On our way

We left Uralla train station on Sunday morning. Mum and Dad, Garry, Anthony and Matthew were all there to see us off. Train trip was pretty uneventful but we were lucky enough top be in the one carriage with a Drummond Primary School group on their way to Canberra!!  Walking through the other carriages, they were soo quiet. I actually spent the majority of the time doing HRS work as I had booked seats with powerpoints. The more I could do on the w'end, the less I would have to do in New York.
We stayed Sunday night with James (Hunter) and Meg who were kind enough to meet us at Hornsby. Spent a lovely evening with them (marinated butterflied lamb) and were off to the airport Monday morning by 7am for our 10.15am departure.
Flight from Sydney to New York was on schedule (how lucky were we, with the Qantas strike on Tuesday) and, although long, was not tortuous.  We had excellent seats on the Sydney to LA leg with not one on either side of us.

Looking from lounge to bedroom

Courtyard

We got to our apartment about 7.30 pm and our land lady, Hara, was waiting for us.  We were delighted with the apartment. By New York standards, it is quite roomy with a separate bedroom, polished floors, kitchenette, wireless, and a living room which overlooks a garden courtyard.
After showing us the apartment, Hara then took us on a little tour of the neighbourhood, pointing out delis and restaurants that she particularly recommends (she had also emailed us 8 pages of recommended things to do in New York, restaurants, tours, shopping).  We then joined her for dinner at a little Mexican restaurant that had $10 meals on Monday nights!  What a great start!
On Tuesday, Peter was gone by 7am to attend his Crucial Conversation Training Program and I did spent the majority of the day working. That evening we went to an Afghanistan Kebab House (on Hara's list). It was absolutely delicious (Peter had marinated chops and I had marinated diced lamb with spiced rice, pistachios, pinenuts & orange peel). There was only one waiter and he looked after a full restaurant on his own. Certainly puts Andrew (from Caffiends) to shame!

Both Peter and I were up about 3am drinking tea - damn jet lag! I went for a lovely long walk from East 70th St (@ 2nd Ave) to West 52nd St @ 8th Ave).walking on 5th Avenue, Park Avenue, Lexington Avenue (such fun!).  Because of the UN Convention there were police, security guards, shiny black cars everywhere. At a number of places there were groups of about 20 police officers. I was tempted to take a photo but thought they might arrest me for breach of security. So I took this photo instead .

As we were both pretty tired last night, we shopped at a couple of the local delis and ate in last night. The food choices are amazing (I know, talking about food again!)  and the alcohol is so cheap. A really nice bottle of single malt whiskey is half the price it is at Dan Murphy's (so Peter tells me).

I'll try and post this now and fingers crossed it works.  Love to receive feedback on how it looks.