When I first took the train from Washington to NY awhile ago, I chose the Acela Express. It was the 'high-speed' train, but once I was on it, I learned first hand that 'high-speed' meant 'slightly faster than hobbling on crutches after a ski accident.' This is apparently due to the state of the tracks between cities. From what the conductor told me after my barrage of questions, if the train got anywhere close to Japanese bullet train speed (faster equals a small fraction thereof, as in, perhaps, one percent) the train would bound off the tracks and fly into an unsuspecting family's living room in Maryland, awkward if you happen to be sitting around in your underwear eating ice cream and watching "Deal or No Deal."
Still, we decided to take the even slower train to NY from DC because the kids have only been on two trains before: the amusement park train at Wonderland in Amarillo that covers its entire oval distance in about three minutes and a small plastic infant potty-sized train with six feet of track that we had on permanent display in our living room while the kids were still crawling around.
The train ride was three hours of good relaxing fun. Alex made a friend named Rain over their common Nintendo DS obsession. Megan and Colleen kept scheming to buy overpriced candy from the snack car. Suzanne and I got in some uninterrupted reading (well, for me reading and napping in this case are synonymous).
Once we arrived in New York, we jumped on the subway to the upper west side near Central Park and then hopped a crosstown bus (awkward because of all our luggage, so I ended up hugging my suitcase to make room for people) to Aunt Davide's.
Davide, our dear friend and official aunt to the kids, generously let us invade her apartment, and that's where we set up camp. Unfortunately, that meant kicking Davide out of her very own place at night because there wasn't enough room for everyone to sleep, but since she is terrific and so accommodating she stayed with one of her friends and completely left her house at our tornadic mercy.
After a quick lunch of tasty NY style pizza, Davide gave us the tour. We walked down her block to Gracie Mansion and then around a great park near the East River. And then we thought we'd stock up on food for the rest of the week, but what we really did in the grocery store was gawk at the prices. Let's just say things are slightly more expensive in NY than in Amarillo, Texas. Hickish but true.
And then, without warning, it was time for bed. Tomorrow: The Lion King.
