Day 2 Exploring New York

Today was a full day of serious sight seeing! We started early to make full use of the day. First stop was Time Square which was crazy. There was a Toys R Us with a proper size big wheel inside, tonnes of NYPD standing about and theatres everywhere. Next stop was the fast elevator ride to the dizzy height of 850feet on top of the rock. The views were ace as the sun beat down on us. We took the subway downtown to the most southern point of Manhattan Island at south ferry. We had intended to take a ferry ride to Ellis island and The Statue of Liberty however the queue was literally a mile long with the temperature soaring we took shelter under some trees in battery park and watched a street display of gymnastics which was pretty amazing.
We then walked up to ground zero and visited the memorial centre which detailed the new plans for the area. It felt very eerie to look up to see a big whole in the skyline. We had a McDonalds for lunch and were serenaded by a man playing a grand piano!

We had learned of another ferry ride leaving from 42nd street which we had hoped would have a significantly smaller queue and were pleasantly surprised to turn up just as a 3hr ferry trip was leaving. We were also very lucky as the ticket guy only charged us for one ticket which was nice! The ferry ride went the whole way round Manhattan Island and went up close to the statue of liberty and under Brooklyn bridge.

On the way back to our base we dined in a grill bar in an area named Hell’s Kitchen. Back at the apartment we met up with Zev and chatted until late.