Day 1, Part 1 – New York

So today let’s start my holiday recap with our first official day in New York.

You can read about our (mis)adventures getting to New York here. We finally reached our hotel at about 4am still wide awake and bushy tailed (time zones are devious indeed). We slept for a few hours and woke up early, refreshed and ready to immerse ourselves in the city.

Our first glimpse of Manhattan on Day 1

We started off our day in Lower Manhattan at the 9/11 memorial. Being at the site brought back vivid memories of coming home from school and seeing all the news channels ablaze with the horrifying news. At the time it was incomprehensible, unimaginable and even as I watched the scenes unfold before my eyes, unbelievable.

Being at the memorial reminded me of the thousands of lives needlessly lost that day. You can’t help but be touched by the spirit of the place – the endless cascade of the waterfalls, the sunlight dappling the tree dotted plaza and the ever present few standing with bowed heads gently running their fingers over the names of a lost loved one carved into the plaques.

It made me wonder about all those untold stories – fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, brothers, sisters, friends… how many lives touched in one way or another by this tragedy.

9/11 Memorial

In my next update, we’ll cover the rest of what we did on Day 1. I promise it will not be as melancholy as this post. The rest of our days in the Big Apple were not as packed as this first day so it should be easy to wrap up in one post per day (if not less!).

Until next time…