A Weekend In New York For The 2007 Online Watch Enthusiast Gathering
Day 3 – Saturday, May 19th 2007
Having gotten to bed at a more reasonable hour on Friday night, Karen and I were up early and ready to take in as much sight seeing as we could on Saturday – we had a lot of ground to cover! We also wanted to take in as many sites before major rain came down, which was a factor the entire day.
Our first stop was Battery Park (so named because of the gun batteries which used to be placed along the shore to defend against attackers). Battery Park is also where you go to get tickets for the ferry which goes to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.
Here’s a shot of Karen we got with one of the “Statue of Liberty” impersonators:
We stood in line and bought tickets to go on the ferry to Ellis Island, but after purchasing the tickets learned that the line to get on the ferry was over an hour wait – time we didn’t have. What to do? We took the Circle Line tour boat instead:
This turned out to be a really good idea for us as we had a nice vantage point from inside the boat, and we protected from the rain which came down while we were on the tour. Here’s a few things we saw on the tour – first, the Ellis Island receiving center where all immigrants to the US used to be taken for processing:
Then we saw “Lady Liberty” herself – the Statue of Liberty!
The Circle Line tour doesn’t stop and let people off at the Statue – only Ellis Island ferry does (it’s the only water craft allowed near the Statue). Still the boat comes close to the island….what an amazing structure it is!
We also got a good view of the former location of the World Trade Center – you can see the “gap” where the twin towers were behind the building with the green top in the photo below:
Here’s a shot of the famous River Cafe at base of the Brooklyn Bridge:
After the tour was over, it was a short walk up to Wall Street:
Here’s a shot of me and the famous bull which is in the heart of the financial district:
The New York Stock Exchange:
The site of George Washington’s inauguration:
From here, just take a left on Liberty, and you’re only a block or so away from Ground Zero – the former site of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center:
Here’s what is now the construction site of the new Freedom Tower:
It looks like the work of clean up is finished and construction is just beginning:
The memorial for those who lost their lives here – “may we never forget.”:
After seeing Ground Zero, we were pretty hungry from all the running around and stopped at this deli style cafe for lunch:
Mmmm…freshly made Panini!
From here, we needed to head back to our hotel, change our cloths, and make our way to the main gathering of watch enthusiasts which was scheduled for Saturday night. You can read all about that by clicking HERE.
After the successful GTG event, Karen and I decided to head over to the Empire State building, and try to get a view of the city at night. The Empire State building was only a few blocks from our hotel – here’s what it looks like at night:
We walked past Macy’s which is only a couple of blocks away:
Here’s the lobby from the 5th Ave. entrance:
We were going to go to the top, but it was still sprinkling rain, and we were told the visibility at the top was quite poor, so we opted to make it back over the next morning before we had to leave for LaGuardia and fly home. So we purchased our tickets and headed back to the hotel, determined to see a few remaining sights before we returned to Ohio on Sunday.
*All text and images contained in this review are the original work of the author, John B. Holbrook, II and are copyright protected. Use of any of the information or images without the permission of the author is prohibited.
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