New York City : Part V The Empire State Building, Central Park, Rockefeller Center, & Radio City.

Like I said in the post before...I would never go to the top of The Empire State Building again. Don't get me wrong. It was REALLY cool. There were just lots of lines. Short lines. But still lots of lines throughout the building that you had to go through in order to get to the top. The coat I was wearing is basically a straight jacket. I was pretty much sick & tired of having to take it off (for security checks & bathroom trips). It has zippers, buttons, & a tie.

The whole place was decorated for Christmas inside & I LOVED that. There were lights hanging down-that I wish I took a video of instead of just a picture-because they were twinkling lights.

Our plan for afterwards was to go to The Statue of Liberty. What we didn't realize was that the last ferry to take you to it was at the same time we were in the Empire State Building. We were able to see it...at a distance from the top of The Empire State Building. So going to see that is on our "to-do" list for next time. :)

Once we got back down to the ground we wanted to go to Central Park. I wanted to do a horse & carriage ride. I hear the mayor is wanting to get rid of those..so I wanted to make sure that this was something that we did. However, Central Park was a decent walk a way from where we were. So we decided to take a cab. BUT a guy on a bike with a little carriage type thing behind it said it was cheaper for him to take us than a taxi. Cool. So we got in the back & we were off. It was such a fun & terrifying experience. We were in a tiny little thing weaving in and out of cars & people. We laughed the whole way. Once we got there the guy told us we owed him almost ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS. Needless to say, we were not happy. He got an earful from us for ripping us off & then we got on a carriage ride & we were off through Central Park!

The whole time I thought of all of the movies that had been filmed in Central Park! A couple of my favorites... Home Alone 2 & Bride Wars. I even saw The Plaza. Which I was very excited about.

After this is was getting dark. So we decided we were going to head on over to Rockefeller Center to see the Christmas tree! Now...the night before was the tree lighting. We were going to go, but decided to be smart...& watch it from a nice, WARM, cozy hotel room.

On our way there we saw Radio City & big red ornaments that I've seen on all the Christmas movies. It was photo-op time.

So then we kept on walkin'. We finally made it there & it was the prettiest thing ever.

I saw a couple like 2 seconds after they got engaged, I saw the ice rink-which was much, much smaller than I had always imagined. It was all such a great experience. With the lights & Christmas music playing....

Once we left here we decided to walk around on 5th avenue. Looking at all of the shop's Christmas decorations & lights. It was sooooo Christmas-y!!

Our trip to NY was everything I had hoped it would be (minus all the walking that I didn't expect-bc I thought everything important & of interest was all basically in one area).

There really is nothing like New York City at Christmastime!

Checking this off of our bucket list & moving on to the next thing :).