Lizzie and Scott

So today, the three boys went off to play by themselves, and the three girls also went off on their own adventure!

Lynn, Laura and Lizzie met up at our apartment and walked downtown to Tiffany's on the famous Fifth Avenue. They were whisked up to the 6th floor and shown to their table. It was a beautiful room with a lovely view of the Louis Vuitton building and Central Park. They ordered Breakfast At Tiffany's from the menu, and received a lovely glass of champagne (yes, the real French stuff!).
Breakfast was delivered in a lovely tiered cake stand and the food was delicious!
The room was decorated with beautiful blue Tiffany boxes hanging from the ceiling.
After breakfast, they strolled through the different floors of the store, drooling over the glass display cabinets. They couldn't get up to the 8th floor though because that is by appointment only, and is where celebrities and millionaires go to shop!

After running out of saliva to cover the cabinets, they took a short walk to the Peninsula Hotel and viewed the beautiful Christmas trees, and continued strolling down Fifth Avenue to Rockefeller Plaza where they met us with us guys.
So what did the boys get up to?

Well, we went off and had a few hours checking out the USS Intrepid aircraft carrier museum, along with the USS Growler submarine, and the Concorde aircraft that flew the very last commercial passenger flight.

This is a must-see if you travel to NYC!

The Intrepid is an old WWII era aircraft carrier that has been turned in to a floating museum to show what life was like on board. It is also an aviation museum with a decent collection of aircraft on board, and one very special spacecraft! (More on that shortly)

Our first stop though, was to venture on board the USS Growler, a WWII missile submarine. She was surprisingly roomy inside, and smelled of grease and machinery, despite being spotlessly clean!

The only really tight spaces to get through were the bulkhead hatches the separated the boat in to separate compartments.

Without further ado, here are some photos of the Growler in all her glory:
We also took a 20 minute guided tour of the Concorde which is parked in the pier alongside the Intrepid. It was pretty cool to be able to climb on board and sit in the seats of the Concorde. We also got a chance to take a look at the cockpit - you'd need to be a scientist to understand all the buttons and dials!!!
After that, it was on to the main attraction! We climbed aboard the Intrepid and had a ball exploring all the nooks and crannies. Not to mention all

of the amazing aircraft parked on her flight deck, and on her hangar deck. The ship has been restored to immaculate condition and is very well worth the couple of hours you need to go through her various displays.
Finally, we ventured down to the rear of the flight deck where a HUGE tent was erected. Wandering inside, we found that very special spacecraft I mentioned before - the mighty Space Shuttle Enterprise!

If you've never seen a space shuttle up close, these things are HUGE! The Enterprise was the first of the shuttles, and was predominantly used to test and develop the design, and train the astronauts to fly and land the enormous glider! (Yes, "glider". The shuttles did not have any engines to operate in Earth's atmosphere, so once they re-entered from orbit, they became a very large, heavy glider!)
In addition to the above, after Space Shuttle Columbia burnt up on re-entry killing all astronauts on board, NASA engineers believed it had sustained damage to the ceramic tiles underneath during launch when some foam blocks struck the tiles. To prove this theory, they used the Enterprise, and fired foam blocks at her belly at the same speed experienced during launch - sure enough, they cause enough damage to compromise the ability of the ceramic tiles to absorb heat during re-entry. The cause of the fatal crash has been proven.
It took us roughly three hours to go through all of the exhibits, but it didn't seem that long. Once we'd had our fill, we walked to Rockefeller Plaza (about 2 Km) to meet up with the ladies for lunch. As try as we might, we just couldn't find an eatery that could take six people as walk-ins. It seems the city is getting busier with each passing day now, in the lead up to Christmas.

We ended up finding a bakery where we managed to squeeze in around a small table and ate lunch at about 3:00 pm!

The we all parted ways and Lizzie and I wound up back at home, on the couch - any guesses on what Lizzie started watching on TV?

Keep checking in for more updates...

I love the USS Intrepid, can't wait to go back there one day ! I see that some of the planes up top haven't been maintained well over the years.

True. But that's what you get when you store aircraft outside, exposed to the elements. And they get extremes in NYC. Hot humid summers, and freezing winters with snow, not to mention exposure to the salt from the Hudson River.

You may recall that when we were there in 2013, they were restoring their Fury in a tent on the rear flight deck. Well, you'll see the photo of the Fury above, in immaculate condition sitting inside the hangar deck. The Shuttle Enterprise now lives on the rear flight deck.