Monday July 4

 Monday July 4 2022

Another crazy start to a day as I had to rush to the side street, grab the rental car before 8am and get it over to the parking garage. 

Once we got the herd up and moving, we grabbed some breakfast next to the hotel and then onto the subway bound for the 9/11 memorial downtown at the site of the World Trade Center. 

The initial part of the tour was all about the buildings and structures but once we entered the Exhibits all about the people, it got extremely emotional. The video room with the numerous videos of the crashes and collapse of the building was heartbreaking to relive and the immense loss of life on this tragic day. 

We walked away from the area after a couple hours and were very solemn for the better part of the day. 

We continued over to Chinatown and did a bunch of shopping as haggling was the norm and there were deals to be had. Hats, shirts, postcards and more! 

We found a nice restaurant and had some modern Chinese with a couple twists. We left and wandered through the area past heaps of fruit and veggies and numerous dead creatures prepared for consumption which was a shocker for the boys. I wanted to play NAME THAT DEAD ANIMAL but there were no takers on Dads Weird Game ideas. 😉🤪😆

We proceeded over to the entrance to the stairs up to the Brooklyn Brodge and walked across. It only too about half an hour but it was still near 90 degrees and there were thousands of people going in both directions. 

We arrived in Brooklyn and had to tour around yet another stadium - Barclays where the NY Nets play. We did some shopping and grabbed the train back to Times Square where there were literally tens of thousands of people milling about preparing for the fireworks at 915 pm just west along the river. 

We needed a timeout so we headed back to the hotel for a breather. Darren got a video chat messenger call from the Bloski sisters touring Portugal so that was Exciting ! We grabbed some supper in the restaurant and changed and realized the fireworks were not 3 blocks from our hotel as mentioned by a fool of an employee but on the complete other side of the island! Off we went and grabbed the 34 bus in front of our hotel which runs west east and not north south like the subway. After missing the first bus become we didn’t put our Metro card into the machine to get an actual bus ticket, we waited another 14 minutes for the next one. Of course this made two of the family members a little sour at of course it’s Dads fault. 😉 Dumb old Dad. 😉🤪😆

Onto the bus - already packed. Next stop bus completely jammed. We drove 10 more blocks and didn’t stop once as there was literally no room. We arrived at the second last stop and all got off as we had to walk a block through multiple security checkpoints for bag checks. We were filed into a massive herd of people 10 across and a mile long walking back and forth through switchbacks of streets and overpasses to get to the waters edge in order to see the multiple barges preparing for the biggest fireworks show of the year. I wonder how many million people and tourists are lining both sides of the East river tonight. Wow. 

Fireworks began at 930 and went for a solid 20 minutes non stop from 5 big Macy’s barges. It was INCREDIBLE! 

I’ve seen some tremendous fireworks shows at the Calgary Stampede especially the 100th anniversary and Globalfest fireworks to music are amazing too. This was over the top in a hyper patriotic way with SO SO MANY PEOPLE. Wow. 

The trip back was an absolute gong show with tens of thousands following the same route out as we came in down parts of the freeway and bridges and then the 22 block walk home as the streets were gridlocked with traffic and emergency vehicles.

 I think every police officer in NYC was working tonight as we walked past several hundred alone in our area. 

We arrived back at our hotel with extremely sore feet after another 30000 step day. Tylenol and Ibuprofen please. Nighty nite 😔