I’ve been to New York at least 10 times in my life, but Rob had never been. I hadn’t done any of the “touristy” stuff since my first couple of visits, but I was happy to do it all again with Rob. We bought $79 City Passes, which included entrance to the Met, the Natural History Museum, MoMA, Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the Top of Rockefeller Plaza.
We supplemented the City Pass with a pedicab through Central Park, the Broadway Show Rock of Ages, and a taping of The Late Show with David Letterman.
We were smart enough to go to the Top of the Rock on our first day, which turned out to be the only sunny day. We took lots of pictures with the Empire State Building in the background. On our last day, it was so overcast and rainy that we were strongly encouraged not to bother going to the top of the Empire State Building. But since it was already paid for, and we were leaving the next day, we did it anyway. They weren’t kidding. There was nothing to see.
They gave us half-price on the flight simulation NY Skyride, which takes you on a virtual helicopter tour over New York. And there was no line, so the terrible weather was actually a bonus.
The City Pass allows you to skip long lines, which was hugely beneficial for our visit to the Museum of Modern Art. The lines there were so long, we probably wouldn’t even have gotten in before we needed to leave for the Letterman show. But because we had the City Pass, we just breezed on in.
I prefer MoMa to the Met, which is very overwhelming. We saw the controversial “The Artist is Present” exhibition, with live nude models, but my favorite part was seeing a group of very young schoolchildren being asked what they saw in a Mark Chagall painting.
Kari Neumeyer 