NYC

I'm back!

New York was Amazing. The best trip of my life. End of.

I won't bore you with all the details, but just a brief day by day run down of events...and trust me, it was VERY eventful...

Day 1

We set of from Leeds about 7am and arrived in London by 1pm (I've learnt the way to survive a coach ride that long is to sleep and hope for the best) When it came to boarding we discovered our Italian teacher had been refused at check-in, it's not clear what happened, but this now left our Irish teacher Paddy, in charge of 40+ students...he seemed nervous :)

The flight was easy, no problems, British Airways is awesome, free drinks constantly, edible food and a film library of about 50 films to choose from....I've never been subject to such luxury in the air :)

I used my time wisely and watched Unstoppable (2010) The Kings Speech (2010) and 127 Hours (2010) a good choice I think :)

We arrived in New York about 8pm and endured a crazy coach ride to the hotel, I felt like I was in a session of Grand Theft Auto.....there was a lot of 'honking' and breaking and squeezing down streets we probably shouldn't have attempted....that was our first taste of The Big Apple....

The hotel was brilliant, we each had a double bed and actual space to move about, in fact one night I actually demonstrated the use of space as a running track to exercise....some people are probably used to hotels like this and think nothing of it, but compared to my last trip, to Paris, this hotel was Heaven, did not want to leave!!!

The Room

Day 2

We started our morning with a traditional USA breakfast, of PANCAKES!! (covered in syrup yum!) The day consisted of:

• Walk down 5th Av and Broadway
• A trip to Madame Tussuad's
• The M&M and Hershey bar stores
• Visit to the MOMA Museum (Museum of Modern Art)
• Tea at Planet Hollywood
• Times Square at night
• View from the top of the Rockafella (Top of the Rock)
• People watching at Rockafella's ice rink (very amusing....Jonny Depp, Chris Brown and Lucy Lu lookalikes...)

I'll also mention now that we walked EVERYWHERE! We tried the subway once to get us down to Ground Zero, but the rest of the time we didn't wanna miss a thing and I'm so glad we stayed on foot, so many buildings and shops we would have missed otherwise :)

New York at night

Times Square

The Hulk

Pancakes

Day 3

After such a busy day, we decided to chill out at Central Park and visit the 'Musuem Mile', the weather was much better, made the park look even more beautiful...

• Walked through Central Park, experiencing the mother and Bugaboo baby exercise club, the millions of NYC joggers and the Lake House from '27 Dresses'
• Visited the MET museum
• Went to the top of the Guggenheim museum
• Got lost/trapped in the National History Museum (Now we know how Ben Stiller felt)
• Was a little disappointed by Bloomingdale's
• Had tea at America's largest TGIFriday
• Strolled back to the hotel for an early night

Central Park Bridge

The best fruit salad!

Central Park

Day 4

Another busy day, don't think we could have fit much else in that day...

• Visited the Empire State building
• Went on the Sky ride
• Saw a girl get run over and walked away completely unharmed.....the most shocking thing I have ever seen, a complete miracle
• Experienced Macy's (absolute Heaven)
• Bought myself a bad ass camera from the worlds biggest electrical store
• Visited the harbour
• Got the subway down town
• Stood meters away from where the World Trade Center stood, at Ground Zero
• Went to the Bodies Exhibition (REAL dead bodies)
• Walked down Wall St
• Saw City Hall
• Stood in Grand Central Station
• Experienced late night shopping in Times Square
• Tea at Planet Hollywood (again...it was just that good!)
• Bumped into everyone leaving the New York Television Awards with their awards
• Stumbled back to the hotel about 1am

New York in the day

Pizza at Planet Hollywood

Grand Central Station

The 9/11 Memorial Plaza being built

Day 5

Packed and ready to go, a relaxing day to end our trip:

• Visited the Apple Mac store
• Spent the day at Central Park Zoo
• More shopping
• Searched high and low for 'Flips' (chocolate covered pretzels requested by my cousin)
• Tried a NY MacDonald's
• Set off back to the airport :(

Apple Mac store

Red Panda

Polar Bear

Mongoose

MaccyD's

Day 6

After a night flight and a dodgy movie called Monsters....(bad choice) we arrived back in England about 11am and had to endure another coach ride, which went thankfully very quickly due to jet lag and general exhaustion!

Back to uni by 4pm and back to reality....at least I now have a month off, so it's not all bad :)

I can safely say New York is the most amazing place I've ever been and I'm already planning my next trip :) I'm so glad I chose to go, it was a bit of a spur of the moment decision, due to events that happened last year I decided to 'just do it' we only live once and it's my chance to live my life without anyone holding me back....it's funny how things turn out for the better in the end. The best decision I ever made and hopefully many more to come.

I <3 NYC