Fall Break Fun in NYC!
Fall break was this past weekend and I was so excited to be able to travel to New York City for the first time to spend time with my dad. I had been wanting to see NYC for a long time, and my dad recently got a job where he commutes to New York, so I was ecstatic to finally have the opportunity to check it out!
I flew out Thursday afternoon, but unfortunately the weather was bad so my plane was delayed. When we drove through the city for this first time, it was rather foggy so I couldn’t see much. Luckily the weather was great on Friday and Saturday. My dad and I love traveling and learning about history/checking out museums, so we naturally had to do everything. Or at least, we tried. On Friday, we went to Hoboken and the famous Carlo’s bakery from Cake Boss on TLC! I love Cake Boss and watching the ridiculously elaborate cakes that he makes, so it was fun to check out the bakery and we got plenty of yummy desserts. We then took a train to the World Trade Center and went to the 9/11 Memorial. I never saw the Twin Towers while they were standing, but they were clearly huge by the size of the bases. Also just seeing the actual place where the devastation happened made it all more real to me, and it was definitely a somber moment. We then took the subway to Chinatown for dinner, and just to check it out, since we had to see all the neighborhoods of Manhattan.
Saturday, we woke up bright and early, as we had a lot to see. We first took the ferry to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. I really enjoyed walking through the building as the immigrants had a hundred years ago and learning about the process that they went through. Then, we drove into NYC to see the Lion King on Broadway. I am not a huge fan of musical theater but it was amazing! There is a reason this show has been running for as long as it has. The costumes, the sets, the performers, everything was incredible. The theater was just next to Times Square, which was cool, but overwhelming. There were so many ads and people, and although it was fun to see, I think it was just a little too much. Next, we walked to Grand Central Station, which was such a beautiful building. We also found the “Whispering Room” where you can stand on one side and talk to someone on the other side of the room through the ceiling. That was definitely cool. We then went to Central Park, which was nice to just walk around and enjoy nature. After dinner, we just happened to walk by Carnegie Hall, and a lady gave us free tickets to that night’s concert! The performance for the night was a joint Japan-USA concert that featured a Japanese Gospel choir. While we only stayed for three songs (I was too tired to listen to the whole thing), it was awesome just to see the inside of such a famous building. It seems like there are so many iconic places in NYC that it’s common to just randomly find one of them.
Sunday morning we slept in after being exhausted from the day before. I wanted to go shopping, but interesting fact: all clothing stores are closed on Sundays in New Jersey. So instead we went to SoHo, which was really enjoyable. There were so many stores that I had never heard of, I even found a Chobani store. It was fun just looking around, and it seemed like half the people were speaking Italian, but that may be because Little Italy was nearby. Overall, the trip was really fun and it was also great to spend time with my dad. It was definitely a busy weekend, but I had a great time visiting NYC.