Day #3 Meet me at the Empire State Building at midnight

Our first full day in NYC and we wanting to see as much as we could. We slept a little to recover from the travel and first adventures into the city. We headed out our hotel lobby and turned right, walked a block through Tudor City, crossed the street and turned left and we we at the United Nations. I couldn't believe how close we were, so we cleared through security and headed in. We booked onto a guided tour so we could see the General Assembly. We took a look around, as we waited for our tour.

Our tour took us around the General Assembly, exlpained the Millenimum Goals and the different branches of the UN. We have people from Australia, the Netherlands, Qatar, San Fran and Vancouver on our tour. Geniune UN. This was one of the highlights of this trip! Mailed myself a postcard with a UN stamp from the UN's own post office. This tour and UN experience took us longer than we had anticipated. So at noon, we ventured back to our hotel to drop off some purchases. And then headed out again...

This time we grabbed a cab and headed toward Central Park. We walk up 5th Ave to the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservior. The heat and humidity were starting to wear us down, so after more water we headed indoors to check out the Met. The Met will need to be a separate post, but sensory overload - completely different from Time Square but just as intense.

During the day, I had been texting with my cousin and we made plans throughout the day to meet at the Empire State Building at midnight.

We left the Met and got lost in Central Park. What we saw: found the Guarian geocache, Turtle Pond, Belvedere Castle, Delacorte Theatre, tried to find Shakespeares garden (and didn't), Bow Bridge, Bethesda Terrace & Fountain, Boathouse, Strawberry Fields, Imagine Mosaic, Hans Christian Andersen, Alice in Wonderland, Literary Walk. While we were in the park we had a sprinkle of rain and a thunderstorm. We left the park through Columbus Circle and caught a cab back to the hotel.

After a nano-nap, we met up with Joni and headed for dinner. We went to a non-Irish, Irish Pub on 33rd and 3rd and then headed up to Empire State Building. We opted for an express option (wouldn't do it again) and saw the NY Skyride. There were a group of Russian boys behind us, and I chuckled because I understood a little of what they were talking about and then they tried to talk with me. We got up to the 80th floor and then took the second elevator to the the 86th floor. (The elevators do not look like they did in 'Sleepless in Seattle'). We we got out at the top, the view was amazing and I was surprise by how quiet and still it felt. Caught another geocache and then started the trip down the elevators.

As we were exploring the lobby, my cousin texted and she was in a cab and coming to meet us. It was great to see her after years and years. We walked back up to the hotel and went to a close bar to catch up. We closed the bar and called it a night. 2:30am was too late to blog... so now it is a day later and I keep asking Jenn, "what did we do yesterday??"