New York, New York

Last Friday we drove up to New Jersey to attend Stuart's cousin's daughter's Bat Mitzvah. It was a lovely event and the boys were good about dressing up and wearing ties for the first time!

Boys at the Bat Mitzvah

We also visited New York City with Stuart's college friend Michelle. Early Sunday morning we drove to Liberty Landing State Park in New Jersey, where we caught a ferry to Ellis Island.

Fancy a Cruise?

We looked at some of the exhibits of immigrants arriving at Ellis Island and then caught another ferry to the Statue of Liberty. You can't go inside the statue at the moment but we got some pics of the boys and Lady Liberty. They also learned why she's green...in case you didn't know, she's made of copper, which turns green when exposed to the air. I was able to show Joshua another example of this as people had thrown coins near a fountain, some of which were green.

 

Then we hopped on another ferry to Battery Park, which is at the bottom of Manhattan Island. From there we took the subway to midtown (with the help of Michelle, who is much more familiar with the NY subway than we are!) so we could go up the Empire State Building...currently the tallest building in New York.

Subway Boys...nothing phases them

Thankfully there were no crowds or long lines and we breezed right through our second security checkpoint of the day (the first was at Liberty Landing where my Swiss Army Penknife was confiscated...darn.) We took an elevator up to the 80th floor and then another elevator to the 86th. (Fun fact that Joshua discovered: the Empire State Building has 73 elevators!) We stepped outside to view the city...

After that breathtaking experience, we took the subway back downtown for our 9/11 Memorial tour. Tickets for the memorial are free but you have to get them in advance...we had an entry time of 3:45. After going through the 3rd and final checkpoint of the day we walked around the memorial. It's a parklike setting...very peaceful and serene and tragic all at the same time. The spots where the buildings stood have been turned into giant waterfalls with the names of all the victims engraved in granite around the outside. Victims' names are organized based on associations such as people they knew or were related to and/or where they were when they died. Relatives requested associations, all of which were honored when the placement of names was created.

One World Trade Center under construction

Survivor tree...the only tree to survive the attacks

All around the memorial other buildings are going up. One of them - One World Trade Center -  will become the tallest building in New York City. The idea is that the new World Trade Center buildings will surround the memorial, signifying rebuilding what was destroyed while remembering this senseless act of terrorism. It was a very moving experience, especially as I could see directly across the street the Millennium Hilton, the hotel I stayed in last time I was in New York, from which I watched people enter the Twin Towers.

After visiting the memorial we had a short walk to the World Financial Center ferry terminal, where we caught our final ferry of the day back to New Jersey, but not before some last minute parkour:

Some people were really tired:

It was a great day. We saw so much in such a short time, and also had so much fun with Michelle. Thanks for coming with us!