The American Adventure! Day 2; The real Fairy tale of New York!

[Guest]

Today, July 3rd 2015 turned out to be THE best day of my life!

We hadn't planned to get up too early as we didn't have written in plans till 1pm but being who we are we love a good explore! So at around 7am we were awake, showering and deciding what to do for breakfast.
As Mitchell had already pinned some places on the map for us to try out, we headed straight for Angela's on 52nd and 6th.





The best thing about Angela's was the atmosphere - even the local sheriffs were nipping in to get their large coffee and bagel.
The staff are lovely too - patiently wait for the typical English tourist to pick one item off of the list of 30!
As the pictures show, we both opted for the pancakes and bacon - the standard first American breakfast right? And what a choice! The pancakes were deliciously fluffy and bacon was strong in that smoked flavour that we had been craving for weeks!
Breakfast (With a large ice tea and a large coffee came to $19

As we had some time to spare, we decided to make a B line for central park - possibly my favourite place in the whole world! (Minus Disney of course ).
We stopped off to take some pictures on some rocks that stood beautifully on the edge of central park just allowing the tops of the city to dazzle through ...





Me being me saw the zoo sign and got over the top excited about squeezing this in as an added bonus this morning! However after the dash over we soon realised that it was far too quiet for it to be open ...and yes 10:30am it opened and it was only just touching 9am!
Seeing as we had an hour and a half to spare, we started to look towards what the plans of the day were ...

Right heres the exciting part - It was my 21st birthday about a month before we came out so Mitchell had arranged a photo shoot in central park to help us take in the sights and get some knowledge around the beautiful area. We hadn't really mentioned it much since we'd got here but I soon realised that I didn't want to be wearing my usual shorts and shirt look in the photos. This in mind we made a plan to head straight back to the hotel, make ourselves look as pretty as possibly (Given the heat and all that!) and spend some time at the zoo before our meeting later on.

Dressed and brushed up, we headed back over to the zoo. Our hotel was really handy for this as its literally 2 minutes away.

The zoo is beautiful. Its not the biggest but its home to plenty of amazing animals and includes lots of things to do for those with children etc. We purchased our tickets at the booth (around $12 each) and headed to the entrance. Instead of talking through this ill just pop some pictures here ...





Red Pandas are just the cutest!



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The Bear joined in our selfie!





I really enjoyed the bears - especially as they had viewing platforms all around!

After meandering slowly around and taking in all the sights, we realised it was already pushing 12! We needed to get to the other side of central park within the hour - it was time to push on!

This is where Mitchell started telling me about what it was we were doing; A photo shoot that would help us see more of central park on our own as we would have a knowledgeable guide with us. I loved the fact he had included this as I'd always wanted a photoshoot but Mitchell had never really been much for it.

So, the company we were booked with were called Gotham City tours and they provide tours and photo's in Central Park for groups of any shapes and sizes!



And here we are looking rather sweaty before our meeting with Sid.

Once we hit 81st entrance on 8th Avenue, our tour guide Sid was waiting for us! Sid was just fantastic! From the minute we met him he was telling us stories of how Central Park came to be what it is today and how each little park, building and statue has its own story.

Ill load the photos on rather than talk all about it - I could talk all day about the experience - out of this world!



We started right in front of Belvedere castle - Possibly the best castle in the world! (again apart from Cinders castle at Disney :P) Sid started telling me about how Gargamel from the Smurfs movies uses this castle as his base on his mission to capture the smurfs. At first I didnt want to believe it (Ruining my favourite castle like that) but then all the best castles have villains right?









Walking around Belvedere castle was so beautiful! The grounds are beyond glorious and the castle itself - there are no words! We started at the bottom taking pictures right outside before climbing to each level and taking in the views. I loved the river that is right under it as the rocks glisten (due to material growing on the Rocks - Sid Facts!) and you can see turtles swimming around - cute!

BUT THEN THIS HAPPENED...











There are no words to explain how I felt at that moment - It was just perfect!
I couldn't believe I hadn't even caught on to the idea that this may have happened, how did he hide that ring?
In all honestly I cried for a whole half an hour before I calmed down - I was beyond happy!

Just a little 'Love story' to add in here - Only a few months ago me and Mitchell had celebrated our 5 years together, we have been together since school and he really is my best friend and soul mate all rolled into one, and considering how shy he normally is, he did so good getting down on one knee in front of at least 50 very enthusiastic Americans who made the whole experience better by cheering and clapping throughout the whole thing!

Quite possibly the best moment of my life had just occurred and I couldn't even speak words!

Funny fact though - Mitchell had been shaking the whole morning and I was convinced it was dehydration as it had been very warm and we hadn't had much to drink at all - I guess I now why he was shaking so much right!?

Continued in next post ...

[academy]

Fantastic Day - I was crying with you

Congratulations to you both .

Looking forward to reading more

[Melbatb]

Congratulations! What a wonderful way to propose!

[ally1966]

Congratulations to both of you. What an amazing surprise and a fantastic day.

[Yorkie Girl]

Ah that was amazing! I had goosebumps when I got to your picture with Mitchell down on one knee (plus I'm also biased that Central Park is the most romantic spot for an engagement )

Many congratulations to you both

[Bubble123]

Congratulations, Awesome first day.. Lovely photos too.

[Guest]

The rest of the photoshoot was surreal , so i'll just post the pictures here and hope you can only feel the sanctuary that I was floating in ...















And to wrap everything up a little more, I had been wondering for a while now why Sid was carrying a skateboard...







The horse and carriage ride lasted around 20 minutes, allowing us to peacefully take in not only the moment but the beauty of the city we were in - there really is nothing like New York City.
I felt like a real princess being carted around my fairy tale - I really was walking on sunshine!

Any one wishing to do a photoshoot in Central Park, doesnt even have to be an engagment, get in touch with Gotham City tours and ask for Sid - he was fantastic! We had over 1000 photos taken all of which were sent to us via dropbox within days.
And just for the record - Mitchell and Sid had the whole engagement thing planned down to a T right before we'd get there!

LINK BELOW

Gotham City Tours Facebook Page - go give them a like for their brilliant job!

After the photoshoot, me still completely in a bubble of love, it was reaching 3:30 so we found our way over to the famous 5th avenue apple store - another surreal experience, the building was incredible!





Inside its crazy! Think of all the apple gadgets in the world - you name it they had it!

Right next door is (Or was should I say now) we found FAO schwarz...



I love the Toy Store and i'll be sure to visit their new location on our next holiday to New York! For any toy lover, its a dream! 3 floors of pure toys, gadgets and games! My personal favourite were the big fluffy dogs as you walk in...






And of course its home to the giant piano!



We had been so obsessed with looking around we had'nt even noticed the time -4pm already, today was flying by far too quickly!

On tonight's plan, we had pencilled in a date at Ellen's stardust diner. Come to think of it i'm not sure if Mitchell had purposely planned this or it just happened to fall on this day!
As soon as I got there I fell in love with the place - Great food and singing to go along with it!
Our waiter was lovely and very attentive - drinks were constantly filled up, always asking if the food was okay and giving us updates about how long our food would be - all whilst singing along!







Mitchell had chosen the sloppy joe from the menu - Minced meat with worcester sauce (Rather sugary - he says).




Whilst I chose to have something called the North Carolina Tahreel ; Bbq pulled pork and a beef burger accompanied with what I can only describe as man'n'cheese fritters - THE BEST THING EVER! (I have since craved them pretty much every day i've been back!)



Ofcourse we were celebrating too, so the cocktails keep coming! I stuck with what I knew and had the sex in the city (AKA sex on the beach) whilst Mitchell tried the Rockys Mojito before deciding it was far too strong and joining in with the city cocktails!

We even had pudding this night too ; Chocolate brownie with nuts for me and a strawberry short cake for Mitchell.



By this point, our eyes were far bigger than our belly and we struggled through pudding before throwing in the spoon right before the end!
Our bill came to $111 with tip , rather an expensive night but it was worth it and the place is great! I loved singing along to all the songs much to Mitchells annoyance! MWHAHAHAHA

I had been looking forward to this evening for a while as it was one of the first things we had booked after flights and hotels etc - we were off to see Matilda!

The area around the Shubert theatre was already rather busy so we took our place in line and waited to be called in.





We were rather impressed with the way they had decorated the theatre in all sorts of Matilda props - gave the place a really nice feel. We took our seats which were almost right at the back but the view we had was perfect!



It was over far too quickly for me, not in terms of the production being to short but it was that good I hadn't even realised how fast the time had gone - it was quite sad the day had almost come to an end!




Wanting to elongate the day, we strolled rather slowly through times square on the way back to the hotel ...




Back at the hotel we started reflecting on the day - I couldn't believe how quickly it had gone and I was still on cloud 9! We laughed at my reaction and how i'd asked if he was serious and Mitchell started to tell me all about how he had had it planned for rather a while now - Sid and Mitchell had been plotting behind my back!

This has to be the best first day of holiday ever - and we couldn't wait to see the pictures!

It didnt take long to fall asleep - after all it had been a very busy day!

Tomorrow we head to Brooklyn for more celebrations ...its 4th JULY!





TRIP INDEX

[Guest]

APOLOGISE guys I wanted to do some editing and it wouldn't let me use all the pictures in one post so now its spread across 2!

[Mortimer Mouse]

Congratulations ! Didn't he do well - excellent planning Mitchell.
What an amazing day and it's all captured on camera.

BTW, is that the Q for Ellens Stardust diner, in your photo? Did it take long to get in?

[Guest]

Originally Posted by Mortimer Mouse

Congratulations ! Didn't he do well - excellent planning Mitchell.
What an amazing day and it's all captured on camera.

BTW, is that the Q for Ellens Stardust diner, in your photo? Did it take long to get in?

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I was over the moon with how well he had planned it thank you!

And yes it is but don't worry it moves very quickly and we were in in around 20 minutes.