New York City Highlights Day 1

It is week three of not working and you would have thought that I would have loads of time to blog and read blogs....
I haven't gone to my Google Reader in over two weeks and blogging, well I have some friends complaining that I haven't written anything (they must have too much time on THEIR hands!!).

We had a trip to NYC planned before I stopped working. We left on the delayed 8:30am flight with Porter.

WE landed in Newark, cleared customs, ran into a nasty customs officer as we were leaving terminal (snarkily said "no cell phones until you leave this area; there's enough signs to tell you"), got into limo and were at our hotel by 11:30. Our rooms weren't ready so we dropped our luggage and went out sightseeing. This was easy to do as we were at 50th Ave and between 7th and 8th St.

This is my favourite location as we can walk everywhere.
First stop (well second as we did end up in a "going out of business" camera shop around the corner and ended up with some purchases). We also met the owner of the store who said they had to move because the rent was increasing from $80,000 a month!!! to $125,000 a month!!!
He had also just sold a large selection of artistic pieces at auction to a Mississauga company the day before.
He tried to convince us to buy some signed Chagall paintings for a mere $17,500 a steal!!
Times Square - is there anything like it?

This is my first visit since they turned some of Times Square into a pedestrian walkway with lots of tables and chairs.

Next stop - lunch!

Then some more wandering and people watching!!

Forever 21 interactive digital billboard  features a camera facing the crowd in Times Square. One million people pass through this square each week. The crowd stands and waves at the billboard and and watch themselves appear on the screen.

 That's us - John is taking the photo

 Please note comment on bottom of screen!

More signs.

Went back to the hotel to put our feet up for a while and then headed out for dinner. It was starting to rain a little.

Then it decided it was going to pour. We spotted Sardi's, a 90 year old old school institution on 44th St.

Source

We popped into the bar just as the skies opened, grabbed a seat at the window and enjoying watching all the theatre goers trying to stay dry as they were getting drenched!!

 Saridi's bar

We decided we should have dinner here and we chose from the fixed menu for $48 each. I had smoked salmon to start with, DH had the spinach cannelloni, we both had steak for the main course and desserts were NY cheesecake and a chocolate mousse.
The photos are not great we had the point and shoot with us.

 Large old-fashioned dining room with lots of families enjoying their meals.

Time to walk some of this food off!!