NYC/Miami

Us 6! <3

Tuesday morning the 6 of us loaded into the van...with 7, 50 pound suitcases, 2 carry-ons, 2 backpacks, and 4 little suitcases for New York City.  The car ride was very tight, with 3 of us (Bit, Tim, Lyndi/Leann) crammed into the back seat, one person in the middle with lots of baggage, and Travis driving while Brayton navigated...It was a great 5 hour trip, although watching Travis and Brayton try to drive/navigate through the city of New York was one of the most humorous, and mildly scary things, I have seen lately!  Brayton thought Travis should replicate the cab drivers, and his advice was 'beep and go! beep and go! hit them!'.  Luckily, we did not hit anyone, or anything and made it safely into our hotel!  We decided to live big and walk/subway around the city..We meandered around Times Square, took the subway to Little Italy and Chinatown, told 40,000 people we weren't interested in whatever it was they were trying to get us to 'buy, go to, blah, blah!'.  We followed Graeme's advice and went to Lombardi's for lunch and had amazing pizza!  Riding the subway was exciting, and luckily Lyndi took care of us and assured we always went the right way...most the time!!
We then decided to make our way to Ground Zero, view the new productions going on there, and down to Wall Street...We were not sure why everyone, from almost every building, was outside for their lunch breaks, talking on cell phones, looking awkward when we realized that there had just been an earthquake.  We were really in disbelief, but quickly texted our mothers to assure them we were all ok!! It turned out it was centered in Richmond, VA area, and had been so strong we felt the shock of it in NYC...well everyone did, but us!
We made our way back to Time's Square, saw some old lady dressed as a Naked Cowgirl (not pretty!!), found a bar, enjoyed a drink and afternoon appetizer and of course, the company of great people!

I have to say, going into the hotel with 6 of us (in our maximum of 4 people per room, room) made for a fun night!  We decided no one wanted to sleep on the floor, so we pushed the two double beds together and made one big one!  Dinner at Patsy's was good food, but I don't think they appreciated young, not OVERLY dressed up, kids...they were brief and fast...so we left and found some nice little bars!  Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) the approximately 10 miles of walking we did all day led us all to bed early!  By 2 am, all 6 of us were piled in the two double beds, push together, sound asleep.

Our sleeping situation in NYC!  

Bit had us all up and ready to go by 9, we got breakfast and coffee, took a lap around Central Park, rode the Subway once more, and headed back to check out and drive to JFK...the time had come...


I thought driving into the city with Brayton's advice/navigating was bad...leaving was worse!  After a day of him watching the people there drive, his advice to Travis was, well, not safe!  Luckily, for the second time in my life (the first one being PEI), I was glad Travis did the right thing and not listen to his big brother!  We safely made it to JFK, curbside checked our bags, (6 - 49 lbs, 1 - 51 lbs) and found out that we had to pay $200 more than we had expected for our bags AND we had to pick them up in Miami, take them to the hotel with us for our overnight layover, and re-check them in the morning....They assured us we wouldn't have to pay again because we had our receipts...but we will see what tomorrow brings.

Unwilling to separate from each other yet, Brayton and I dragged the other 4 from Terminal 8 to Terminal 1 via AirTrain to eat lunch with us...It was one of those lunches where you know in less than 30 minutes we'd be saying 'see ya later' and not wanting too, but having too....It sucked...The anxiety kicked in...but we did it..

We all hugged 'see ya later', OK, maybe we cried it...and parted our ways...Brayton and I made it easily through security, found a cute little bar right next to our gate and waited patiently.  The weather channel kept reminding us that there was a Stage 3 Hurricane, Irene, heading for the East Coast..and we were heading for Miami, planning to fly out to St Kitts the next morning.  Our plane was slightly delayed because the 'air conditioner wasn't working' but overall we had a painless, 3 hour flight and landed safely in a warm, clear skied Miami only hoping it would be that way tomorrow morning when we needed to fly out, and Irene was supposed to be even closer!

We collected all 7 of our bags, no problems, and headed to our hotel.  We went to dinner at Denny's next door and ate an enormous dinner full of calories and bad American Food that we probably won't have for a while!  After that, bed looked and felt realllly good!  Hoping for good weather and easy flying South tomorrow morning!