Anyone who read my previous New York posts will know that I recently embarked on my first trip to the states, specifically to New York, with my best friend D. We’d wanted to go since we were 13.
Day 1 and Day 2 have been pretty extensively blogged now so I’m swiftly moving on to the super exciting Day 3.
We’d pre-planned our days quite meticulously but the plans were open to change if (as with Day 2), we discovered something we wanted to see was nearby to where we already were. Because Day 2 changed so drastically – we were supposed to do the SATC tour followed by late lunch in Central Park, but ended up doing the NY Public Library and Grand Central as they were near to the drop off point of our tour – it meant we’d freed up time from another day later in the week. So we decided to change the plan completely for Day 3 and do what we’d not done on Day 2 – Explore Central Park.
We found a cute little cafe for breakfast – I had a really tasty Spinach and Bacon Omlette and D had Eggs Benedict – and then headed straight for Central Park as we wanted to do as much of it as we could and it really is HUGE. People who’ve been tell you that it’s huge but when you look at it on the map it doesn’t look that big. Believe me, it’s massive!!!! We were in there for most of the day and probably only covered a third of it. It’s humungous!
Anyway, on the way to Central Park I suddenly realised where we were! Before we’d set out on our trip I had done a LOT of research and planned routes and looked at endless maps and even visited my fair share of websites, which showed lots of cool places to go. As D is the biggest SATC fan in the world (Yes I do believe this to be true, she not only knew all of the answers to the questions on the SATC tour but she even knew things the tour guide didn’t!) I also looked into some locations from the show. I knew we would be going on the SATC tour but I wanted to do some research too. In doing this I came across the website iamnotastalker.com (if you’re a fan of SATC please go to Lindsay’s site, I think you’ll really enjoy seeing the places she’s been to from the show). Which is basically dedicated to seeking out movie and TV show locations – including SATC. Somehow when looking at this website I became particularly enthralled by how Lindsay (the lady who runs the site) found Mr Big’s church that he goes to with his mother. Lindsay even posed outside a house that she thought was the one Carrie stood in front of while she waited for Big. But oops, she was standing in front of the wrong house! Anyway, whilst walking down this road on the way to Central Park I suddenly realise this is the house!! And look over the road and there is the church!!
So we took lots of pictures outside (as Lindsay did – even repeating her pose) and as we were looking around the front of the church, a cleaner comes out and asks if D and I want to go inside. We say “if that’s alright?” and he ushers us in. We take a seat in one of the pews and no sooner have we done this than the priest appears and starts practicing playing a flute on the alter. The most serene and beautiful playing you have ever heard. We listened a while and then left, it felt like a very personal NY moment just for us. :0)
After our saintly moment we headed on to Central Park. We decided very quickly that we needed a specific Central Park map as there were places in the park we specifically wanted to go to, such as Strawberry Fields, the Imagine Mosaic and the Alice In Wonderland Statue. We made our way around in a sort of backwards giant S shape if that makes sense? Starting at the lower east side and moving up. We found Strawberry Fields and got an ice cream as we walked through it to the Imagine Mosaic.
From there I suggested to D that we go to see the Dakota Building which is where John Lennon and Yoko Ono lived and is sadly famous for the fact that it’s where John Lennon was shot. We took a few photos of the outside but it’s an eerie place to be honest, because of the legacy of what happened there I guess. Which is why I was shocked to discover that Yoko Ono apparently maintains their top floor apartment there. I don’t know that I’d want to stay somewhere that my husband died. But then she must have happy memories of that place too.
To get back to our happy place we wandered back into the park and headed for Alice. I couldn’t really get any good pictures of her as these annoying kids, err I mean lovely little children, were playing all over it. This is the best I could do without looking like I was photographing kiddies.
Whilst in Central Park we also saw Cleopatra’s Needle - one of three Ancient Egyptian obelisks re-erected in London, Paris, and New York City during the nineteenth century. Although the needles are genuine Ancient Egyptian obelisks, they are somewhat misnamed as they have no particular connection with Queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt.
The Lake in Central Park
Belvedere Castle
Conservatory Water in Central Park
Kerbs Boathouse (if you’ve seen the guilty pleasure that is 27 Dresses you might recognise this)
Bethesda Fountain
And finally, The Mall
After eating the most vile pretzel I’ve ever had the misfortune of tasting in The Mall we headed out of Central Park and decided as we still had a fair amount of daylight hours we would take the subway to Coney Island for some bracing sea air – or as my friend Greg Holden puts it in his song ‘Coney Island’ – “Where the air will clear my mind”. Hmmm, this is what greeted us when we reached Coney Island.
As you can see it was really busy! It was like an even more run down version of Blackpool, during the closed season! And as it was June it definitely wasn’t closed. The whole place is like a ghost town. Very strange indeed.
Coney Island being a massive let down we quickly hopped back on the subway and headed back to our hotel to freshen up for our evening sojourn into Little Italy.
I wish I could say something really exciting about Little Italy but my food was so dull there that I can’t think of anything else to say. It is a lot nicer a place than China Town though so if you’re going to go to one make it Little Italy. Just make sure you go for something exciting on the menu if you eat there as the safe option is the boring option!
Well folks that’s another day done! I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did! :0D
Lady K x
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