I Heart NY

Next stop: New York City!
My Mom drove us from Kingston or should I say Amherstview to Syracuse, NY where we hoped a plane and after a short 40minute flight landed in the big apple! Andy had been previously but this was my first time and I instantly fell in love.
We were lucky enough to be able to check in to our hotel (Four Points by Sheraton Midtown) early, freshen up, and then head over to The Empire State Building. We couldn't have asked for a nicer day: warm, sunny, and incredibly clear. The view from the top was outstanding!

Afterwards we walked over to Times Square to try to get Broadway tickets for that evening. We really really really wanted to see The Book of Mormon (by the creators of South Park) but it was sold out so much so that the best the scalpers could do was $300 per ticket. That was a little, well okay a lot out of my price range so we settled on Avenue Q. It ended up being very good and very funny. We ended the night in a little bar on Restaurant row and then a totally cliche photo shoot in Times Square, oh and New York Style pizza!

Day 2 consisted of a very excited Andy waking up a slightly hungover Liz at about 7am. We headed out and got a cab to the bottom of Manhattan, then ran through the rain looking for the ticket booth for the ferry to Liberty and Ellis Island. We found it, bought our tickets, then bought an umbrella, and then of course it didn't rain another drop and the sun came out!!

Anyways, we did the whole Statue of Liberty thing but then skipped Ellis Island because this was all still pre-coffee and I was suffering a major caffeine withdrawals headache. Sad face.
Back on the island of Manhattan we made our way towards Ground Zero and found a little cafe/diner for breakfast and coffee.
The rest of our day was jam-packed with Ground Zero (or what we could see of it since they're building the new freedom towers), Wall Street, a few dumb cab drivers, The Brooklyn Bridge, and then a few hours of shopping in Soho.
Later we headed back to our hotel for a break and to get ready to meet up with Katie.
We met Katie (who now lives in New Jersey, 40mins from NYC by train) at Penn Station and then took a cab to Little Italy. We had a few drinks at one place and then headed to a small and non-assuming joint to eat. It was probably the best Italian food I've ever had (possibly better than Italy??). I decided on the Eggplant Parmigiana even though I'm not the biggest eggplant fan and was very pleased with my choice!
After dinner it was time for some bar hopping... except we ended up walking the wrong way on Canal Street and ended up at a little but packed bar that had only local beers on tap. Then we headed to The Gold Lounge, which really did it for me in terms of New York (ie Sex and the City stylez, duh). It was tiny but drinks were strong (and f*cking expensive!) and the tunes were sweet. We drank and boogied in there for a while, then ended up at an Irish bar somewhere else, where we saw an afroman lookalike and Andy had a Guinness. By this time it was getting quite late and we had to get Katie back for the first train of the day (at 5:15am!). We couldn't find an open bar, let alone any bar, near Penn Station so we bought a few tallboys from a shop in the station and drank until the train arrived!

Day 3 hurt a bit. We slept in and scrambled to check out on time. We were able to store our bags and set up a car to the airport for later that afternoon. Then we walked to Penn Station again and met up with Meghan and her b/f Rob. We hadn't been to Central Park yet so we headed that way and had lunch along the way and then met up with Katie and her friend and wandered around Central Park for a few hours. It was another warm and sunny day and the park was beautiful and made me fall deeper in love with the city.

We said Goodbye and then headed back to our hotel. Our car was waiting and ended up being a Lincoln town car, fancy schmancy! It took us to Newark airport for our flight to Las Vegas. I nearly had a panic attack when we arrived because the check-in was ridiculously long and not moving! But there was no line at curbside check-in and the measly tip we gave was worth not waiting in that horrible Continental line.
Next stop: Vegas, baby!