I would like for my kids to develop a love of New York City. I want them to know what they can find there and gain the ability to navigate it confidently. It is such a gift to live so close to this iconic city full of art, music, culture, food – from the classic to the sublime. I hope that traveling into the city as often as we can gives them a taste of the experiences to be had there. I love lists – and I love this list. It’s full of good suggestions – and we’ve crossed off many. A couple of our other trips to The Big Apple are chronicled here, here and here.
Until recently, I had always relied on someone more experienced than myself to get from point A to point B – but no more! I have taken Gavin and Mikey in by myself and recently Sean joined us as well. Gavin is beginning to be helpful and is catching on quickly to landmarks, uptown, downtown, and crosstown, the subway system and knows his way around Penn Station pretty well. I am sure the other boys will follow suit. I am determined to learn the subway system and we are gaining ground. I have a favorite map and I like this, this and this app for my iphone.
We have been taking trips into Central Park so we can systemically tick off highlights of the park. When my sister called recently with an impromptu invite to more sights, we happily joined her. On our agenda was The Central Park Zoo and ice skating at Wollman (now Trump) Rink.
The zoo is small, but really neat. I enjoyed watching the feeding of the seals with towering skyscrapers all around. I also could appreciate the tropical bird exhibit with all it’s wonderful heat and humidity in middle of December. Totally worthy of a repeat.
Ice Skating at Wollman Rink is affordable (compared to Rockefeller Center), easier to be a spectator (for $5), and picturesque.
Worthy to be an annual event, I think.
Our next trip in – just Gavin, Mikey, Sean and I – took us to Sony Wonder Technology Lab.
It is was empty there on a Wednesday and tickets/reservations are free – just what we homeschoolers shoot for. The boys got to try every interactive station. They made movies, performed robotic surgery, synthesized music, broke down digital files to be sent, programmed robots, experimented with digitized animation and lots more. There was plenty to do and see and learn here!
When we were done there, we promptly commenced with the business of getting home. For some reason that always seems more daunting. As we were making our way back to the subway station, Gavin spotted two items of interest for us. The first was an authentic, completely restored Wells Fargo Wagon in the lobby of a Wells Fargo Bank. Once home, I showed them this as reference 🙂
Then he spotted several pieces of the Berlin Wall. Hmmm, that’s neat Gavin, how did you know that it was the Berlin Wall? He said there were pictures of it in some books he recently read. There were NO pictures of in it any book I’ve read – EVER.
I enjoy when our whole fam makes the trip to NYC, but these jaunts with Gavin & Mikey are really neat too. I’m shooting to get there once a month – keep me honest, folks!
“New York provides not only a continuing excitation but also
a spectacle that is continuing.”
― E.B. White
