Day 8 of our epic New York adventure included a trip to Wall Street for a walking tour of the area which Jess and I were exceptionally excited for as well as an unplanned trip to the 9/11 Memorial.
The day was exceptionally cold so it probably wasn't the greatest day to be doing outside walking tours but we persisted and arrived at the pre-arranged start point at 2pm for our tour. The tour guide we had was an extremely knowledgeable and super friendly lady who took us around the Wall Street district to all the buildings where traders first started selling shares, to the New York Stock Exchange and then finishing with the famous Wall Street Bull. Being former (or lapsed) accountants, this tour around the financial district of New York was a great experience and one we will highly recommend. We especially enjoyed having photos with the bull however unlike many other people, we didn't feel the need to rub its balls for extra luck.
Once we had finished the tour of Wall Street, we retired to the lobby of a nearby hotel to warm up from the freezing cold outside and plan our next step. Due to the cold, our options were extremely limited so we decided that it would be a great time to visit the 9/11 memorial and museum. This was high on everyones to do list for New York but I don't think any of us were ready for just how emotional and heart wrenching the museum would be.
Arriving at the memorial, the first thing you see are the two pools of reflection which are placed where the bases of the north & south towers were. The way the pools are set up, the water cascades down to the bottom which is so deep that it appears endless. Once entering the museum we were met by a number of exhibits detailing the events of the day in question and the heroic efforts of the New York Fire Department and the New York Police Department as well as the many ordinary citizens who helped. The atmosphere within the memorial was truly reverent and allowed people to take their time and move through at their own pace. We all agreed it was an important place to visit and would recommend to others coming to New York.
The penultimate day of our New York :Pass had us ascending the Empire State Building, something that had eluded us due to either bad weather or excessive wait times over the previous days. Unlike the previous day when we went and the wait was at least two hours and the line was enormous, when we arrived the line was non-existent and we moved very quickly. Once we made our way to the top of the Empire State Building, we maneuvered our way past the hundreds of tourists with selfie sticks and the Instagram "influencers" pouting for the camera to have a few family snaps with the Manhattan skyline in the background. Unlike our day at the Top of the Rock where it was exceptionally cloudy, the sun was out in full force which led to some great squinting photos as we tried to adjust to the sunlight.
Our final day of the 10 day New York Pass had us touring another sporting stadium, this time Yankee Stadium home of the New York Yankees. With none of us being huge fans of baseball, this might seem like a bit of a weird choice however the stadium is an absolutely incredible sporting colosseum and the history of the Yankees is something that is truly impressive. The tour took us down onto the ground as well as around the stadium to the memorabilia room where there were displays with all the famous players as well as all the world series rings the Yankees had won. We also were shown the plaques for all the Yankees players who had their jersey numbers retired which was pretty cool to look at. Once the tour was done we headed to the Hard Rock Café next door for lunch before going home to crash and recuperate from our days of hardcore exploring.
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