Monday, August 10, 2009

I love New York!

New York was awesome!
I recently went to New York for my cousin's wedding. It was my daughter Jennifer, my mom, my aunt Judy and myself. I knew right from the beginning it was going to be a very fun trip. It was like traveling with Lucy and Ethel from I Love Lucy! haha.

The trip started by Scott driving us to Chicago. We stayed in a hotel there and then was up bright and early on Mon. August 3rd to catch the plane. We arrived at the Islp airport in Long Island. My cousin, Jeni picked us up from there and took us to our hotel. We were there long enough to unload the luggage and then she took us downtown Port Jefferson, Long Island to get something to eat.
After eating she had a wedding meeting so we walked around Port Jefferson. While walking we came to the Chamber of Commerce and after talking to her about our hotel we decided to check out a Bed & Breakfast. We are so glad we did! Our B&B landlords were so nice and helpful. We later ate dinner at the "The Pie". It was an Italian restaurant. We walked around for awhile and then called a taxi to take us back to the B&B.

While at the B&B mom messed up the remote control for the tv so we had to call Dan, our landlord. He is a really nice guy, a retired NY cop. He couldn't figure out what she did so he called his friend who is a big wig at Direct Tv. Him and his wife came over in like 10 minutes and fixed it in like 2 minutes! It pays to know what you are doing.

On Tuesday we had breakfast at the B & B. It was really good. Barb took us to the train station. We took the two hour train ride to Penn station in NYC. It was funny because we had to change trains once and boy if you don't know what you are doing you can get lost. Well, there was this guy with his two boys on the train and after talking amongst ourselves he over heard us talking about knowing when to get off and he said he was going there too. So we just watched for when he got up. We followed the man with the red hat to the next train and even sat behind him. It was kinda stalkish but he just laughed.

After arriving in Penn station we took a taxi to Battery Park. This is where we caught the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. After taking pictures and visiting the gift shop we took the ferry to Ellis Island. It was all so interesting! Just imagine how awful it would be to come and not speak the language and be hussled into a big room with other strangers!

We then took the ferry back to Battery Park where we bought "designer purses" from the men on the street. It was alot of fun. Then we took a taxi to Chinatown where we ate a restaurant that Dan had recommended. I had plain white rice. I made the mistake of asking for butter. At first he didn't know what I wanted and then he finally did and said, "No butter, this Chinese restaurant" It was funny.
From there we shopped in Chinatown. We asked one of the shop owners if she had any designer purses and she took us across the street, down a hall, up some stairs, down a hall and thru a door where there were tons of purses! We had a blast!

After leaving there we had so many bags full of purses that we decided to taxi back to penn station and head back to the B&B. It was really funny because the train was full so this poor man ended up sitting by us. Needless to say Aunt Judy told why we were there, where we had been, what we had bought, basically our whole trip thus far. He didn't seem to mind and laughed along with us. It did make the train ride go faster!

On Wednesday we had to catch the train so early that we didn't have time for breakfast at the B & B. We took the train into NYC and this time we took a taxi to Time Square. That was so neat but we didn't have alot of time so we didn't get to see everything. We also bought a ticket to a Double Decker bus. That was really interesting, but we didn't get to finish the entire route.
We took the train back and got ready for the Rehearsal Dinner/ Out of towners Dinner. This was held at Chad's dad's house.

On Thurs Jenn and I left mom and Aunt Judy at the B&B, stopped by the hotel and picked up my cousin Kelsey (she's 13), and we took the train back into NYC. She wanted a designer purse. We took a taxi to chinatown. Boy, was that interesting. This time we were taken into stores that had hidden doors, down stairs into secret rooms full of purses. Fun shopping!! We did this about three different times.
We then took a cab to the Empire State Building, not to see that but just to get us closer to our next destination. We walked the next 21 blocks in 22 minutes!! We were on a mission!! On our way to our next destination which was the Disney Store, we came upon Trump Towers. This is something my mom had been wanting to see so we called her and told her we were standing outside of it. We then went inside.
We finally got to the disney store and shopped there. From there we walked to Central Park. We had a hotdog from a stand there and ate it on a bench in Central Park. Hey we wanted to say we've been there! We then took a cab back to Penn station and headed back because Kelsey had to be back for pictures since she was in the wedding. We accomplished everything we wanted to in the 4 hours that we had. We had 16 minutes to spare when we got back to Penn station before our train came.
After we dropped Kelsey off at her hotel Jenn and I decided to walk to our B & B. It was really not that far it's just that it was up a hill. We stopped at each telephone pole to rest before preceding on. It was funny. It only took us 11 minutes. But carrying our purchases up the hill ugh, and it was hot too.

Then it was time for what we came to New York for in the first place. The wedding! We took a cab to Lombardi's for the wedding and reception. The wedding was beautiful. Jeni was beautiful. The reception had so much food for dinner!!! and the desserts...there was one room just for desserts!!! Jeni also had a painter there to do an abstract painting of the reception. That was really cool! I'm in the painting!!

Over all this was a very fun and interesting trip. Aunt Judy was a riot and had us laughing hysterically each night while in bed. I'd say more but what happens in New York stays in New York! hahaha.
Next time I'll be better prepared for where to shop, what to see, and plan definitely more time to stay.

3 comments:

Jeni said...

Oh my goodness!!! what a beautiful blog!!! You wrote it so beautfully :). Everything was so perfect......Thank you so much for making my wedding week so memorable. I can't begin to tell you how much it meant to me that you all were there. I love you so much. sooooo much!!!

Toyin O. said...

NYC is the best, sounds like you had a great time.

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