Filloa, great report and a very interesting point of view.

Please keep it up.

Congratulations on the baby, many more I hope.

We have been to LV as well, for 3 night which was more then enough. I was looking for a word to describe the town and you hit it right on the nose..."bizarre".

Great report. I agree with you about the NYC subways...we've used subways in Barcelona, Paris and London....clean and easy. New York subways were not. (Once, our 11 year old said, "Look, a mouse." DH said, "That's not a mouse, it's a rat." Unfortunately, it was not the only rat we saw in the subway.)

I try not to feel uneasy by the TSA inspection notice, but I have had a few problems. I had some Febreeze in a closed container, in a ziplock bag. After TSA had inspected, there was Febreeze all over everything in the bag. I guess they saw an unknown clear liquid and they opened it up and checked it out...but then they did not close it properly. Same trip, I had some costume jewelry in little clear bags. They obviously opened them up and looked through them....nothing was missing, but several pieces were broken because they did not re-seal the bags and the jewelry scattered all over everything. So I can see that if they were inspecting in front of me, I could have made sure they closed everything properly. But having bags inspected out of my sight does make the lines at baggage check shorter.

DAY 15 (14th July)

DH gets up early again and does his jogging at Central Park. He cames back really excited: he has liked it so much that instead of running for an hour or so, he did two hours. However he feels not tired but energized and willing to have his shopping day. He wants to purchase some clothes, especially jeans which are cheaper than in Spain (at least 50% cheaper). We walked to Macy’s at 34th st. and addressed to Visitor Centre, when we are given a discount card (11%) when showing our passports. We purchased clothes and parfums (American brands like CK or DKNY are cheaper and even European fragances tend to be the same price in euros than in dollars, and euros are higher than dollars now). However, although with not so much offer, duty free shops at the airport are even cheaper. We came back by bus with our purchases and went again to Route 66 for lunch. Well, it is Saturday and they offer the brunch specials. We liked it again and after lunch we rested a little at Ameritania. By this time of the trip, we have left organisation aside and our last 24 hours will resent this fact. In the afternoon, we returned to shopping and then decided to go to the Top of the Rocks at Rockefeller Centre. However, our doubts make us to get there a little later than we had wished for and there is hardly any natural light. The night views are also nice and we took some beautiful pictures of Empire State Building with its lights. The only fault I found at the Top of the Rocks was that there is not a good view of Chrysler Building, my favourite at NY. After that, we came back to the hotel, I was feeling some pain at my belly and was a little worried.

DAY 16 (15th July)

Our flight leaves at 6 pm, so we have the morning to do something. We arrange a shuttle with the porter of Ameritania for 2 pm. We check out, they will keep our lugagge and we decided to go to Harlem (it was Sunday). We took the subway, but it didn’t stop at the stations we needed: there are announced changes at loudspeaker, but I can’t get which stations are being supressed. So we can’t stop where we intended and addressed to Abysinian Church, at 142th st. We were surprised again with Harlem: beautiful and quite charming houses from the subway stop to the Church. We did a long queue, and people were being admitted by groups. We payed for our bad organisation and when there were only 20 people more or less in front of us at the queue, the men who was allowing the entrance told all of us that they were already full for that day and that there were no point in waiting any longer.

We came back downtown with one hour to have lunch, once again at Route 66. Took the shuttle to JFK, which was quite comfortable and quick, and waited for our flight. We had a one hour delay inside the plane but after that, there was no incidence. We arrived at Madrid, picked up our car at Barajas and returned home (we live presently about 4 ½ hours from Madrid).

The next day, I had an appointment at my gyneacologist for an ecography. Good news: it is all OK, we could see all the parts of the baby’s body (even his fingers), the weight and measures are perfect for its age and it is a boy for sure. A good conclusion for a very good trip.

Thanks for all the help I have received from this forum. I hope to be in the need of more help to organise our next trip very soon.

Best wishes.

Como esta?
i just read your report Filloa - it was so delightful. i love your english!
i hope next time you will consider coming to San Diego.
Adios!

Hi, nanabee. Many thanks. We want to come back to USA and we expect that it would be in a few years (it will not be so easy with the baby and we have also other destinies in mind, like Peru, Brazil, China or Myanmar). Most probably, the next points of interest at USA will be Yellowstone NP and California. I have heard about the beauties of San Diego at Spanish forums and I think that DH has family there (he has also family in Buffalo, several sisters of his grandmother emigrated to the States about 1920.

Hi Filloa:
Yes, my daughter went to graduate school in Buffalo. Nigara Falls is there and is spectacular. I don't advise going in the winter!!
Congrats on your upcoming new addition to your family!
Yellowstone is wonderful too. If you are in California I recommend seeing the Redwoods, and Yosemite NP. (Northern California) then driving down the coast from San Francisco to San Diego. Not really that long of a trip (8 hrs. by car straight thru).
Hope to hear more of your travels!

Fabulous report. Thanks so much.

Excellent report. I loved the analogy of Chinatown and the fake purse! Congrats on the baby. That's wonderful.

Wonderful report, Filoa.

And I feel I need to comment upon something you said:

As a lawyer and a great admirer of American Constitution, that I find to be one of the great inspirers of the system of liberties of many countries, I felt that it gave me no guarantee… I understand security concerns about terrorism, how would I not? I came from a country with a terrorist gang in activity for more than 30 years and that suffered an Al Qaeda (or something similar) terrorist attack in 2004 with 192 casualties, but I won’t made me change my opinion about individual liberties. Well, it is only a cultural opinion and I wouldn’t like that any USA citizen would take offence from it (I found American people to be generally kind and friendly).

Not only don't I take offense, but I completely agree with you and want to compliment you on how well put this was, be it in a first or second language. This is the type of thing that embarrasses me as an American and it seems many people just don't get it!

P.S. When you return to the US, you really should consider the Pacific Northwest--Seattle and Portland and Vancouver and the surrounding areas. You seem to really appreciate natural beauty and this area is estupendo!

Hello, Well, Las Vegas "bizarre" had me royally laughing. How funny and true and yet ,I have gone there about 6 times or more. Each time I always wonder why I go back. Your trip report was a great read. It gave me a lot of ideas for New York if I ever get to the East Coast. When I lived in Germany we spent one summer in Spain. You have a wonderful country. Congratulations on your little one..from San Diego.