Big Bus Tour of New York

     Today was tour New York by Big Red bus day. We were out for over 12 hours which made for a long tiring day. We had a big breakfast in the hotel, then headed for the Rockerfeller Centre to go to the Top Of The Rock. It is an observatory about 70 stories up that is north of the Empire State Building. We had been up that one before. This one gave us views all the way back to lower Manhattan (World Trade Centre) as well as north to Central Park. Unfortunately it was not the best day for photos.

South From Top of the Rock

    From there we headed to Times Square to pick up the Big Red Bus hop on hop off tour. It takes about 2 hours to do the complete cycle. “Luckily” it was Sunday and we were told that the traffic was not that bad! We had decided to only get off at the site of the world trade centre. A new tower is up. We walked the grounds which is a total dedication to 9/11 except for a new structure holding many stores.

New World Trade Centre

    We toured the 9/11 dedicated memorial collection. If you want to see how deep the terrorist act has affected Americans go see this collection. One exhibit had a photograph of every single victim. It is extremely well done and by the time we were in the hall that recalled the events step by step (minute by minute?) we had seen enough. It was very sad. It was like going through the entire tragedy again. Perhaps it was because that day is deeply imprinted on us! The area was very crowded and it seemed a bit “cramped” so you had this feeling of being closed in! We spent a lot of time in there but we could have stayed another hour. Outside are the 2 reflecting pools where the towers stood. In the centre is a deep pit (can't see the bottom from the side). Again very well done. We have been to ground zero in Nagasaki, the site of then atomic bomb blast. The memorial was quite simple in comparison.

   From there we walked over to Wall Street to see the

On The Bus

famous bull which we had seen on an earlier tour. At Battery Park we caught the bus for the return to Times Square. We used our ticket to hop on another tour bus that took us north to the area of Central Park. That is when the skies opened up and we were drenched as sat on the upper open deck of the bus. They did give us rain ponchos. It did cool down the 95F heat index. Drenched, we got off that bus and decided to re ride the main bus. That was a mistake as the rain returned, so we moved to the lower area of the bus. Of course you can't see much from there especially since the rain continued.

   Finally finished touring, had a quick bite and then decided to go back to Times Square again. However not “much” was going on and being a bit tired we decided to end the day still wet from the downpours. We head to the ship tomorrow!