Four States, One Big Adventure: Day 3 - The Day We Went To The Crown

[NatsyNoo]

Originally Posted by florida girl

Another action packed day.You took some amazing photos from the OWO.

Too many photos,never 😄😄😄😄.

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Thank you! I don't think it was ever us taking good pictures but the landmarks just lend themselves to it! They all just look so 'New York' to me, I love them!

Originally Posted by Disney Wishing

Thanks for sharing the photos of the 911 museum. I couldn't face going on our last trip as I would find it too emotional. On our first trip to New York back in 1998 we went up the South Tower Observation deck. I'll never forget watching the footage of it tumbling down

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I had dinner in one of the towers as a child in about 1998 I think so it's quite poignant for me too. It is very moving and upsetting but I also think it's important to visit these sights as they are such a fundamental part of our modern history. What happened on that day triggered so many other events and I don't think you can watch the news now without somehow being able to tie at least one of the stories back to 9/11. So from my perspective, a holiday should be about happiness but a couple of hours to really get to the crux of what happened is also a really brilliant way of spending time. We also went to Pearl Harbor later in the trip which was also sad and earlier this year we went to Berlin where we visited a concentration camp so we do cover a lot of this kind of stuff. We both enjoy history so it's good for us from that perspective too. We're not really into art so we skip galleries etc. If you get the chance to visit the museum, I would really recommend it. It's extremely well executed.

Originally Posted by Cannavar

Another amazing day. Loving all your photos. I wish I had the effort levels to make a trip report as extensive as yours for all our trips!

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I think it's just because I can't stop typing when I start...and I also touch type so it doesn't take me very long to do the text, it's the photos that take the time and there's so many because I can't whittle them down any further Thank you for reading!

Originally Posted by amymiller

OWO looks brilliant, it still wasn't open when i last went, so something to try should I go again. Nice to have the perspective from the bottom of Manhattan, makes you realise how big it is, Central Park looks miles away.

Your shake shack meal looks delicious, always been to Five Guys over it; but am penciling it in for the next time I'm in London to try.

Don't fancy those stairs to the crown of Statue of Liberty! Looks like you had perfect weather to enjoy the views.

Impressed with how quickly your writing the days up, well done! Great first section of the report.

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OWO is wonderful, I'd strongly recommend if you get the chance to go. It certainly showed us how far we had walked the previous day!

Shake Shack was amazing, I am totally going to go to one of the London ones next time I'm up! It's so worth the price tag! Much better than Five Guys IMO!

The Statue of Liberty steps were hard going (I run 4-6k 4 times per week so consider myself to be fairly fit) but it was worth it to say we had climbed to the crown. I actually did it as a child but Matt hadn't been to NYC before so it was great for him to do it!

Thanks for reading!

Originally Posted by princess_chazy

You can never take too many pictures! It's always good having 2 people with cameras as I find Ben always gets a good picture of something I missed (tablet from sol). We didn't stay long for baseball either, we got there pretty late but good to have experienced it! Eek Disneyland next!

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Oh yes between us we had 3 cameras (2 phones and the camera) so we certainly had it covered
I think a couple of hours at the baseball is plenty, the game was still going on when we got back to our room

Originally Posted by abiknox

Just wow, seriously, I thought we fit a lot in on our first trip but this is insane. I cannot get over how much you covered in 2.5 days!

Your photos are fab, love the blue sky!

I'm considering OWO now, and the 9/11 museum, just so interesting although very somber too I imagine.

PS. What I wouldn't do right now for that Shake Shack burger!

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Go hard or go home lol. As I said in my day 2 reply to you, we had to just go for it or we wouldn't manage to see it all. The flight to LA the next day gave us a rest, thank god, we needed it! We both said we couldn't have done another day like that!

We were so lucky with the weather, all holiday actually! The only days we had iffy weather was the following day in Disneyland was cloudy so we couldn't sunbathe by the pool as planned (but that was no big day, I'd rather have had the sun in the parks anyway!) and in Hawaii it rained a few times but it's funny rain because it's warm, quite light and short bursts so people don't bother trying to shelter, they just stay out in it because it's nice and refreshing. The weather is something we definitely couldn't complain about!

OWO is so good, you must do it! I know you've done NYC a couple of times now so it's a great 'new thing' for you to do. It's a great experience and the views are spectacular, especially on a clear day!

By the way, same about the Shack Shack burger!

Originally Posted by sweetemotion

Wow, you did so much in one day! I thought I went all out in cities, but knowing just how big NYC is I feel bad for your feet just reading this!

I'd love to visit NYC but I think 5/6 days would be be minimum for me.

Loving the trip report and can't wait to read about your time in Hawaii

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Haha thank you! I appreciate your sympathy!
I think our itinerary in NYC is what most people would look to do in 4-5 days so if you want to do any of the museums, I think your guess is about right!
Hawaii's a few days away yet but I'll get it posted as soon as I can!

[TractorBoy]

Have been waiting for your trippie. Hooked after just a couple of days!

Great pics by the way!

[NatsyNoo]

Originally Posted by TractorBoy

Have been waiting for your trippie. Hooked after just a couple of days!

Great pics by the way!

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Thank you!
I'm busy sorting out some photos tonight but will aim to get the next couple of days up tomorrow!

[TracyW]

Wow, great first stop report, and some amazing pictures!

[NatsyNoo]

Originally Posted by TracyW

Wow, great first stop report, and some amazing pictures!

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Thank you!

[fillmore]

What an epic visit to NY. The photos of the 9/11 museum are so thought provoking. We were at the top of the tower 3 months before 9/11 and I still can't believe they are not here anymore. The photo of the fire truck made me well up! Great report!

[NatsyNoo]

Originally Posted by fillmore

What an epic visit to NY. The photos of the 9/11 museum are so thought provoking. We were at the top of the tower 3 months before 9/11 and I still can't believe they are not here anymore. The photo of the fire truck made me well up! Great report!

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Thank you for reading! The 9/11 was definitely a trip highlight, it's so well curated! It was incredibly moving, especially when you hear the accounts of people who were there on the day and read the stories of those who were involved in the rescue or caught up in the chaos

[jobelly]

Fab trip report so far, we're having 4 nights before Orlando next year but will have 3 kids with us so probably (definitely) won't get as much done. Did you buy all your tickets separately or one of the multi pass? Also was it worth doing all three towers?

[NatsyNoo]

Originally Posted by jobelly

Fab trip report so far, we're having 4 nights before Orlando next year but will have 3 kids with us so probably (definitely) won't get as much done. Did you buy all your tickets separately or one of the multi pass? Also was it worth doing all three towers?

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Thank you for reading! 4 nights will be a great amount of time! That would have been ideal for us, would have certainly saved our feet on the second day when we walked 66k steps!

Before I went, I was certain that doing all three skyscrapers plus SOL was stupid but I felt that we had to do it anyway because all the forums said so, and I'm so glad we did!

Rockefeller is supposed to be great at sunset but we did it to get a daytime view
Empire State was so beautiful at nighttime
But my general advice for both of those would be do one at day and one at pure night
Then One World just offered a totally different view, has that poignant perspective because of where it is and is also the tallest building now so is unique in that respect too
So if budget allows, I would recommend doing all three...sorry

The multi-pass thing is different depending on what you want to do. I added our activities up and for the bits that a pass would collectively cover, the pass cost more because the other elements that the pass included were not going to be used. So I prepurchased all of our tickets separately (which saved us a fair amount of queueing time when we were there, especially ESB). I would recommend writing a list of your activities, writing down the cost of each, and then working out which pass(es) would be the best option(s) for you and then just doing the maths. It won't take long but even if it saves you £50 for the family, that's £50 you wouldn't have had otherwise. HTH!

[jobelly]

Originally Posted by NatsyNoo

Thank you for reading! 4 nights will be a great amount of time! That would have been ideal for us, would have certainly saved our feet on the second day when we walked 66k steps!

Before I went, I was certain that doing all three skyscrapers plus SOL was stupid but I felt that we had to do it anyway because all the forums said so, and I'm so glad we did!

Rockefeller is supposed to be great at sunset but we did it to get a daytime view
Empire State was so beautiful at nighttime
But my general advice for both of those would be do one at day and one at pure night
Then One World just offered a totally different view, has that poignant perspective because of where it is and is also the tallest building now so is unique in that respect too
So if budget allows, I would recommend doing all three...sorry

The multi-pass thing is different depending on what you want to do. I added our activities up and for the bits that a pass would collectively cover, the pass cost more because the other elements that the pass included were not going to be used. So I prepurchased all of our tickets separately (which saved us a fair amount of queueing time when we were there, especially ESB). I would recommend writing a list of your activities, writing down the cost of each, and then working out which pass(es) would be the best option(s) for you and then just doing the maths. It won't take long but even if it saves you £50 for the family, that's £50 you wouldn't have had otherwise. HTH!

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Thanks will start to add it all up! If money doesn't allow (the way the £ $ rate is) which two would you were best? I think the kids definitely want to do ESB as they've heard of that one and they also want to climb Statue of Liberty. We were going to get tickets from grandparents for Christmas for Aladdin on broadway but apparently minimum age is 6 so we won't be able to do that but I'm not sure we could ask for tickets for ESB instead.