eat!!  I can’t even remember what I ate, but it was a lot.

After breakfast we ventured a bit more into the strip, reaching Ceasars Palace this time.  Hit again with the same WOW factor, picking out familiar sites from movies we’ve seen (especially from The Hangover).

Two casino’s in half a day doesn’t sound like much, but with so much walking and getting lost within the Casino’s, it dawns on you how much planning you really need to do for this place.... and more time.... and more money!

It was about lunch time and we were in the mood for seafood.  Those of you that have been following our blog whilst we were on the East Coast, will know that we love our food and where we can, we have been trying food we’ve seen from various tv shows.  Particularly “Man vs Food”, and today we wanted to check out a restaurant known for awesome crawfish and crabs, “Hot n Juicy”.

mmmmm.  We were quickly seated and ordered 1lb of crawfish and 1lb of King crab legs, with corn on the cob and potato.  Hot n Juicy is the perfect name for this place, heaps of juice and plenty of spice.  I’ve never had crawfish like this before, they look like redclaw that we have back home.  Massive heads, and teeny weeny bodies, but still yummy and juicy.  The King Crab was my favourite, had always wanted to try it, especially after watching that show “World’s deadliest catch”.

I could live on King Crab.  There was a massage place next door, being the naive tourists we were, we walked in to check their prices.  I had a bit of a sore neck and back, and the massages back at our hotel were insanely over priced.

After walking through the door, we were greeted by an asian lady, wearing a tight skimpy dress.  I asked her for their pricing and she glanced over at KN, with a perplexed look on her face.  As though she was thinking, “what is this lady doing here?”.  When she told us their pricing, while looking oddly at KN, it was pretty obvious what they specialised in.  Ahem, moving on...

We were full from lunch and headed back to our hotel.  Along the way, we ventured through the Aria casino and other places.... it’s a bit of a blur to be honest.  Not from drinking and partying, it’s just there’s so much to these Casino’s, it is really challenging to soak it all in.  It’s like your mind is constantly stimulated by the different themes of the Casino’s, you don’t know what to do with yourself.

A bit of gambling here and there, not winning a thing, by the night we crashed in the hotel.  I think we skipped dinner being so full, buggered again we fell asleep.

Coming next, ROAD TRIP!! And our last day...

Day 11 - Last big day!

Prelude

You may have noticed the blog is a couple of days out.  You may have also noticed yesterday’s blog had no entry for my earlier reference to a bar visit in Hoboken (was actually in Jersey City in the end).  Well it did happen, we’ve just been sleeping in the past couple of days and back to late starts again!  

No it wasn’t a huge night, but a late night for us nonetheless, with a bit of alcohol in the mix.  So, apologies for the missing entry yesterday.  PJ Ryan’s was the name of the bar and it was nice and relaxing.  We also brought some burgers and fries with us into the bar, from burger joint called “Five Guys” that my cousin recommended.  Best burgers we’ve had in NYC by far!

It was actually on our “to do” list to visit a dive bar in NYC.  We see them a lot on TV, naturally we wanted to go to one.  This place wasn’t exactly a dive bar, but still a bar.  One of my cousins actually chuckled when we mentioned our plan to visit a dive bar, apparently they’re notorious for being dodgy by reputation and getting mugged in?

This place had none of that atmosphere, it was a cool bar.  Met some of my cousin’s friends, had I not been sick and tired, we would of had a big night out maybe.  It was the first time we sparked someone’s curiosity with our accents since being here.  My cousin had a friend who made good attempts at imitating us, funny fellow he was.  I should have taken video, there’s something about American’s trying to say the word “Facebook” in an Aussie accent that sounds hilarious.

Back to today’s blog....

We slept in a bit so had a late breakfast in lower Manhattan.  The plan today was a visit to Brooklyn, specifically to walk the bridge into Manhattan.  So we took the PATH train to 14^th street and found the closest diner we could find for breakfast.  We ended up at the "Good Stuff Diner" (109 W 14th St).  Another hot breakfast, I ordered the same type of meal KN had at Tom’s Restaurant yesterday and KN had waffles and a sausage? 

We’re actually on a plane to Vegas as I write this and I turned to ask KN through my laptop screen because I can’t hear a thing.  She confirmed yes, waffles and sausage.

We sat on the stools in the diner and ate away.  Food was delicious and I was curious as to the other customers ordering alcohol late in the morning (KN confirms it was Saturday, people with hangovers).  I saw two orders of bloody Mary’s go out and another two orders of some kind of champagne with orange juice.  I’m sure there’s a name for that, I just don’t know it.

After breakfast, I ordered a latte to go.  Didn’t attempt to drink it till we got to Brooklyn, because the gentleman steamed the milk to molten lava temperature.  A short ride into Brooklyn, we made our way to the bridge.  As usual, I tried to bring up Google maps, but it's so damn slow if you don't have proper 3G access (T Mobile on an Aussie iPhone is basically on the EDGE network).   

Just outside the subway, there was a map on a wall somewhere pointing out the Brooklyn Bridge, so we followed that instead. It looked fairly clear on the map, but walking up the road following the streets that were named on the map, we weren’t 100% sure we were going the right way.  Another tourist also walking near us, was not so sure either.  Interestingly, he asked us for directions first, I replied with a kind, “Sorry this is our first time here, we’re also tourists”.  He smiled and went his merry way.  We ended up following him for a bit, because we were all heading for the Brooklyn Bridge.  As we got closer, the street intersections near the bridge throw you off a bit.  So we were kind of following each other for a while, swapping roles of navigation leader after crossing different roads.

We found the bridge with the pedestrian walkway, only to be thrown off by how far away in the opposite direction the entrance seemed to be.  So we ended up in front of the other tourist, who disappeared, but mysteriously we ended up at the traffic lights to the entrance, and then he was in front of us?

Near the walkway entrance and said tourist we followed, then followed us, then followed...

At the beginning of the walkway, we strolled on at a steady pace.  The weather was perfect again and it was a nice walk.  Picture here and there, we approached the beginnings of the bridge.  I forgot there was refurbishments going on, so on various sections of the bridge the view is cut off by galvanised steel.

Lovely view, shot taken by KN

You could still see over the steel walls for most the walk anyhow, past the half way mark at the different viewpoints, you have the full view anyhow.  Really nice views, could definitely see how this would be a nice walk heading into the evening, walking into Manhattan.

Closer to the other end, you get the locals selling art work (sketches of the bridge), the usual stall for drinks/food, bike rentals now that you’ve already done the walk (they should have them at both ends!), and the random crazy dude contemplating life on the bridge with a mop on his head.

Yes, random crazy dude sitting on the bridge with a mop on his head, I have evidence....

Mop head man

I wonder what he contemplates on the Brooklyn Bridge everyday...

We reached the lower end of Manhattan, same area near Wall St that we ventured through yesterday and made our way back onto the PATH at the World Trade Centre station to go back to the hotel.

Unfortunately we didn’t get to see the memorial site, but did get a good look at the construction of the freedom towers.  For those of you interested in travelling here, I’ll say it again, the Jersey City area is so convenient.  The PATH WTC station is still going through some construction work, but is open and running trains.  This station is huge, and is only a couple of stops away from where we were staying (Courtyard Marriot – Jersey City).

Back at the hotel, we had plans to catch up with family again.  First stop, Hoboken to check out the Cake Boss bakery (Carlo’s Bake Shop), to pick up some cake for my cousin’s kids who are big fans of the show – before making our way to Liberty State Park.

We arrived in Hoboken and this place is something else.  The building architecture makes the place stand out and really helps feature all the stores, restaurants, shopping spots, and living apartments in general.  Pizza store after Pizza store, restaurant after restaurant, shop after shop, I can see why people choose to live here.

While looking for a parking spot, we noticed a long line of people in front of a pharmacy directly across the road.  Which seemed odd, because there was another shorter line in front of the bakery?  After finding a parking spot, we made our way to the bakery and lined up in the shorter line.  A few minutes later, one of the staff from the bakery comes out to ask if we all have a ticket.  Err, no we say.  Please make your way to the line across the street and wait to get a ticket!

The line up in front of the pharmacy!

This place was so popular and busy; they needed two lines to serve customers.  We made our way to the other longer line and waited.  After a bit of a wait, the line all of a sudden migrates across the street, woo hoo!

Forty five seconds later the line migrates back, so we all kind of do this slow shuffle backwards to allow the crowd to move back.  Throughout this amusing people shuffle up and down the street, a food cart vendor was making comments to the crowd, about using common sense.  Maybe we were all just lost in the line up process, or just daydreaming about cake.  Or maybe he was just annoyed the crowd was blocking his food cart.

At this stage it was obvious this line wasn’t moving anywhere fast, so a few of us decided to go for a walk and have some pizza for a late lunch.  We settled for a pizza shop that had plenty of choice, right near the bakery.  Ordered two slices, one pepperoni and one chicken with this soft white mozzarella cheese.  I know I had some pizza at Times Sq that I rated highly and this is a big call.  The pizza we had at Hoboken is the best pizza I have ever had in my life.  Period.

The base was thin, but not too thin.  It had a crunch to it, but was fluffy with texture in the middle.  The sauce was delicious, cheese plentiful and delicious, everything all together was awesome.  I wish we had this kind of pizza at home.  There is a place called “New York Slice Pizzeria” back home, I’ve had it several times.  I think I’m qualified now to criticise them for that name.  Taste nothing like this, it pales in comparison.

I know its Hoboken and technically not NYC, but still.  From what I’ve been told a number of pizza shops here in Hoboken were based in Brooklyn originally and then moved or opened up shop at Hoboken to meet the demands of this growing community.  So it makes sense this pizza was incredibly awesome.

We finished our pizza, walked across the road to see how far along the line my cousin and his kids moved, maybe 3 or 4 steps.  Maybe that was wishful thinking; I don’t think they moved at all.  We called it quits for the time being, deciding to come back another time.

Not far away is the Liberty State Park, where you can catch the different ferries to see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.  Unfortunately the Statue was recently closed for cleaning, so we couldn’t go on any of the tours to see the statue.  Liberty State Park however is close enough to get a decent view, ahem, of her backside.  You also get a view of Ellis Island, plus the park is HUGE with a massive playground for kids.

Ellis Island

Statue in the background.  A lot closer than it looks.

Arriving at the park, we walked over to the boardwalk and took some photos and soaked in the view.  I came up with the idea of having a pose with the statue, facing the same direction (back to the camera).  I was joking, saying this could be another planking thing (taking photos with iconic statues or people or something else, facing the same direction but having your back to the camera).  The photo turned out to be pretty cool, thanks to my cousin’s great photography work.

We also visited the “Empty Sky” memorial.  If you haven’t heard of it, it was opened recently and is a memorial for the residents of NJ who passed away in the 9/11 incident.  The memorial itself is two walls standing in parallel, facing the same direction and location as the original World Trade Centre towers.  So standing in front of these walls, with the skyline in the background, they are in the same position as the original towers.

On these walls, are the names of all the victims from 9/11 that came from NJ.  In front of the memorial, they also had some steel frames from the WTC towers.

Getting late in the afternoon, we decided to have an early dinner at an Asian Seafood Buffet restaurant called “Minado”.  It isn’t too far from Hoboken, but mix in some traffic and the drive gets interesting.  We made it there eventually, step inside, and you can see what makes this place so popular.

We have buffet’s back home and Asian restaurants, but nothing mixed like this.  This place had so much choice, from sushi, fried rice, baby back ribs, crab legs, different fried fish, salads, the list goes on.  Everything I ate was delicious, another restaurant I wish we had back home.  We ate till we felt sick.  Not from the food, from being too full.

After the awesome dinner with family, saying a few goodbyes, we headed back to Hoboken to see if we could make it into Carlo’s Bakery again.  It was around 8.30pm, the bakery shuts at 9pm, we made it.

They actually had the doors shut and had a few customers inside, but they were nice enough to let us in.  My cousin’s kids contemplated over which cake they wanted to choose, while we looked at all the different baked goods they had.  So much choice, but still full on food, it was hard to order anything.  The girls picked a cake, I ordered a slice of pumpkin pie, a few obligatory shots in the cake shop and we made our way back to the hotel.

KN and I were beat yet again, a long but awesome day, we knew this would be our last full day and night in NYC, so we made one last trip into Times Square to see it all again and do some shopping.  The lights, the shops, the atmosphere is something that keeps you going back and definitely wouldn’t get sick of it.

Last hot dog in Times Sq (KN was taking pics of me again shoving food in my mouth).

Even though we’ve seen and done all we wanted to, there’s still so much more to this city we are yet to see.  We bought a few more NYC touristy items, shirts and so on.  I bought some more things for the kids and I, tired from the day we decided to head back to the hotel.

An awesome way to end our time in NYC, today as I write this we’re on a plane to Vegas.  Today, or rather this morning was spent mainly in Jersey City (for breakfast, more shopping and a last goodbye to family).  So I probably won’t blog on our short time here today.  

In a day or two the next blog will begin in Vegas, for the few days we’ll be spending here.  If we can fit it in, we’ll be attempting a road trip to Grand Canyon (renting a car), horseback riding in the desert not far from the strip, and anything else we can cram into the next few days before heading back home! Once we get back home to Brisbane, I’ll also be uploading a few video’s I took on my iPhone, which puts some more context behind some of my blog posts since we’ve arrived in the States.

Stay tuned...