Lady Liberty

Well, we’ve officially wrapped up our first visit to the city that never sleeps, and we’re starting to feel as though we’ve never slept. We are leaving with SO many great memories, and of course, souvenir magnets to remember them with. 

Today, for the big finale, we visited Ellis Island & the Statue of Liberty. Between the two of us, Ashley and I only have 1 relative who immigrated to the U.S. while Ellis Island was open. Ashley’s grandfather on her father’s side came here from Italy during that time. Unfortunately, he came through Canada, so we had no records to look up at Ellis Island. Nevertheless, it was a very cool experience to see how so many people came to this country. Of course, the Statue of Liberty was one of the highlights of the whole trip. It was magnificent up close, and the view of NYC from the island was unbeatable. Sadly, the kids weren’t tall enough to be able to go all the way up to the crown, but we did get to climb up to the pedastal. Now, let’s play a little game with these next couple of pictures. I spy something… small and cute! Can you see? Check the bottom-left corner. 

All in all, it was a fantastic first visit to the Empire City and we can’t wait to return. We did have a few observations as to how the city was different than we had expected.

1. Quieter – We really expected a louder, bustling city with yelling, honking horns, and lots of noise. It was much quieter than we thought it would be on the streets, in the subways, and in the public places we visited.
2. More Peaceful – There were so many places to sit & relax. It was much easier than we expected to find a place to just kick back and have some time to yourself. 
3. More Polite – I don’t know if it’s all the stereotypes or what it is, but we really expected people to be much more rude. In fact, we felt just the opposite. Everyone was very nice. People held the door for others, constantly offered up their seats to us and others on the subway, smiled, said hello – basically all of the things we do down south. We really could not tell any difference in the level of politeness of people in general. 
4. Less Crowded – With it being the most populated metropolitan area in the U.S. (almost triple the 2nd place L.A.), we really expected more lines and more crowds. Obviously, the tourist attractions were often a little crowded, but other than that it felt way less crowded than we expected. We never stood in line long for a restaurant, never had a hard time finding a table anywhere, never had a problem hailing a taxi, and just never felt over-crowded in general. Maybe it’s our years of experience visiting Walt Disney World, but NYC seemed quite well-suited to handle the population. 

Well, I hope you’ve enjoyed keeping up with our escapades. We love getting to share them with everyone, because although we are having fun, we miss you all very much! 

Now it’s back to real life! Time for Kaden and I to focus on finishing up the school year strong and get ready for Kaden’s birthday in just a couple weeks!