Bob and Ann in Egypt and Jordan 2009

It has been over 20 years since we have been in New York. We wanted to make the most of it so we were up fairly early. I had taken Tylenol PM last night, so I was a little groggy. This meant that Ann was up first – a small change in routine.

Our breakfast was included in the room rate at the Hilton Garden Inn. The hotel had a typical buffet with melon, grapefruit, cereals, waffles and Costco muffins, sweet rolls and bagels. There also were eggs cooked to order with bacon, sausage and hash browns. The coffee was good.

We left the hotel around 9:00 and took the free shuttle to Federal Circle where we caught AirTrain to the Howard Beach station. We transferred to the subway and took the A train to Broadway-Nassau and the No. 4 line to 86th Street. The A train was dark, crowded and dingy. The No. 4 train was bright with room to sit.

At 86th Street, we walked west crossing Park Avenue and Madison and then turned south on 5th Avenue. After a few blocks we reached the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The two primary exhibits that we visited were the “Reconstruction and Reinstallation of the Egyptian Art Galleries” (what else would one do before spending over three weeks in Egypt?) and “Looking In: Robert Frank's The Americans”. In between the galleries, we had lunch in the main cafeteria. We also walked past “Annual Christmas Tree and Neapolitan Baroque Crèche “.

After the museum, we caught a bus and rode down 5th Avenue to 46th Street. We got off and walked over to Rockefeller Center. After taking several photos, we decided to walk to Times Square to see how much it changed since we were here before. It has changed a lot. The main feature we noticed was the car-free pedestrian area that stretched for several blocks. This makes it much easier to get around. We stopped at one of the electronics shops that is left over from the Times Square changes where I bought a new mini-mouse for my netbook.

After Times Square, we walked to Grand Central Station where I bought a paperback book to read on our flight to Cairo. It was getting close to dinner time so we stopped in the Oyster Bar Restaurant to eat. I had yummy pan roast shrimp. It was very rich with about a pint of cream sauce mixed with some paprika and other things. Ann had some smoked trout that was very tasty, but the serving was too large for her to finish.

After dinner, we caught the #4 train to downtown and the Fulton Street station where we transferred to the A train for our ride back to the hotel. At the station before Howard Beach, our train was delayed for about 30 minutes because of a track problem ahead of us. It was something about a bridge being raised for a ship. While we were waiting, we had an interesting conversation with an inebriated local man about multiple topics. He had a little trouble focusing on a single thought. This meeting gave us some basic insight of the local culture.

We got back to our hotel at around 9:00. We were both pretty tired and got to sleep at a reasonable time.