SUNDAY 2nd

The second day of 2011, our 29th wedding anniversary, and the weather was a bit iffy - low cloud, a bit of fog and some showers! Mumsie and I headed off early to get our bus tour of Brooklyn, catching a train down to Bowling Green and walking across Battery Park to the Grayline pickup point, only to find that the Brooklyn tour was cancelled and in fact had not been running since the big storm! Many thanks to the Grayline ticket seller in Times Square who yesterday said all was OK and tried to sell me two $39 tickets! Easy to get rippedmoff in this fine city!
So we had a walk along the waterfront and saw thousands of tourists getting ferries out to the Statue of Liberty, hoping to get a glimpse of the icon through the heavy fog/mist! We decided to get the free ferry over to Staten Island and have a look around over there, so we hurried to the ferry terminal just in time to catch a trip and took the half hour ride to the island. I had seen a TV monitor in the terminal promoting Staten Island and it suggested taking a bus to South Beach, so we waited at the stand outside the terminal and when the bus duly arrived the very New Yorker driver gave us all the details of where to go to and said he would let us know where to get off! 
We set of at a frenetic pace, with the driver waving and honking the horn at every person he saw, and swerving wildly in and out of the traffic - it was a bit of an eye opener -  but we got to see a little of the neighborhood, which was mostly pretty tatty old houses and shops and lots of dirty snow! As we progressed we got closer to the ocean and the houses got better and everything became a bit more attractive! We passed the huge bridge linking Staten Island with Brooklyn and after about twenty five minutes the driver screeched to a halt and let us off at South Beach - a lovely stretch of sand (quite uniquely covered in snow) extending for a kilometre or so!
Took a few photos and then it started to rain so we sought some shelter under a gazebo of sorts before we got a text from Katie saying she had got us tickets to "Chicago" for a matinee starting at 2.30pm. Right!!!! So we found a bus stop and waited nearly half an hour for the bus (Sunday timetable) and got the same maniac driver who got us back to the ferry in record time! 
So with twenty minutes or so on the ferry, a five minute ride on the subway and a seven block walk from Times Square we made the show on Broadway with minutes to spare! Phew!
But boy was it worth it! What a sensational show in a quaint old theatre in very good seats got at forty percent off!!! Katie did well! We loved every minute of the show and were quite disappointed when the final curtain came down! I wish we had booked another show if that is what Broadway is all about!
Mumsie and I got some knick knacks for the grandies and while the Shopping Queen and Jase did some more shopping, we headed back to Long Island City for a spell.
Later we wandered down to Lounge 47 again and had a meal and a few drinkies, meeting one of the revellers from NYE and spending a happy and funny couple of hours talking to him about all things Yankee and Aussie!!!!
So our day was full on and although we missed the Brooklyn tour, the brief look at Staten Island was interesting and "Chicago" was something not to be missed! An anniversary to be remembered!