Sunday, 3rd September, 2006
Our cases packed and stowed in the left luggage room, we once again enjoyed omelets and hash browns at 'Andrews'. It's a bright sunny day with blue skies, perfect for a view from the top of the Empire State Building. The views were astonishing, we took far too many pics, and we reminisced of experiences of other high places, the Eiffel Tower, Paris and the campanile at the Duomo in Florence, and rated this third!!!!!! But that said the views were spectacular. Before being whisked to the 86th floor for the observatory, we were given a simulated sky train ride over and around New York as though we were flying in a helicopter.
Back on ground level we caught the Big Taxi open-topped tour bus and relaxed in the sunshine as we were taken through the streets and avenues to soak up the Big Apple. The three hour tour took us around mid, uptown and downtown New York, and past many well known landmarks, including a stop to view: the Rockerfeller Center, Central Park, flat iron building, Carnegie Hall, Chrysler Building, Greenwich Village, Broadway, Little Italy, Times Square, Soho, Chinatown, Ground Zero, NY public libraries, the Statue of Liberty.......and more!!!!!! It seemed as if we were sighseeing up to the last minute. We were off the tourbus at 4.30 p.m. and on the 5.01p.m. New Jersey Transit from Penn Station to the airport, in that half-hour we even managed to squeeze in a supermarket trip to get some tea for Ben! So here we are in Gallaghers looking out over the airport waiting for our meal and our plane!!!
I'm at home now and typing up this diary, and drinking a cuppa! Our flight home was uneventful, after lots of security checks again, fingerprints and photos too! We arrived into Birmingham, at 8.30 a.m. local time and we were back home by 10.00 a.m. WOW!!!! What a trip!!! Fantastic!!!!! :-)))
Saturday, 2nd September, 2006.
After an omelet breakfast at 'Andrew's', we caught a yellow taxi, (it was raining or we would have walked!) which took us to the Metropolitan. This impressive building houses a museum and art collection. We had a wonderful time here, so much art, even David's Death of Socrates, which brought back memories of A103. There was also another collection of modern art.
When we emerged from the Museum a few hours later, it was still spitting with rain, but we decided to walk through Central Park and stopped at The Boathouse.
This café restaurant had beau
tiful views over the lake, and there was a pianist playing as we devoured our burger and fries! It was still raining, so we donned our plastic rain capes we had been given at the Houston conference, and made our way through Central Park to see the John Lennon memorial 'Imagine'. People had placed flowers there.
We caught the subway at 72nd Street back to 34th Street Penn Station (a wonderful art deco station) to our hotel on 7th Avenue. After a rest, we set out again in the rain the the Empire State Building with a view to going to the top, but it was shrouded in mist and cloud so we never got passed the impressive art deco foyer. Purchasing hot chocolates we made our way to bed - oh! and managed to get onto FC for a short while :-))
Friday, 1st September, 2006.
I'm sitting drinking a coffee in MoMA. For the last two hours we have been immersed in the world of Dada at a special exhibition, which includes many of the original works from artists such as Hans Arp, Max Ernst, Marcel Duchamp. Man Ray, Hannah Hoch...the list goes on. Four and a half hours later (after entering) we left MoMA!!
At the half price ticket office off Times Square we purchased two tickets for tonights performance of Hairspray. Then we wandered down Broadway and now find ourselves in Bubba Gumps seafood and shrimp restaurant, themed on the film Forest Gump. We've ordered the mahi mahi and wait in anticipation! While waiting we were cross-examined on our knowledge of Forest Gump. We wondered if they wouldn't serve us if we didn't get the questions right!!! The mahi mahi was delicious, and after a quick change at the hotel we were back on Broadway. Hairspray is a lively full-on rockin' musical set in the 60's, full of colour, excitment and frivolity, yet reflective of the time of change. We really enjoyed the pure joy of the occasion, and the all American demonstrative response of the audience. On the way back to our hotel we stopped off for a hot chocolate :-)
Thursday, 31st August, 2006
Our last visit this morning to Murphy's and our last session at the conference before having to say goodbye to our new found friends before setting off for New York! We had met people from all over America, they came from places with great sounding names, like Kalamazoo, Paducah, Tallhassee, Chattanooga, Hazard, Colorado Springs, Needville, Brownsburg, Jacksonville, Seattle, Baton Rouge, Kansas City, Toronto, Canada, Alaska, to name a few, and of course us from the UK!
The day was spent travelling between Houston and New York, but 11.00 p.m. found us in the bright lights and crowds of Times Square!!! :-)
Wednesday, 30th August, 2006.
Another early start and breakfast at Murphy's :-) After the first conference session and a half hour spent on the computers, blogging and emailing, I set off on my own to explore the Butterfly Center, a large purpose built glass domed jungle like environment, with large exotic plants, and thousands of colourful and varied butterflies. It was peaceful, relaxing and calming just to take time and to sit and watch! In the hatcheries butterflies were in various stages of hatching out, and I stood and watched as a butterfly emerged from its chrysalis.Back at the conference, and before lunch there was an awards ceremony. Among the presenters were two of the wives of crew members lost on the Challenger mission of 1986. One of the awards collected by David, on behalf of the National Space Centre, was for the number of members of the public given the opportunity to experience a Challenger Mission.
After lunch and a personal meeting with the CEO, we met up with two other delegates from Tallahassee and from Baton Rouge, and we went to downtown Houston to visit the Hard Rock Café, and Ben and Jerry's for an icecream.
Back at the hotel we boarded the coach to take us to the George Observatory. It was quite a long ride out into the countryside through the cotton fields. The Observatory is in the Brazos Bend State Park, and access is through a woodland path. Here we were confronted with huge spider webs complete with resident Golden Orb spiders!!! There were literally scores of them (shudder). They were out in force because it was their breeding season, apparently the female eats the male after mating. :-/ On our way along the path, dodging the webs, we also saw two little alligators looking at us from the lake! However, it was worth it! After another Texmex meal, and darkness had fallen, we viewed from giant telescopes distant galaxies and star clusters with names I'd never heard of. A close view of the surface of the moon (fab) and a spectacular close up of Jupiter and three of its moons. I can't describe how enthralling this was, I had never had the experience of looking through these telescopes before, and it was wonderful!
Alongside the Observatory there was a Challenger Learning Center and we had the opportunity to view their set-up.
In the dark we made a single file as the leader with a large flash light guided us back through the spider webs!!!!!
Another BRILLIANT day :-)
