I finally fulfilled my dream to see New York!! We went to NY for 10 days in the end of September. We left early Monday morning. We left the house around 5.30 to take the flight at 7. I had to change Nathan in bed and just carried him out. But as soon as he saw Seik who came to take us to the airport, he was wide awake J. We thought that he would fall asleep once we boarded the plane and we certainly hoped he would coz we were very tired ourselves. I only slept like 2-3 hrs the night before from packing. But Nathan was so excited although it was not his first time flying and didn’t fall asleep for the first few hours. The flight was a very long and we had a 3 hours layover in Baltimore. Nathan had so much fun with the escalator at the airport and we had to take go up and down the escalator so many times. We arrived in NY at almost 7 PM. Took the cab to Aluk’s apartment and had pizza for dinner there. If it was just the two of us, we would definitely go out but with Nathan, the whole day trip must have been very tiring for him although it was still early for Arizona time.
Well, when we made our plan to visit NY, we decided that we would take it easy and not rush it so that Nathan would have time to rest and enjoy the trip. So instead of the old travel mindset of hitting as many places as possible, we kind of planned it loosely and planned to spend more time at each place so we could stop and rest. It turned out that taking Nathan for the trip was not bad at all!! I think he was having fun and learning a lot of new stuff. He got to ride the bus for the first time, recognized taxis, buses, trains, planes. We went to Toysrus in Times Square and rode the ferris wheel inside the store. We went to FAO Schwarz to play their big piano. We even stopped and waited almost half an hour for some street performers to start dancing on the side walk. We caught the dance just right at the end and seeing how excited Nathan was, we waited for the next dance although it took a while to get enough people before they would start dancing. It was worth it though, Nathan really enjoyed it and was so excited about it. I think he had fun and I would do it over again with him in tow. Although this time, I am so thankful that we could stay at Aluk’s place. No, not about the money coz we already set aside the budget for hotel. But the convenience and cleanliness that count. I was freaked out because NY was fighting with bedbug and I would worry about staying at a hotel. It was also great that Nathan got more space to play in than at a hotel room.
We did a lot a lot of walking during our stay there and I am sure Nathan loved sitting in his stroller while we walked around the city. We walked through Central Park from the southern entrance and came out halfway to the Met Museum. Too bad, Nathan was already tired and napped in his stroller when we strolled the park L We thought that he would be able to run and play there, but well he was already tired that he didn’t want to come out of his stroller, and finally fell asleep. We went to Chinatown a couple of times, Times Square, UN headquarter, downtown, strolled along Park avenue, Rockefeller Center, Top of the Rock, St Patrick Cathedral, Grand Central station, and took the Long Island ferry to see the Liberty statue. We didn’t go to the Liberty island though since I read about how tight the security and the long line to board the ferry and get to the island. Furthermore, if we went, I wanted to go up the platform and the crown. But we couldn’t go up the crown with Nathan since the elevator is under renovation and there was no guarantee that we could still get the ticket with admission to the platform. So we thought about doing the Circle Line cruise that circles Manhattan. But it’s a 3.5 hr long cruise and I doubt that Nathan would have much fun sitting in a boat for so long. So, we ended up just doing the Staten Island ferry which was free, fun and kinda reminded me of the Hongkong ferry.
We left NY on Sunday and went to Stamford, CT. Our friend, Aang, drove from Stamford to pick us up to his house. His dad even cooked lunch for us. After lunch, we went to downtown Greenwich which was just a street filled with shops. Nice and quiet with a lot of boutique type stores not suitable for my wallet J
We left Stamford for Washington DC that night. We took the Amtrak to Union Station and arrived at 11 PM in DC. We took a cab ride to our hotel, Marriott in Wardman Park. Really nice hotel, but I was worried about bedbug and I also didn’t really like carpeted hotel room (which is what most hotels in the US have L) . When we stay at hotel, I always opened the comforter and flat sheet to check if the bed sheet is clean and I usually wear slippers in the room. But now with a toddler in tow, it’s not possible to have him wear slippers all the time in the room, so I kinda freaked out about getting dirty. Enough with the whining! J Our hotel was only a few blocks from the National Zoo so we were planning to take Nathan to the zoo, but it was pouring the next day so we went to the Smithsonian Natural History Museum instead. It was interesting but he is too young to appreciate it so he was more thrilled going up and down the stairs inside the museum than looking at the fossils J From the museum we walked to the US Capitol. It was a nice walk except that it was sprinkling and a bit windy, while Nathan was taking his nap in his stroller. We went inside the US Capitol visitor center but missed the last tour for the day. We walked to the Union Station from there and had a late lunch since we had our breakfast late. We went back to Wardman Park from there and had Chinese dinner nearby our hotel. I wasn’t hungry but thought Nathan might get hungry later at night.
The next day, we went to the zoo in the morning. Nathan’s first trip to zoo! And mommy’s first time seeing Panda live! We were lucky that when we there, the zoo staff was feeding the pandas so they actually moved up to pretty close to us. Nathan still remembers panda and that panda was mamam (eating) J We have a panda keychain and a few days ago he found it and said ‘panda’. Good job baby! From the zoo, we walked to a Malaysian restaurant near the subway station by our hotel and Nathan fell asleep in his stroller. He woke up for lunch though and after lunch we took the metro subway to the white house. After taking some pictures, we walked from the White House to the National Monument. And Nathan was off his stroller, walking with me all the way to the National Monument. And it was definitely not a short walk, especially for a one and half year old! I had him on the baby leash so he didn’t run off to the street. He was just very happy exploring the streets and the park that we went through and he wouldn’t let me carry him at all. It was really a wonderful feeling seeing how happy he was. From the National Monument, we walked to the Reflecting Pool and Nathan also walked himself. He finally got on the stroller and fell asleep when we walked from the pool to the Lincoln Memorial. He slept for quite a bit until we came out of the Lincoln Memorial. Btw, Lincoln Memorial is just like the Chiang Kai Shek Memorial in Taipei that we went to before. I didn’t know that before…*blush* From there we went to have dinner at downtown DC, we walked past the college area of George Washington University. The area is very alive, with a lot of groups of college age students walking around. After dinner, we picked up some donuts and went back to the hotel.
With that, the vacation was overL We returned to Phoenix the day after. Our flight was at 2, but Dulles airport is still almost an hour trip away from DC so we booked our taxi for 11 o’clock and it cost $60-$65 for the cab fare! Ouch….
Well, overall impression of the trip is awesome!
I love New York!! It reminds me of San Francisco but in a more crowded, dirtier and much bigger scale. I am not sure if I want to raise family there but I sure love to live there if I were single or just couple with no kid. And well, definitely love to visit again J
I like how CT is lined with trees and bet the fall foliage must be really gorgeous there.
DC visit is usually filled with visits to the extensive choices of museums and most of them are for free. However, we only went to one since we didn’t think that Nathan would enjoy it yet. So may be another trip when he is older that will be filled with visits to museums J. DC seemed clean and organized in most parts that we went to. I loved walking on the streets and parks there. I love walking in big cities like NY, SF, but at the same time, I love strolling down the parks and more laidback neighborhood. Oh another thing is DC has very very very long escalators going into their underground subway stations!
I was also very happy that we got to see Aluk, Aang, Icha and their two little girls. I only regretted that we were all so tired and lacking sleep when we saw Aang fam that I probably appeared kinda dozed to them L We stayed up pretty late almost every night chatting with Aluk and the last night we were there, we talked until 3 in the morning.
