NYC Day 2 - Part 2

We stopped for lunch in Central Park. We had hot dogs from a hot dog cart like the one below. I didn't really care for my hot dog to be honest. I thought that it was too spicy. I was actually kind of disappointed.

I was quite surprised when we were walking down one of the paths and passed this huge rocky area. The landscape seemed so uncharacteristic of NYC. 

Then we rode the carousel in Central Park. We all had a great time doing this, even the young and the older! The carousel itself was beautiful. I took pictures of the whole thing. It was very antique looking. 

I think Cal picked this horse because she thought it was a zebra...she has a thing for zebras lately.

(Must take after Aunt Bizby.) 

This is a view of one of the lawn's that people could picnic and hang out in. You can see the skyscrapers in the background peering out over the trees. 

Mark finally finished his rehearsal and met up with us at Central Park. He and Calloway were standing by the Balto statue. Balto is a famous dog because of his contributions to the Iditarod sled dog race, where he saved many people's lives. 

This lady (yes, she was a real person) was standing near one of the paths in Central Park. She was pretending to be a statue and her sign said that if you took a picture to be respectful and pay her. So, I took a picture and let Cal drop in some coins. After I took the picture she did some ballet moves but it was really kind of creepy, to be honest. She was actually an old woman which made it more unnerving.  

This is the area where they do the famous sailboat races. There is even a place here where you can rent sailboats to sail. 

This is the Alice in Wonderland statue. She stands 11ft tall. This is actually a memorial that Lewis Carroll built for his wife. She had a huge love and passion for children and he wanted to have something built that children could play on. It was very neat. 

As we were passing this rock below, Calloway said, "I wanna rock climb!" And so Mark, Richard, Calloway and Casey climbed up this big rock. Calloway was so happy and really excited when they made it to the top. Her shoes were a little bit slippery but she climbed most of the way with a little help from Mark.

As we approache these steps up to the Belvedere Castle (which is in the middle of Central Park.) Calloway told us to stop and let her go first. She is really into this whole, I can do it, Me first thing. 

Belvedere Castle 

Watching the people row boats in a lake in Central Park. (This is on my to-do list for next time.)

Then it was off to The American Museum of Natural History

(Which is the museum feature in the movies "Night at the Museum".)

Although, it didn't look the same.

We came to see the dinosaurs....well, that's what Calloway wanted to see. And she got lucky! The whole 4th floor was full dinosaurs and other skeletons from eras. 

This was the hall of African mammals. These elephants were huge! 

This room had a random assortment of animals. I'm sure it wasn't random but I didn't have time to read any signs to see what stuff was. We got there an hour before the museum closed and certain exhibits were closing early, so we were basically making a mad dash through the museum trying to get to all of the stuff that closing, before it closed.  (Btw, do you see that giant spider at the top....I don't think I'd ever like to meet any of his family members.)

And finally Rexie!

Calloway absolutely LOVED looking at all of the dinosaurs. 

Now, let me explain...at this point, those exhibits that closed early, were closed. So we spent a little bit of time in the Hall of Dinosaurs. This exhibit was footprints from a dinosaur and we thought it would be cool to put in perspective how big they were compared to our hands. Also, just a little interesting FYI. These tracks are molded after the dinosaur tracks found in Glen Rose, TX (which is about an hour from us) at dinosaur valley state park. 

This little guy, who was probably about 10yrs old was playing in the subway. Now the cool part is that he must have been some child prodigy because he was playing tons of classical pieces, all by memory and reall, really, well.

Stay tuned for NYC Day 2 - Part 3 which will show our trip to Toys R Us, Bubba Gump Shrimp, M&M World, the Hershey's Store, and find out what two famous people I saw in Times Square.