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Sunday Funday - Statue of Liberty!

We woke up somewhat late this morning, around 9 a.m. We had planned to wake up earlier so we could get to the statue when it wasn't so crowded, which online reviews has said was prior to 11 am. However, we didn't even get on to the subway until 11 am because both of us wanted to stay in bed longer. We ate breakfast at the City Kitchen, downstairs in the hotel. We got an American breakfast (bacon, toast, scrambled eggs, and home-fried potatoes) and a doughnut from "Dough", one of the restaurants in the City Kitchen food court. The doughnut was AMAZING!!

We took the Subway from Times Square to Battery Park. It was Samantha's first subway ride and she really liked it.
Once we got to Battery park, we had no trouble at all finding the Statue of Liberty boat. It was already docked and letting people off. The boats leave about every 20 minutes, so we got our tickets and stood in line.
We had to keep crowding in so they could get more people in the line behind us. We also had to go through "airport-style security" to get onto the boat, which meant we had to stick all our stuff through xray  and  go through a metal detector. .
Once everyone got through security, they piled everyone into a big holding area while we waited for the boat to be ready for boarding.

The boat was really nice. Three stories. We sat on the top deck and it was VERY WINDY,  cold and overcast.  We really did not dress warmly enough, but it was nice not to be so hot, like we are used to in Florida.
The boat took us to Liberty Island and we got off and started walking. The place we started from was at the back of Lady Liberty, and Tami took a few pictures.



We walked around, taking more pictures of the harbor and the park with tons of tiny pink flowers strewn around. Even though the overcast gray day was not great for taking photos, it was still so amazing to see Lady Liberty up so close.




After we walked all around and took lots of pictures, we went into the gift shop and bought some stuff. It was really crowded but we found some cool stuff and everyone was very polite.
After the gift shop we were getting a bit hungry so we bough soft pretzels. Samantha loves soft pretzels. We ate them while sitting out in the cold wind for about 5 minutes before deciding to catch the next boat out.

The next boat took us to Ellis Island. By this point, both of us were tired. We walked around the museum a bit, just to be able to say we'd been there, but after 30 minutes, our feet were tired and our heads were hurting and we were kind of over it, so we picked up and got on the next boat out.

We got back to the hotel and immediately crashed on our nice soft beds. Samantha took a nap and Tami worked on her computer.
Around 7 p.m. we were pretty hungry but Samantha was very tired still and didn't want to walk anymore. Tami suggested pizza for dinner so we walked down to the Famiglia pizza which was conveniently located a block from our hotel. We were just going to get a slice each, but instead we ordered a whole small pie. It was amazing! The pizza absolutely tastes different here.

After dinner, we stopped at a souvenir shop. Because we were so cold all day, we decided to buy hoodies! Samantha got the stereotypical "I 💛  NY" hoodie, while Tami went with one that just says "New York" on it. The employees were very eager to make a sale. They offered their help at least 20 times.
After that we went to the pharmacy again to pick up epsom salts for baths. We each took long hot baths which really helped relieve some of the soreness from all that walking.

Now it's off to a good night's sleep and a new adventure tomorrow! :)

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