A couple days in NYC

 SINCE WE WERE ALREADY IN NEW JERSEY... I figured why not stop in my favorite city: NYC!

Mike had only been once when he was around 2 years old and didn't really remember it.  I wanted him to see why I love the city so much. (Plus he has always kind of been anti-city and I wanted to change his mind!)

My Background: My first visit to NYC took place in 2002 - after 9/11 I wanted to see the city firsthand and I fell in love right then and there. I LOVED the idea of a big city- the lights, the movement, the tall buildings... everything! 

The funny thing is, that as an adult, I HATE being around crowds. The idea of lots of people in one place ... no thanks! But somehow NYC is fine! 

I'm not going to go into a whole lot of detail about each place we visited since I was just there in late 2023 and covered them in previous blog posts beginning here. I will only be talking about the ones not previously covered:

Day 1: 
-Walked around Rockefeller Center/St Patrick's Cathedral/FAO Schwartz 
-One World Observatory - THIS WAS NEW FOR ME!  We really only went here because we were trying to kill time before our scheduled museum entry.  I honestly wasn't too impressed with the observatory and I think the Summit is way better!! 
-9/11 Memorial and Museum
-Statue of Liberty
-The Summit

Picture at the Summit

Day 2: 
 -Tavern on the Green (I ate here probably close to 20 years ago so don't remember much about it)... I think we both thought the restaurant was fine (we ate there for lunch), but nothing too spectacular.  Originally Tavern on the Green was built as a sheep fold in the 1880's to house the sheep that grazed in Central Park's Sheep Meadow. It was transformed into a restaurant in 1934!
-Squid Games - I actually got an ad for this while we were in New Jersey and it looked fun! We watched the Squid Games, but aren't huge fans... the games themselves looked fun and it was a unique experience! There were 5 different challenges we competed in and we had fun doing it! 

Posing before the games

-Highline
-Nina Conti show! This was fun - I follow her videos online. She's a comedian/human ventriloquist/improv extraordinaire! It was pretty enjoyable and we had a good time- the show was a little short though! 

Whose Face Is It Anyway show!

 
Another reason I LOVE New York City is there is SO much to do. You could literally find new places to eat, new things to see, new things to do EVERY SINGLE DAY of your life for 20 years.  

If you’ve never been to NYC I will always recommend 9/11 memorial and museum, Statue of Liberty, the Summit, Times Square, the Highline, and Central Park because they are just classic New York. 

I'll leave you with one of my favorite photos from this trip: 

 Next up: UTAH!

Six Flags, NJ

State number 39: NEW JERSEY! 

Mike and I have Kings Island season passes and we ended up getting the all park pass add on at the end of last year. This means we can go to Cedar Point and Six Flags with our passes! Since boardwalks and casinos didn't really interest me in Jersey, we decided to try out Six Flags instead! 

We arrived on Wednesday and made it into the park around 5:30.  When I originally planned this trip, I didn't realize they closed at 7pm during the week! Thankfully, it wasn't an issue anyway!

We started our adventure by riding Superman (front car!), El Toro, Medusa (front car) 2x, enchanted tea cups, and Houdini’s great escape. We pretty much had the park to ourselves since NJ schools were still in session and it was raining off and on.  We got in way more than we thought we would just being there an hour and a half! 

Afterwards, we went to La Piazza restaurant which was near our hotel and it was SO GOOD!! Our hotel was Hampton Inn and Suites in Robbinsville. I looked online at recent reviews and there was mention of bed bugs... We scanned our room up and down since almost a year ago we came down with scabies! Thankfully, no bed bugs to be found and we had a wonderful nights sleep. 

Next day (Thursday) we arrived at the park at 10:30 opening. Unfortunately, we got there at the same time as all the bus loads of kids! UGH!  We ran to the new ride called The Flash! Then rode Justice League, Batman, Dark Knight, Nitro, Jersey Devil, Skull Mountain, and ended with Joker. 

We left the park around 1:30 to eat lunch. (The lines inside the park were just too long for food) We decided not to go back after lunch and instead drove to Asbury Park. 

Here are my ride rankings for

Six flags (New Jersey):

5 star-

4 star- Medusa, El Toro, enchanted tea cups,  the flash, nitro, joker, 

3 star- Superman, jersey devil, skull mountain, Batman 

2 star- Houdini’s great escape, justice league, dark knight, 

1 star- 

I think we're pretty spoiled living in Ohio... Cedar Point and Kings Island have given us pretty high standards and ultimately we weren't too impressed with Six Flags.  They have a few unique rides like The Flash, Jersey Devil, and Joker. 

The Flash- a combination of Invertigo (Kings Island) and Top Thrill Dragster (Cedar Point). 
Jersey Devil - a single rail coaster.
The Joker - has cars that spin 365 degrees as it travels the track. 


ASBURY PARK: We decided to go to Silverball Retro Arcade and spend the afternoon there.  They had a whole bunch of pinball machines, skeeball, and old arcade games. My favorite was the Elton John pinball -you could even select different songs of his to play in the background! 

We also walked the boardwalk at Asbury Park, but it was pretty cloudy and the weather wasn't ideal. 

All in all, I'm glad we checked out Six Flags - it's not necessarily a place I would go back to, but we had the all park pass so it was worth it!

Next up: NEW YORK CITY 

Royal Caribbean Cruise to Grand Cayman and Jamaica

The past few months have been a little rough, exhausting, and a lot...  Back in November I saw a Black Friday deal for a Royal Caribbean  cruise and within minutes it was a done deal! 

Mike and I just got back from a few days in the Caribbean. 🔆

The CRUISE itself: 

I've been on a Celebrity Cruise, Viking Cruise, Norwegian Cruise and now Royal Caribbean. 
(I've also been on a Chinese river cruise and Icebreaker cruise to Antarctica, but I don't count either of those as "official.")  I think  Royal Caribbean has been my favorite of the cruises. 

I don't remember Celebrity well enough- I think I liked it, but that was 20 years ago so I'm not an expert on it by any means.  Viking was okay... again, geared towards older crowd 65+ which had its pros and cons. Norwegian was decent, but some of the shows were a little raunchy and I didn't care for that aspect of it. 

Independence of the seas is the ship from RC we just came off of and I enjoyed the amenities on board.  They had a flowrider which we didn't do, but we did do the water slide, rock climbing, shuffle board, putt putt, escape room, basketball, pools, and ice skating. 

About our destinations... 

Grand Cayman: 

We chose the excursion which included a visit to Stingray City.

Stingray City is a series of shallow sandbars found in Grand Cayman. It's a tourist attraction where you will see many stingrays and visitors can pet and interact with them. These stingrays are still in their natural habitat which is nice! The guides are very hands on and ensured both the humans and stingrays were comfortable during the encounter. 

Our next stop was Dolphin Discovery. I am always wary about place like this, but this place has claimed to have high standards for animal welfare and are internationally certified for their marine mammal care.  I did ask one of the staff members about the dolphins - if I understood correctly, it sounds like some of the dolphins were rescues while others at the facility were born there. 

Just so everyone knows- I HATE any form of mistreatment to any animal and only want the best for them... so the jury is still out on this excursion. I know people will debate back and forth about whether or not the dolphins are happy in captivity.  The dolphins are super sweet and smart.. and the dolphins that were rescued got used to humans and can't be released back in the wild. I can go back and forth all day on the subject so my only advice is do your research and ask questions before booking any kind of animal excursion. 

Jamaica:

Mike and I were in Jamaica a few years ago with the Viking cruise and had a horrible excursion. It was very upsetting- so much so that I didn't want to even claim Jamaica as a "been to"country... thankfully, we got a RE-DO and it was so much better this time around!!

Dunn's River Falls

"Dunn’s River Falls is an astounding flowing falls that extends across more than 183 metres or 960 feet and is one of the most well-loved travel destinations on the island and a ‘must-do’ bucket list item." Dunn's River is one of the few rivers that actually flows directly into the Caribbean Sea. The Falls is natural and every crevice and natural pool of water was created by the flow of the water's current. Climbing up the falls is a popular activity for locals and tourists. I might have slipped a couple times, but no worries! We made it!

Blue Hole is a series of natural pools made out of limestone. Travelers visit Blue Hole to swim in the pools, cliff dive, rope swing, and more. We did many jumps, tried out the rope swing, and had an enjoyable time. There were guides with us every step of the way ensuring our safety

All in all, it was a nice relaxing get away! Now I'm just waiting for my next 3 trips :)