I have forever been fascinated with everything about New York City and every time I see an image of anything related, it stirs something inside of me. My first visit to the Big Apple was in May of 2016. My fiance Sara and I flew in to LaGuardia Airport and as soon as we cleared the jetway, I could immediately feel the vibrant and fast paced atmosphere in the air. The taxi ride from the airport took us across the Williamsburg Bridge, through lower Manhattan and through the Holland Tunnel to our Airbnb in Jersey City. The sights along the way were so amazing, I could barely contain my excitement. As soon as we got settled into our comfy loft, we tackled the 8-10 blocks on foot to take in the lower Manhattan skyline just opposite the Hudson River. As we got closer to the Jersey side of the river, we could see the World Trade Center poking through the trees and extending toward the night sky. Reaching the bank of the river and experiencing this for the first time was nothing short of incredible; so much so that I actually misted up a little.

Over the next few days, we visited as many attractions as possible including Central Park, The Empire State Building, Top of the Rock, Times Square, 9/11 Memorial, Brooklyn Bridge and tons more. The first day, we started our day at the American Museum of Natural History and afterwards put on close to 17 miles on foot, which resulted in some pretty nasty blisters on my feet and meant we relied a little more heavily on Uber, Lyft and Taxis for the rest of our visit. Dinner in a revolving restaurant, lunch at Bubba Gump and some pizza at Grimaldi’s in Brooklyn were just a few of our culinary experiences.

Three things I took away from our trip for certain:

1. On my next visit, I will spend less time looking through the viewfinder of my camera. Being a photographer, this is difficult to say, but I feel like I missed out on some of the natural first-person beauty by concentrating so much on getting the next great shot (of which there were many).
2. WEAR COMFORTABLE SHOES! This is definitely a situation where function > style! I tried my best not to let the pain from the huge blisters on my feet ruin a single minute of our trip, but it wasn’t easy.
3. One 4-day trip is not nearly enough to take in the sights. There is SO much to see and the size of the city is deceiving. When looking at a building, you get the feeling it’s only a few blocks away because it’s so tall when in reality, it’s probably more like 1/2 mile away.

I will be back soon! Thanks for reading!