On Sunday, most of the Cats-Caders packed up and headed home. Ross and Joyce planned to leave Monday for a ride up the east coast, and Rich and I didn't have to be back at work until Thursday.
One of the group, 'RadarContact,' is an air-traffic controller who lives near NYC. He offered to borrow a car and take Ross and Joyce into the city for the day, and they invited us to ride along.
Radar drove us to Tarrytown, NY, where we caught a train to Grand Central Station. While we were waiting on the platform, a young lady came up to me and commented on my Crocs. She was from California, in the area for a volleyball tournament, and had noticed that everyone at the tourney was wearing Crocs -- then she found out they were sponsoring the event! She borrowed her friend's Crocs flip-flops to see how she liked them, and headed for the city.
Ross is quite amused by my yellow shoes, and couldn't resist the opportunity to take this picture. 
The train traveled beside the Hudson River and right down through the city. We saw Yankee Stadium, Harlem, and many other famous places along the way. When the train pulled into Grand Central Station, we bought day-passes for the subway and headed out to see the city. We were nearly overwhelmed: so many things and people to see. We hardly knew where to look next. Radar was an excellent guide. We had very little time, and he made sure we saw as much as possible.
I loved this little church standing in the shadow of a modern skyscraper. The city is a marvelous study of the contrast between old and new, and this is a perfect illustration.
This is a view of New York Harbor and the Statue of Liberty from the Staten Island Ferry.
Here are Rich and Radar in Times Square. We walked down Wall Street and Fifth Avenue and saw Saks and Tiffany's, Rockefeller Plaza and the lions at the New York Public Library. We bought hot dogs from a street vendor. We rode in a taxi and...
in a carriage through Central Park. Our cab driver was an Irishman who mumbled comments over his shoulder about the sights we passed. I had a hard time understanding him, but his information seemed mostly to be related to various movies and television programs that had been filmed in the park.
We saw the Empire State Building, but we were running out of time so this was as close as we got. Shortly after we took this picture we headed back to Grand Central to take the train back to Tarrytown.
It was a wonderful trip, and I'm so grateful to RadarContact. Without him and the generous loan of a car from our Cats-Cade hosts, we never would have made the trip.
Next post: Ground Zero.
