Growing up and living in the desert Southwest where the tallest things you see are mountains and desert in between, it’s hard to fathom anything else until you actually see it for yourself. I’m on my way to Normandy for the 75th anniversary of D-Day, and I was able to have a 36 hour layover in New York City. I pent the day yesterday with my traveling companion wandering around Manhattan sightseeing.
On arrival at JFK airport, the terminal was filled with rows of American flags and all the military branch flags as a tribute to our military. It was impressive and heart warming.
After breakfast at the airport, we looked for the subway station nearby. According to the transit app, it was was within walking distance. Turns out it was a 20 minute bus ride and 2.5 miles away. It was a 45 minute subway ride to downtown Manhattan. There was a guy sleeping on the bench across from us, and at one point another person got on the subway with a large subwoofer blaring rap music. I thought that only happened in the movies. Our first stop was the 9/11 Memorial (photos coming soon). Before we got there, this guy presented us with a tour package to see the local “attractions” of the 9/11 Museum and Freedom Tower Observation Deck. Turns out, it costs $35 to get in the museum and $45 for the observation deck. He offered us a pack of both for $57 each. I don’t know how many hundreds of people were there experiencing these two venues, but someone is making a boatload of money off of this tragedy.
Nearby the memorial is Trinity Church (more in another post) and it’s currently being renovated. Actually hundreds of buildings in Manhattan are getting renovated right now. Also, nearby is St. John’s church that survived the 9/11 attack.
I’ll do another post on St. John’s Church after my trip, along with Trinity Church.
Walking around in a large city sometimes the strangest things can appear around a corner. Take for example a parking garage. A vertical parking stall, actually.
Not sure how this works, but I can only guess.
Do you remember Sesame Street on PBS? And the song how to get to Sesame Street? Well, I found it! It’s near the Lincoln Center for Performing Arts.
In our wanderings, we came across Strawberry Fields in Central Park. It’s interesting that it’s a designated quiet zone, because it was anything but quiet. Hundreds of people were there getting their photos and selfies of the Imagine memorial, and a guy was there playing a guitar singing Beatle’s songs (he wasn’t that good either).
I got other photos of Strawberry Fields, and I’ll be making another post later on it as well.
We’ll be doing more sightseeing today before our flight to Paris tonight.
Enjoy,
Kelly
Kelly Guymon Photography 
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I love that tower of cars. Screams New York.
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