New York - you are now 879th in the queue...

Across the Lake - Central Park
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We arrived in New York by coach mid-afternoon. Handily it dropped us off just a few blocks from our digs. We had booked something called Off Soho Suites, which gave us a small apartment on the border between Chinatown, Noho and Little Italy. Our apartment was nice and excellent value for New York, although strangely situated in an area almost entirely dedicated to restaurant kitchen equipment shops. However, in the evening we discovered that a non-descript door next to our hotel turned into a nice German bar where we had a couple of Franziskaners (a very tasty wheat beer) before trying to find somewhere for dinner in Chinatown. Eventually tracking down somewhere recommended for seafood but busting for a wee after the beers, we sat down to a nice big crab and some fantastic spicy clams. Afterwards we popped into a small and well hidden jazz bar, although we were a bit late for the live act, who was just finishing up. We stayed for a couple of drinks, helped by the crazy French barmaid who was giving all the girls free shots of some strange concotion she was rustling up, having one for herself every time and therefore being somewhat merrier than the punters.

Arty Subway Shot
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In visiting New York, we had broken one of the rules of our trip - not to return to anywhere we'd been before, but it so nice... Anyway, that meant that we had already done much of the sightseeing, with the exception of the Empire State Building, which had had a queue going round the block last time we were here at Christmas time. This time we were determined to get up there and the queue didn't look too long when we got inside. Until we realised that this queue was a queue for the next queue, after which you got in another queue for tickets and then a queue for the lift. We braved them and got up to the top without too much hassle. The 102nd floor was worth the extra money if only because no one else wanted to fork out for it, so we could actually see the scenery, and very impressive it was too!

Looking Downtown
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We also explored the ever shrinking Little Italy, ate pastrami sandwiches in Central Park and wandered about bits of Soho, full of boutiques we couldn't afford even with 70% off sale. In the evenings, despite meaning to head over and check out Harlem and Brooklyn, we ended up mostly in Greenwich village with its interminable choice of restaurants and live music venues, catching some good blues and a large pizza.

On our last day, we returned to a favorite restaurant from our first stay - Mary's Fish Camp is a small place serving fantastic seafood and fish. Sat at the bar we ordered an oyster po boy for Phill and a spicy fish taco for Monts and reminisced over a bottle of wine... soon we had to head back to pick up our bags and get off to the airport, but we will definitely be back...