New York, New York...Part 3

It pretty much rained all of Sunday. After our usual start to the day with breakfast in the Cranberry Cafe we took the subway to the end of the line at South Ferry and took the ferry from Battery Park over to Ellis Island. We'd decided not to bother with getting off at Liberty Island, having taken all the pictures of the Statue the day before and as it was pouring down we just stayed on the ferry to its second stop at Ellis Island Immigration Museum. As we didn't have any ancestors to look for in the records we just looked round the exhibits instead, downstairs are the statistic based exhibits with all the facts and figures. Upstairs in the Great Hall there isn't much to see but the hall itself is an amazing looking room. Off one end deceptively hidden by what we thought was a mirror and ignored it the first time, was a trail of rooms following the experience of the immigrants when they came to Ellis Island - medical tests, legal questions, mental tests etc.

After leaving the ferry back in Battery Park we walked in the rain up to the World Trade Centre and to ground zero. From seeing the view of the skyline you can see where the twin towers are missing from the picture and it's amazing seeing the space on the ground that two huge towers stood there, there doesn't seem to be enough room somehow. We walked through alongside ground zero to the Winter Garden at the World Financial Centre, and after a bit of shopping stopped for a bit of chinese for a late lunch. My learning point for the day was always go for what you want off the menu, I thought it was a shame to all order the same main course so I went for angel hair pasta and veg which was a bit bland and then had to steal some Lemon sweet and sour pork from both Mum and Sal's plates.

We got the subway back uptown for a bit of shopping in Bloomingdales, take Sal's ring into Tiffany's for a clean, and a quick look at St Patrick's Cathedral and Grand Central Station and then back to the hotel for a rest. By 9pm Sal and I were very settled in the room and ready for staying in for the night but Mum persuaded us to get up as planned and we walked over to Rockefeller Centre to go to the Top of the Rock. We'd decided to see the city from here at night so that we could see the Empire State lit up, this was only half successful as the fog covered the top of the Empire State so we could only see as far as the band of lights. The view of the city was great though and we were pleased that Mum had insisted that we get out of bed!