2 Miles and 4 Feet from Home: Rest Day & NYC Tour

Today we decided to take a day off and just rest and relax. The party group next to us had gone to bed about 1AM. Anyway we decided to go up to the office and let them know what was going on as well as move campsites. This group was going to be loud no matter what. Luckily they did have another site so we changed and extended our time to leave on Sunday. This would be our longest stay in any one place. This campsite offers a free pancake breakfast from 8 to 11 every morning so we took advantage of that. We took our own blueberries of course and added them. Delicious! After breakfast we decided to wash clothes and I went out to talk to the KOA office about a tour of NYC they were offering. We are going to NYC on Sunday but will have Jasper and be very limited on what we can do so I thought this tour might just be a good idea. Normally I would really not like a tour like this but after three weeks of having to figure every possibility out I decided that this may just be a relaxing way to spend the day. The tour looked good and he gave a us a few kennel names so we could leave Jasper there while we went to NYC. The bus left at 7:30 in the morning and would be back at around 7 depending on traffic. We found a vet about 15 minutes away. We would have to leave Jasper the night before but could pick him up as late as 7:30 PM the next day. We hated leaving Jasper for the night but this was the best we could do. Anyway we went early to go see the vet and make sure that Jaspers paper work from our vet met their requirements. It also gave us a chance to make sure that we liked the people and the place. It was in the small town of Gardiner, NY. Once we got there we saw that they not only took care of dogs but about every other kind of animal you could possibly have. They said they would love to keep Jasper and we decided to bring him back at about 6PM. We went back to the campsite and just acted like actual campers relaxing around the campsite taking Jasper to the dog run and I even went for a swim in the pool. The water was cold but it felt refreshing for sure. We learned that Orange County Choppers was only 20 minutes away. That is the place from the tv show were the crew build very specialized choppers usually to different themes. Even if you are not into motorcycles this is a very cool place by any standard. So after dropping off Jasper we went and toured their place and had dinner in their restaurant. The place was full of everything from families to hard core bikers. We felt right at home except in the parking lot. The parking lot was full of big trucks, big cars and big motorcycles and there we were with our little red Toyota Prius and our handy dandy Luggage rack on the back! Ha Ha! Anyway no one seemed to care but we did stand out. After dinner we headed back to the campsite and just hung out and went to bed around 10. It felt weird not having Jasper there and we were already thinking about how nice it will be to get him back the next night.

We woke up early the next morning and got ready to go for our big outing. We met up at the KOA office at 7:15 and we were on the bus and headed to NYC by 7:30. It took about 90 minutes to get to NYC and then another 30 to get down to the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. I have been to NYC several times but for some reason always missed this so I was looking forward to it. Lyn had never been to NYC so all of this would be new to here. We had a small group of about 16 people with mostly retired people but a family thrown in as well. The weather was perfect. We got on the ferry and headed for Miss Liberty and within 5 minutes the views were awesome in just about every direction. Finally we pulled up and got off the boat and we were there standing right in front of the Statue of Liberty! We took a moment to take it all in. This was a huge accomplishment for us. It made us remember the huge path it took for us to get to this very moment. It started with emails to each other then skype then daily calls, then two trips to Singapore, then all of the paper work to get Lyn her K1 Visa, then finally arriving in America, then getting her green card, then finally getting her citizenship last fall and now standing here in front of one of the most iconic places for an immigrant to stand!!!! Well to say the least it was a little overwhelming! As we looked around you could see people from every nationality taking pictures in front of her speaking multiple languages and smiling mostly just big grins on their faces. Well I would have to say that we had big grins on our faces as well and then we took our share of pictures as well! What a great day! After about an hour there we took the boat back and headed to Grand Central Station taking in all of the sites long the way. Our tour guide was from the area and lots of interesting tidbits along the way. The traffic was crazy as you would expect but we finally made it there. We had lunch there and then walked up a few floors to take in the station and its views. Pretty hard to capture it in photos but we tried. After that we went out and walked through a street market. Very cool! Next it would be the Empire State building! When we arrived we were told that it would take about 45 minutes to get to the top. This building always impresses me and today was no different. The lines were super short but it still took about 45 minutes to get to the top. The views were awesome and made for a lot of great pictures. Lyn even had her picture taken with King Kong himself! After we got back down to the bus we headed to times square for a quick look around and a piece of cheese cake from Juniors! After that we settled in for the long bus ride home hoping that we would make it in time to get Jasper before they closed. As luck would have it we made it back by 7:15 and got Jasper with 5 minutes to spare. When we got back to the campsite Lyn fixed dinner and we had cheesecake for dessert! Yum yum. By this time it was almost 10 and time for bed. Tomorrow we may give Woodstock another try! We will see how we feel in the morning.