Jersey City, New Jersey/New York, New York - September 27 - 30, 2015

Jersey City, New Jersey/New York, New York - September 27 - 30, 2015

September 27, 2015

Today was a day that we have been dreading - trying to drive into New Jersey.  We have had such challenges in the past several days, with the directions provided from Fantasy that we don’t have as much faith as we once did.  Additionally, this day the instructions said “Don’t use your GPS”.  To this point, the GPS is about the only thing that has saved us.

As usual, Bev worried for not.  We got to the Liberty Harbor Marina RV Park about noon, as instructed.  They did not want us to check in before noon, but wanted us there so we would be ready for the 2:30 p.m. bus tour.  This park boasts being “The Closest RV Park to New York City”.  It is nothing to write home about, it has no sewer hookups, and the power is questionable and don’t even think about a swimming pool.  We were getting ready to leave for the 2:30 bus when the refrigerator quit working.  We thought that we would have to stay back in order to fix the problem.  Luckily, we were able to hook up to 30 amp and get the refrigerator working, however, air conditioning was out of the question.

The bus left at 2:30 with our driver, Fabio, and Tour Guide, Joanne, and took us through the Holland Tunnel into New York.  Fabio negotiated the New York streets like a champ.  We were taken to a point in New York where we could catch the Subway and get familiar with how it worked.  The subway took us to Grand Central Station, where we had a tour then reconnected with the bus. 

From there the bus took us for a tour of Chinatown, where we departed and went for dinner at the Peking Duck House.  It was a great Chinese meal complete with Peking Duck.  Lots of great food served family style.  Yum. 
 

After dinner we were taken to board the boat for the New York Harbor Cruise.  Wow, was that fabulous.  We took off down the Harbor and saw the skyline of New York.  The highlight of the cruise was the seeing the Statue of Liberty all aglow.  Beautiful.  With the boat rocking, it was necessary to take a gazillion pictures to get one that wasn’t fuzzy.

After dropping Joanne at the subway, we headed back to the RV Park.  When we got there, I got a text from Grandson Colin asking if we had seen the eclipse.  I hadn’t, so asked him about it, and then went out and watched the eclipse and again took a gazillion pictures to capture one between the cloud cover.  Thanks Colin for the heads up.  It is quite a sight to see a bunch of “old” people staring at the sky and pointing – but there we were – 10 – 15 of us.   Very cool.

September 28, 2015

Today is a day off from planned tour activities - yippee.  Stan was ready for a day to sleep in.  We have been hitting the road at “8ish” for way to long.  He slept until 10:00 a.m.  He needed it.

Bev was anxious to get busy on some chores and catch up on reviewing pictures and writing for the blog.  The day evaporated way to fast. 

We had to wait around for the maintenance man to fix our power connection, dump the sewer tanks and go to the grocery store for bottled water etc.  Wow what a day huh?

At 5:30 p.m. was happy hour with many of the “caravaners”.  It gets dark earlier so we didn’t stay out too late.

September 29, 2015

We didn’t have to meet the bus until 10:00 a.m.  John, the bus driver, picked us up and we headed into the city to pick up Joanne, the tour guide.  We went to the Upper Westside, Lincoln Center, Central Park, Museum Mile, Rockefeller Center, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Trump Tower. Time Square.
 

Central Park

We walked through Central Park, seeing “Strawberry Fields” the tribute to John Lennon, who was murdered near his & Yoko’s apartment near Central Park.  There were statues (Alice in Wonderland, Hans Christian Anderson reading The Ugly Duckling, Daniel Webster, etc.), fountains, horse drawn carriages, pedicabs (which charged $2.49 - $3.49 per minute), model boats, just to mention a few of the sights.

“Central Park is an urban park in middle-upper Manhattan, New York City. Central Park is the most visited urban park in the United States as well as one of the most filmed locations in the world. It opened in 1857 on 778 acres of city-owned land. In 1858, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, two soon-to-be famed national landscapers and architects, won a design competition to improve and expand the park with a plan they titled the "Greensward Plan". Construction began the same year, continued during the American Civil War further south, and was expanded to its current size of 843 acres in 1873.”
 

St. Patrick’s Cathedral

We were able to go into the Cathedral and take pictures of this amazing structure.  It was under a renovation last year when Bev, Darin & Katie were here.  It was not scheduled to be finished yet, but with the recent visit of the Pope, they got the renovation completed early.  There was a service taking place in the back chapel of the church, so we were able to hear the fabulous organ played.
 

“The Cathedral of St. Patrick is a decorated Neo-Gothic-style Roman Catholic cathedral church in the United States and a prominent landmark of New York City. It is the seat of the archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York, and a parish church, located on the east side of Fifth Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets in midtown Manhattan, New York City, New York, directly across the street from Rockefeller Center and specifically facing the Atlas statue.”

We had an early dinner (4:30 p.m.) at Mustang Harry’s, before going to the theater. 

The play we saw on Broadway was “Something Rotten”.  It was a very high energy hysterical musical.  The cast was awesome.  In addition to acting, they could really sing and dance.  Thoroughly enjoyable.

 

September 30, 2015

Boy was it tough getting up and going on the bus at 8:00 a.m.  We had to set an alarm.  Bus driver, John, picked us up promptly at 8:00 a.m.   He is a master at managing the New Jersey/New York traffic.

After picking up tour guide, Joanne, we started our day by going to Battery Park, where we caught the ferry to Liberty and Ellis Islands.
 

“The area and park are named for the artillery batteries that were positioned there in the city's early years to protect the settlement behind them.”

It started to rain before we got on the ferry and we had not brought an umbrella, so Bev bought one for the ride.  Before we got on the ferry there was a security checkpoint where we even had to take our watches off.

When we got on the ferry there was limited seating, so Bev decided to stand.  It so happened that there was a pole for her to hang onto.  After a bit of encouragement, she did a bit of a “Pole Dance” demonstration.  She earned her very first dancing tip, thanks to Jack from Minnesota. 

The first stop was at Liberty Island.  We got to take a bunch of pictures from the water before we departed the ferry.  We went into the base of the statue and there was another security checkpoint.  Before we even got that far, we had to rent a locker for our backpack.  Luckily, it was only $2, so not bad.  It had fingerprint recognition for renting. 

Our tickets included going up into the pedestal only.  We would have had to have reservations for months to go up any further.  We were able to take pictures from there we went to view the museum.  When we went back to get our backpack out of the locker, it would not recognize Stan’s finger, so we had to have assistance to help us. 

“The Statue of Liberty is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor. The copper statue, designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi, a French sculptor, was built by Gustave Eiffel and dedicated on October 28, 1886. It was a gift to the United States from the people of France.”

We got back on the ferry heading to Ellis Island.  The first thing we did was watch a 30 minute very moving video about the years when Ellis Island was in use.  From there we went to the Café and had a bite to eat before we continued through the rest of the museum.

“Ellis Island is an island that is located in Upper New York Bay in the Port of New York and New Jersey, United States. It was the gateway for millions of immigrants to the United States as the nation's busiest immigrant inspection station from 1892 until 1954. The island was greatly expanded with land reclamation between 1892 and 1934. Before that, the much smaller original island was the site of Fort Gibson and later a naval magazine. The island was made part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument in 1965, and has hosted a museum of immigration since 1990. Long considered part of New York, a 1998 United States Supreme Court decision found that most of the island is in New Jersey. The south side of the island, home to the Ellis Island Immigrant Hospital, is closed to the general public and the object of restoration efforts spearheaded by Save Ellis Island.”

We returned to Battery Park and were picked up by the bus.  From there we went to the 911 Memorial, another very moving place.

“The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is the principal memorial and museum, respectively, commemorating the September 11 attacks of 2001 and the World Trade Center bombing of 1993. The memorial is located at the World Trade Center site, the former location of the Twin Towers, which were destroyed during the September 11 attacks. It is operated by a non-profit corporation, headed by Joe Daniels, whose mission is to raise funds for, program, own and operate the memorial and museum at the World Trade Center site.”

If that wasn’t enough for one day, we were dropped off in Chinatown, to do some shopping – basically it was all junk, so we didn’t buy anything – did find a cash machine.  After 30 minutes of shopping, we walked around the corner and down the street and were in Little Italy.  We had a wonderful dinner.  We both had Veal Marsala, along with salad, pasta, and tiramisu for dessert. 

Our last stop for the evening was back at Rockefeller Center to visit the Top of the Rock.  As Stan said, it is overrated.  It might be that we were just tired. 

Finally, we got back to the coach about 9:00 p.m.  After 13 hours of sightseeing, we were beat and ready for bed.