New York, Day Seven
For our last full day in New York, we decided to head east across Central Park. We stopped at two playgrounds along the way, saw the outside of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, saw a little bit of the Upper East Side, had a rather bad dinner, then in a big loop southwards to get home on the subway, going via Grand Central Station.
First playground of the day, the Mariners Playground.
This little water fountain started out being very low-powered. The kids stood around it and collected water into buckets and had a good time. Then somebody increased the water pressure all of a sudden, and the little kids all ran away.
The nannies of New York. The stroller of choice was obviously the Bugaboo, which costs $760 (100.000 isk)!
A fancy building overlooked the park (on 85th Street).
Anna got pretty wet, but it was ok because it was pretty warm out.
It started raining a bit, so we decided to get going. Here is Mr. Skinny-Long-Legs getting a new dry outfit while purring dad.
We walked east-ish and walked past this nice looking house.
Looking over the Oval/Great Lawn, a large grassy field. There was calm music playing, and stacks of water visible...
... as well as yoga mats. It turned out there was a free yoga event in the park!
There were a LOT of yoga mats. Some 10,000 people were expected to attend.
Nothing like a corporate sponsor for your relaxed breathing... 🙂
Next up: The Obelisk.
We were somewhat surprised to find a piano sitting next to the obelisk! It said: Play me, I'm Yours!
Siblings at the piano.
Bjarki jamming... 🙂
We convince Anna to do her recital piece, but she's already getting a little bit rusty. Can't wait to get our keyboard back! 🙂
What a fantastic idea to have a piano next to a popular monument! 🙂
More walking...
We splurged on some ice-cream, and then stopped at the Ancient Playground, thus named because it is next to the Egyptian wing of the Met.
Bjarki on the run. Here we're looking back to where we came from.
A rather elaborate playground, but with low visibility for adults.
Siblings waiting "patiently" to get on the cool swing.
Bjarki happy on the cool swing. Bjarki used to hate being on the swing (he'd insists on getting out right away, and shivered with fear), but after his eye operation swings are now fun!
Bjarki pushes Anna on the cool swing.
Bjarki happy on the regular baby swing. A happy Bjarki makes a happy mom! 🙂
Anna running off after Bjarki. Note the pretty houses in the backyard.
We left the playground around 6pm, and walked to the entrance to the Met. At least we've seen it on the outside now! 🙂
Prelude to the worst dinner of the trip, food quality wise. We should have known better.
In the main hall of Grand Central Station.
Hrefna and Anna in the other direction. It's pretty massive! 🙂
Finally, some pictures from our hotel room. We stayed at the Hotel Newton, and had reserved a Double Queen room (Deluxe Queen), but I think we got upgraded to a Deluxe Junior Suite (i.e. we got an extra roomlet with a sofa and tv) for no extra charge.
The room was pretty small, and we just barely managed to drive the stroller between the bed and the desk.
Thankfully we had a large closet where we could stash two full pieces of luggage.
Here's our little lounge. Finnur used it to watch the World Cup in the wee hours of the morning. 🙂
The bathroom was off the lounge. It was shiny and new. Yay! 🙂
We specifically asked to be in a room that faced away from Broadway so that we wouldn't be disturbed by traffic noise. The tradeoff was a rather blah scenery out our window from the 3rd floor. I never discovered why two of the windows were decorated with flowers.
The view in the other direction. Some lovely barbed wire!!
We packed our bags that night. The next morning we only had time to eat breakfast, and finish packing before it was time to head to the airport. The drive there wasn’t fantastic (crazy driver!) but it was somewhat scenic. The flight went well, and then we were in Iceland!! 🙂
