Kunz Krazies

We had a few hours before our flight to wander around Times Square and take a few photos. Then we spent the rest of the day making our way back home. It was great to travel with these friends. Joelle especially did so much work planning it and getting us awesome theatre tickets. I was super glad to get home to this guy.....  And these kiddies....

Last full day in New York. I started by going to the Museum of the City of New York. It was a nice little museum and had a great little film that gave a super clear, interesting history of the city. I wish I had seen that on the first day. After that I met Trulee and Paula at the temple. We had a great session. Love the decor of that temple. They've tied in a lot of New York stuff in the decor. It was also nice just to feel the spirit of the temple in the middle of New York City. After that I went back to the apartment and vegged until the play Lady Day. This was a one woman show featuring Audra McDonald played Ella Fitzgerald. She won Best Actress this year for the play. At first I thought it was for mimicking her singing style. But she was portraying her as a drug addict and alcoholic a few months before she died and it was a so gripping. Can't quite explain it, but there were parts where I was just holding my breath because the feeling there was so intense. Wow...

Monday we made it up the Empire State Building and had a great view! After that we went on a tour of Rockefeller Center and went to the top of that building too for more fun views of the city. The tour guide there was one of the best I've ever had--just so dang funny but knew his stuff. He told us all about the architecture of the buildings but we learned a lot about the Rockefellers and history and stuff too.  The rest of the afternoon was pretty much taken up getting into the Jimmy Fallon Show. Lots of waiting in line. We were laughing when we realized that they had separated people into lines based on age. The people in front of us, about our age, turned around and said, "We're in the OLD line!" We noticed they put the young people on the aisles and the front. He he. It was fun to see how they put together a show. All the cameras and stuff. Jimmy Fallon sat and joked around with the crowd during the breaks. He's suc...

It was Sunday, so I got up early to find a 9:00 sacrament. It was kind of an adventure to venture off by myself, but I found it. It was a nice sacrament and then I headed to Grand Central Station. I bought a ticket to New Haven where I met my friend April Abrantes. April and I were never companions on our missions, but we lived in the same apartment for six months. After my mission I went out to see her and we were in the Hill Cumorah Pageant together. Later, she came out to Utah State to school and we worked together. Even though I only see her every ten years or so, she's a wonderful friend and we always have a great time catching up. I never quite know where to look on selfles. he he. She took me to her house and fed me dinner and we just talked and caught up. I rode the train back into New York late that night and Joelle came and met me at the station so I wouldn't have to walk back by myself late. It was a nice restful day and a good day for my feet to heal.

We got up early to go up the Empire State Building, but the ushers there said there was zero visibility at the top, so we bagged it. We headed to the Brooklyn Bridge and walked across. It was nice--a really cloudy day, but warm.  After the bridge we went to the Tenement Museum which was a nice view of the lives of immigrants to New York. I think I might have gone home after that, because I don't have any pictures of anything and I'm drawing a blank. My feet were KILLING me...pretty much just all blistered up. That night we went to You Can't Take It With You featuring James Earl Jones. There were lots of people in it with TV and movie careers. I think it was early in the run, so they didn't have all the timing down, but again, it was fun to see such talented actors. That is a play without a super compelling plot, but they played with it and made it so fun.

We woke up and headed to Central Park to bike around. We rented our bikes at one of the entrances to the park and then had a leisurely bike ride through the park, stopping and frolicking through the Strawberry Fields. NOT. There were a million bikers and runners and I felt like I was on a freeway. There were only certain places you could bike and if you got out of place you were yelled at by various people. BUT in spite of that, it was still fun. It was just a little overwhelming. We stopped a couple of places and took some photos. Our bikes were not exactly top of the line, so I was pedaling like crazy and barely moving. He he. After that we went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I didn't have long to spend there because I wanted to go visit a friend who was living in New York, so I saw a photo exhibit and then kind of wandered through the sculpture garden. My friend is living down off Wall Street and it was interesting to hear what it's like to live in...

The next day we were off to the Statue of Liberty bright and early. We headed down to the water and caught the ferry out to the island. We spent a couple of hours there, ate lunch, and visited with this actor who was doing a living history thing and playing the part of the designer of the statue. He sat and talked to us for a long time during lunch. We headed to Ellis Island next, which had some interesting exhibits. It was interesting to see that they are still trying to clean up from Hurricane Sandy. When we got back from the island we went to the 9/11 memorial and museum. That was an incredible museum. I've been reading a few books about 9/11 lately, so it was on my mind anyway. That museum was just so well done. There's one section that is a multi-media presentation of what happened that day. So it has tons of video, audio, plus exhibits--kind of feels like you're reliving it. It was emotional--I think all of us cried while going throu...

New York was having a huge heat wave on the first half of our trip and I thought I was in some version of hell. Walking down into the subway was like a steam bath. Luckily the cars are air conditioned even if the stations aren't. We started the day at Amy's Bakery, around the corner from our apartment. Yummm. We tried the famous black and white cookies. Which aren't that good. But everything else was delish. We started by seeing the the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Then we took a peek at the Columbia campus and then walked through Harlem looking at some historical sites. We stopped and ate at a Joe's Crab Shack--- I know that doesn't seem super New Yorky, but we were so hot we needed a place to sit in air conditioning and rest our feet. After that we went to the New York library. They were having a cool exhibit on children's literature, so I had a nice time looking through that and then I headed home to rest.  Our first p...