New York City

Tip: look up. What an amazing variety of designs, textures, decorations and heights of the buildings!

We arrived on the President’s Day public holiday Monday, and after a VERY long wait in the immigration queue at JFK (maximum of four desks open to non-citizens), we caught the LIRR train into the city (that never sleeps). We alighted at Penn Station and walked up 7^th Ave into the theatre district. Our room is on the 12^th floor, which gives us a great view of the skyscrapers and midrise building of Midtown.

I think I may have written too soon about avoiding the weather as a topic of discussion. It is cold, really cold here but we have the trade-off of blue skies. After an early wake up we hit the streets to explore. Bad move! Not a lot opens until 10am.

We were suitably impressed by Grand Central Station, loved NY Public Library (what a palace to literature) and visited Edward (Pooh) Bear and his friends. We strolled the southern area of Central Park, marvelling at the snow and ice on the ground, the squirrels gambolling around, the hawk trying to catch them and the frozen lakes. We had our first NY hotdog from a street stall (not impressed) and then marvelled at the luxury brands on 5^th Ave. Speaking of frozen, it is interesting to see running fountains decorated with icicles – it really is that cold!

A visit to the Rockerfeller Centre's Top of the Rock to marvel at the NY skyline from on high was fantastic (through the timed ticket still required about an hour’s queuing to get to the observation decks). A celebratory glass of bubbles 70 storeys up, sitting in winter sunshine, was a lovely way to round off the day. Dinner was at Virgil’s Bar and Grill; the smoked ribs were delicious. The amount of food people were served was huge (few finished their plates and left with doggy bags), so we ordered carefully and shared some starters, which was more than enough.