New York, New York! (Day 3)

June 22, 2012

Statue of Liberty

The plan for the day included a visit to the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, and Castle Clinton. We walked along the waterfront all the way to Battery Park, which is where you can purchase tickets for the Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island Ferry. The ticket booth is inside of Castle Clinton. Tickets are $17 for adults; $14 for seniors over age 62, $9 for children 4-12, and under age 4 is free. You can also order tickets online if you know in advance when you want to go. The ticket line was short and the waiting line to get on the ferry was short also.  Again, you must go through security screening before boarding the ferry. The first stop, if you take the ferry from Battery Park, is the Statue of Liberty. The Statue of Liberty was a gift from the people of France. Construction began in 1875 and it was dedicated in 1886. The Statue of Liberty was designated as a National Monument in 1924. The park service offers tour every 30 minutes at the flag pole in the middle of the courtyard. The tours last 30-45 minutes and talks about why and how the statue was made and a bit of the history behind it and the island. There were a lot of kids on the tour that we were in so it seemed that the guide directed the presentation to a kid level of understanding, which is good if you take kids with you. We walked by a different tour guide at one point and it seemed that his tour was more in depth, probably since there were no kids in that tour group. The inside was closed, due to renovations. Renovations should be done by the end of 2012, at which point you can get to the crown and into the lower pedestal. Beware that the crown is very hard to get up to, due to the fact that the park service only allows 10 people up at a time, with only 3 groups going per hour. Time to allow at this site would vary, depending on if the pedestal (museum) is open.

Ellis Island

Back to the ferry for Ellis Island (which is part of the Statue of Liberty National Monument). Ellis Island was America’s largest and most active immigration station back in 1892-1924. Over 12 million immigrants were processed in Ellis Island. The national park service offers a tour, which covers a large portion of the building. We took the tour and thought it was great. The tour was about 45 minutes in length. There were some kids on the tour, but the presentation was not really geared toward them.  There are a ton of displays and a few short films to view. The huge plus for us was that there was air conditioning! You could easily spend most of the day there. We were there for probably about 3 hours. The funny thing about Ellis Island is that New York and New Jersey keep fighting over what state it is in – the verdict – the building is in NY the grounds in NJ. NY claims it should be all theirs since the place was built on a landfill that is full of NY garbage.

Castle Clinton NM

Boarding the ferry we headed back to Battery Park. We checked out Castle Clinton National Monument. The fort was built just before the War of 1812, to protect the harbor from attack by the British Navy. Later, the fort served as an entertainment complex, immigrant processing station, and then an aquarium. In 1975, the fort was restored to its original fortress configuration. There really is not much to see at the fort, other than a few canons and some small display boards. The most interesting thing, in my opinion, was the photographs showing what the area looked like at certain dates in time. Plan to spend 30 minutes or less at the fort.

After the fort, we headed back to the apartment, making a quick stop for a late lunch on the way. For lunch, we went to a place called the “Shake Shack”. Allison had been here on her previous trip to NYC and said it was good. They sell burgers, hot dogs, fries, and custard. I had the shack burger and a vanilla shake. The shake was good the burger was not the best. I do not eat fast food, and I would consider this place fast food – very greasy.

For dinner we went out with the people we were staying with. We went to a place called 508 Gastro Brewery in the Soho neighborhood. We ordered a large variety of appetizers – truffled mac & cheese, spinach dip, Italian sausage flatbread pizza. The mac & cheese was very good. For my main course, I had a burger with fries. The fries were the best I have ever had – they add all sorts of seasonings on them. The burger was good, typical of a burger served at pretty much any establishment.