Day 6

I know there are all kinds of things to do in Philadelphia, but some of the kids just weren't up for another historical site.  Even though it was more driving, we decided to hop back in the car and drive to NYC.  It was only a little over an hour to get there, so it seemed silly not to go.

Neither of us wanted to navigate the streets of Manhattan with the minivan, so we drove to Staten Island, parked in a parking garage and rode the free ferry.  

I know it's not like actually getting on Liberty Island, but we got close enough to Lady Liberty to check that off our bucket list.

 The kids stayed up at the front for the whole ferry ride and loved the feel of the wind on their faces.  They've got some of me in them and are always up for a boat ride.  (I get that from my mom).

  

 Jason was "shooting" everything in sight.

 It was really cool to watch the wood pilings flex as the boat tried to dock.  We hit into them a few times and the whole thing would shift and groan.  Crazy how many times ferries run into that wood as they run at least every half hour and more during rush hour 24 hours a day.  Mike kept saying "even the guy on Wall Street has to ride this ferry with the homeless guys".

 It was sprinkling a bit when we got off the ferry, but we went right down into the metro station to ride over to Central Park.  It costs a lot of money to take a family of 6 on the metro!  Each time we got on it was 2.75 a person.  We walked as much as we could, but we still had three stops.  I guess if we lived there we would buy some sort of unlimited pass or something.  There's got to be a better way to get a family transported.  :)

Mike wasn't nearly as scared of the metro as he was when we went last year.  He's got this big city thing down now.

 I always feel like a bag lady.  I had my backpack, camera bag, and the lunch bag.

We got out at Central Park and walked around for a little while.

We ducked under a bridge to wait out the rain.

 Jake wanted to find the place that was in Home Alone.  We think we did, but we'll have to watch the movie again to find out for sure.

It was a misty, rainy day, but it sure was beautiful to see those low laying clouds on the sky scrapers.  ("Why are they called sky scrapers, Mom?" Nate).

After playing at the park for a while, we started to walk to Times Square.  I saw a homeless guy that made eye contact with me and then got very angry and started coming after us.  I had one of the kids and we all started walking faster to get away, but he kept coming.  He was cursing at us and yelling about the "eye of the devil".  It was all a jumble of words, but no matter where we went, he followed us.  I was worried about Mike getting in a fight with him because he was in "caveman protect my family" mode.  I've been in big cities before and been in a lot of situations, but this one was different.  This guy was completely crazy and he wasn't going away.  When we got into a busy group of people with horses and pigeons everywhere, he melted away into the crowd and we were able to relax.  It was a crazy experience and I'm glad it ended the way it did.

The kids got a taste of big city life as we walked the 15 blocks to Times Square.

Then, they got an eye and ear full as we stood in the Square and saw the Naked Cowboy, several super heroes, and Disney characters.  Why don't I have any pictures of all that?  Allie thought it was funny how Minnie Mouse would take off her head in between pictures.  She said it would have traumatized her as a kid because she thought they were real, so if Minnie had taken her head off in front of her as a little girl, she would have freaked out.  I thought that was funny.

We found the subway again easily and rode to the World Trade Center Memorial.

I love how Jason traces everything with this finger.  He found someone with the name of Jason and traced it.

 We took the kids across the street to St. Paul's Chapel.  It's got the nickname of "the little chapel that stood" because so many buildings were damaged and toppled when the world trade center buildings were destroyed.  We had grown used to just walking into churches and cathedrals, so we walked into this one, only to find that there was a concert going on.  The music was beautiful even if I am not a super big fan of opera.

 Despite what Jake looks like in this picture, he really enjoyed it.  He brought home a program so he can count it as an orchestra concert for school.

 Jason nearly fell asleep on me, so we knew it was time to go.  I had to carry him for a while after that because he really just wanted to sleep.

We got back on the metro and rode to the ferry stop.  Got back on the ferry and rode to our car without any trouble.  I think if I were to go back, I've got things down.  It was fun for the kids to go see NYC in a quick 5 hour burst.  It would have been fun to go see a show, or do other things, but we didn't have a whole lot of time.  It was great to be able to do what we did.  Yay for New York City!