Empire State Building

We headed off on foot along Madison Avenue to St Patrick's Cathedral (St Paddy's as they call it), where we had time to look around the magnificent structure and artworks before Mass at 5.30: very traditional and old-style, with the added pomp of a cathedral atmosphere. Our hosts are Lutherans but feel quite comfortable going to a Catholic service. Next we took a bus to the Empire State Building; it took a long time to get through all the queues for security and then queues to get to the lifts. There was quite a crowd, being a Saturday night and because it was getting close to sunset; we had a good look at all the different aspects of New York by daylight and realised how huge this city is.

Then we watched the sun set; then one by one the lights started to come on – so pretty to watch and a totally transformed outlook once they were all twinkling. Again, Meg Ryan didn't show, nor did Tom Hanks, Cary Grant or Deborah Kerr....

We were going to eat in the bistro in the lobby of the building, but they had very loud rock music blaring and we couldn't face a dinner of shouting at each other. So we ate at a little hamburger joint on 5^th Avenue. Then back to Grand Central for the train to White Plains. Once again we were walking the mile from the train station to their condo around 10.30pm without fear: we've felt much safer than we expected in this town.