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By Annie Bennett
My hu
bby and I just got back from a five-day vacation in New York City to celebrate our 10-year wedding anniversary. We lived in Scotland for five years while my husband attended Veterinary School before moving back to North Dakota. While living abroad, we visited many different countries and saw many different sites, including the Coliseum in Rome, the Tower of London, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and the pyramids in Egypt just to name a few. But since moving back to North Dakota, we hadn’t really been on any adventurous vacations.
We have always wanted to visit the Big Apple and see the sites that make it famous. After all, we have been to more countries that U.S. states! We planned a rough agenda of the places we wanted to see in advance, but knew we would run into a million extra things along the way, which is exactly what happened.
Because we were only there for four nights and five days (two of which were half days, since we needed to travel,) we made the most of it. Some of my favorite things include the 9/11 fountains, the NYC Stock Exchange, biking around Central Park, the outside of Rachel and Monica’s apartment (from the T.V. show Friends), Radio City Music Hall, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Rockefeller Center (where we went to the 70th floor for a full view of Manhattan), the State of Liberty, the Museum of Natural History, walking the Brooklyn Bridge, eating at Katz’s Deli (from the movie, When Harry Met Sally), NBC studios, buying “I Love NYC” shirts, awing over Time Square, being on the Today Showand taking a selfie with Al Roker (it is a terrible photo of me or I would share it), Grand Central Station, walking along High Line Park, the terrifying ride in a yellow cab, visiting the Museum of Modern Art, browsing the shops on Fifth Avenue (especially Tiffany’s), dinner with friends in Greenwich Village, seeing Donald Trump being escorted to his car, and eating too many hot dogs from street vendors. The city was very noisy and busy, but we just took it all in.
New York City is a truly amazing city. I loved being able to pick out any type of cuisine we craved and being able to walk or take a subway to go and get it. It was awesome that just steps from our hotel were the NBC studios. It was incredible to wake up on the 39th floor of an iconic, luxury hotel – right on Fifth Avenue. But, as amazing as New York City is, it just doesn’t compare to North Dakota.
At the end of our vacation, even with as much fun as we had and as many things that we saw, I can’t tell you how nice it was to be back home in North Dakota. I missed the quiet, not filled with sirens and car horns. I missed being able to walk down the street and not having to fight a crowd. Even though we don’t have the Statue of Liberty or 25,000 restaurants like Manhattan, we do have some great places to eat and sights to see. I love to travel and see new places, but in the end, I will always come back to North Dakota – a place I am truly blessed to call home.