Empire State - NYC & Rochester

Days 31-33: Wednesday-Friday 16-18 July 2014

We arrived from Dublin to JFK airport around one in the afternoon on Wednesday. We didn't want to get too jet lagged, so we decided to stay up and go do stuff after we checked in to our hotel! We really didn't have too much planned in NYC...I mainly wanted to take Michael to a Broadway show, because he'd never seen one, not even on tour! Ridiculous. I thought my husband was cultured....just kidding, just kidding. Anyway, that was scheduled for Thursday night.  So Wednesday evening we made sure to get a picture with the other Robert Indiana Love sculpture that was on our itinerary, that way we could hang it on our wall with the others. After that we went to Times Square and found a Thai restaurant to eat dinner at. It was pretty good. Since we had just traveled across the Atlantic, we went straight back to our hotel after dinner and went to bed at about 8pm.  We were pretty exhausted.

Thursday morning we set out for the 9/11 World Trade Center memorials.  They are really beautiful. It's hard to believe it's already been 13 years since that tragic day. I was young, but I remember it very well. I visited NYC with my sister and friend in 2011 and it has changed a lot since then! A lot of progress has been made with the Freedom tower. It's almost done!

Of course we walked down Wall street and went inside Trinity church.

On my last visit to NYC I did not go to the Museum of Modern Art.  I'm really glad we went because it is a great museum! I love modern art.  I know most people don't "get it," but it really moves me.  I'm an art freak, so it's okay if you still think it looks like a kindergartner did it, I understand.  That used to be me.

They had a fun exhibit with a bunch of retro video games. We played with those for a while. :)

Gotta love Andy Warhol.

Don't forget about Jackson Pollock

Good ol' van Gogh

Then we mozied over to Radio City and Rockefeller Center

So we went to this really cool Discovery exhibit and saw the work of Nathan Sawaya - he does art work originals and re-creations with LEGOS. It's really cool stuff.  At the end of the exhibit you write your name on a lego block for it to be used for a later project! It was fun to see, especially after having had seen most of these pieces in real life just a week or two before!

After that we had some New York pizza at John's Pizza in Times Square. It was pretty good, but definitely a tourist trap! We didn't care after having had Florence pizza, this stuff didn't even compare. Then....show time! We saw A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, it won the 2014 Tony Award for Best Musical! It was hilarious! We both really liked it and Michael even said he was "surprised how much he enjoyed it." I say that's a winner!!

Friday we slept in and then went out to eat breakfast at a yummy place. I don't recall the name anymore. We had to check out at 10:00am but our train from Penn Station to Rochester didn't leave until 3:30 or so.  We decided to just go ahead and go to the station and hang out.  There wasn't much we could to with all our stuff.  There was wifi at the station and a lot of food kiosks, so we survived the four hour wait.  After doing so many train stations in Europe we got pretty good at the waiting game.  The bonus this time was that we had working cell phones and internet access! Woohoo!

We made it to Rochester without too many issues.  There was a bit of a delay, but we finally made it around midnight or so! Grateful to see Michael's dad after being away from family and friends for so long.  Don't get me wrong, Michael and I loved and cherished all the alone time, but we love our family so much and were so grateful to spend a few days with them.

Days 34-38 Saturday-Wednesday 19-23 July 2014

Our four days in Rochester were spent relaxing and spending time with Michael's dad, step-mom, little step-brother, and Grandma.  It was really nice to spend time with Michael's grandma, who also happened to be visiting at the same time as us.  We had a great time watching movies, playing cards, and chatting with everyone.  We took an afternoon trip to Palmyra, since it's only a 45 minute drive from Michael's dad's house.  Last time we visited the Hill Cumorah and Sacred Grove it was cold and icy! This trip was a little more pleasant. :)

Picture we took with Michael's grandma just before we headed back to Arkansas. We love you, Grandma Bollero!  Was the best way to wrap up our trip of a lifetime!