NEW YORK DAY ONE

O.K., I'm going to tackle this one day at a time because I have so many photos to share...and so little time (yeah right). I've got the first three day's of photos up on facebook too, if anyone is interested.

WE ARRIVED late on Wednesday although it didn't really feel that late (we added three hours to our day). We stopped off at the TGI Friday's for a quick bite and gave Corey a call for any last minute tips for catching a subway to Manhattan (we flew into Newark). We are such amateurs. The cab ride was cool because we got to go under the Hudson River in the Holland Tunnel. We arrived at Corey and Susan's about the same time Corey got off work and all headed to a fun restaurant called Dukes. It was themed around the Dukes of Hazard, obviously, because all the food was southern (and delicious). They even had a Daisy Duke Burger. I opted for the grilled chicken sandwich with avocado. I was a little jealous when everyone else's fancy drinks came with beads wrapped around them, so I had to order one the next round so that I'd have a pretty necklace of my own. Here are our generous hosts Corey and Susan at Dukes.

The next morning Corey handed us a loaded MET card (subway fare) and Susan gave us a few tips on trains to take, and we were off. We stopped across the street at one of the many local vendors to grab an iced coffee (with a little cream and vanilla) and bagels and walked over to Madison Square Park to sit and watch the people. We were right next to the Flatiron building which was one of the fist skyscrapers ever. It sits on a pointed intersection and the building is triangular. Very interesting! What a cool building. Then we jumped on a subway and headed up to the Natural Museum of History for some culture and education.

The Natural Museum of History was amazing!!! It was cool to see so many life-specimens; everything from ancient human remains (three million year old Lucy is even there), to T-rex fossils, to taxidermied Polar Bears! Wow, quite a display. We both really enjoyed the planetarium show, and Jeff was quite impressed by the meteorites on display. I wish we had another day to spend there because we didn't even see everything. We were getting hungry and had been walking around the museum for hours when we finally decided to give up and save the remainder of the museum for another visit someday.

When we left the museum we headed across the street to Central Park to get a bite to eat. We got lost in The Ramble and followed The Lake until we stumbled upon the Boathouse Restaurant where we stopped to share a kebab and sit under the outdoor umbrella as it began to sprinkle.

We decided to walk though the park to the south end, head towards Times Square and then catch a subway back to Corey and Susan's. We also stopped in at the Tavern on the Green and took a picture of their pretty and posh outdoor seating area. They were busy moving everything for the evening's event indoors because it was beginning to rain (can you see where this is going?)

This is one of the southern entrances to the park.

O.K., so then the rain hit, full on!!! It was pouring! We ducked inside a little diner for some New York Buffalo Wings. They weren't as spicy as we hoped, but the seating was great. We sat in the front of the diner that was completely opened to the outdoors, watched people rushing around in the rain, reviewed our NYC map, and even grabbed an umbrella from a street vendor outside the diner.

We had to stop and take a picture here...oh and Dave Matthews was on the show while we were in NY! It might have been worth it to stand in line to get into that show if we had known!

I didn't take too many pictures that evening. Once we got back to Corey and Susan's (we were soaking wet) we got cleaned up and walked with Susan to a nice Mexican Restaurant called Dos Caminos. Corey and Sean met us there. The food was good! I especially liked the guacamole which was made to order at our table. The bathroom attendant was an interesting touch. We realized then that we weren't in OK town anymore! Watch out NYC, here we come! ....story to continue