It's a long weekend in the US, so we're in New York.  We decided to fly early on Saturday morning rather than late on Friday night,  no point paying for a hotel room for Friday night just so we have some place to sleep.  The downside of that appraoch is the 4.00am alarm clock, and the 6.00am flight.

It's easy to forget how long it can take to get from A to B.  The flight is about 2 and a half hours, but we spent the best part of another hour and a half catching trains and subways, and then walking to our hotel.  We're staying at the Millenium hotel just off Times Square.  Sorry, let me correct myself, we were supposed to be staying there, but it appears we were one of the lucky people plucked out of their big hat to be upgraded, so instead we're staying at 'The Premier'.  Some of the perks of which include complimentary breakfasts during our stay, complimentary coctail hour (2 hours actually) with heure d'oeuvres (finger food to you and I), and the internet that I'm using to write to you is also complimentary.

They were also nice enough to allow us to check in even though we arrived long before the check in time.  And as if all that wasn't good enough, our room is the right next to the elevator, rather than the usual situation of having to walk to the end of an endless hallway.

After the day before neither of us were in any rush to hit the streets again.  When we did eventually get a move on it all started badly.  Having a Metro underneath the hotel was great, but when we tried to buy our tickets we couldn't.  The credit card readers on the machines wouldn't work.

We occasionally hit problems with Irish credit cards in machines, but when the US card didn't work either we knew it was a problem with the machine.  We tried a few other machines but none would work.  We had cash, but not small enough bills, and as good as the Washington DC Metro is it seems the idea of giving change hadn't occured to them.  So when we least wanted to be walking up and down stairs, we had to go back to the hotel to get change.

Our first stop was Roslyn.  It was Sunday so everything was closed, but even allowing for that Roslyn seemed quiter than I remembered.  We carried on to Pentagon City where we had breakfast the day before.  This time we were in search of Lunch, and I wanted a sweatshirt.  DC was a lot colder than I had expected.  I ended up buying a very touristy Washington DC hoodie, that came with a free hat, I'd be glad of that hat by the end of the day.

The alarm clock was set for an early start.  I hate strange alarm clocks.  I'm never confident that they're set properly, so I usually do a trial run, I'll set it for 2 or 3 minutes in the future and make sure it goes off, then I'll set it for the real time I want to wake up.

On Saturday morning the clock was set for 7.45.  We had to be at the Renwick Gallery on Pennsylvania Avenue by 9.30.  We were booked onto a photo safari with Washington Photo Safari.  The idea is that you show up camera in hand, and a professional photographer takes you around the city offering general tips on photography, as well as specific tips on how best to photograph DC's monuments and memorials.

As time ticked by and we got ready, it looked like we wouldn't have time to grab breakfast.  We didn't fancy spending $4 or $5 for an orange juice in the hotel, but it looked like it would be too early for any of the nearby restaurants to open.  We didn't want to risk missing the 9.30 meet up, so wandering around aimlessly looking for somewhere to eat wasn't a good idea.

Then sometime around 9 O'Clock Sandra made a discovery.  "Hey It's 7 O'Clock".

As Christmas was approaching, and we were likely to be heading back to Ireland early in the new year, we decided to take advantage of the few days off work and travel a bit.  Travelling during Christmas was likely to be a nightmare, especially with extra security at airports, so we thought going somewhere for New Years Eve might be a better idea.

New York was obviously the first place that came to mind.  The whole of America tunes in to watch the ball drop in Times Square.  Flights were surprisingly cheap, but the cost of hotels put us off.  Besides, we’d already seen New York pleanty of times.  Not that it isn’t a great city to visit, one of my favourites in fact, but we both wanted somewhere a little different.

We’d talked about Washington DC a few times.  After spending a couple of Summers there in the 90’s, I knew the place reasonably well, but Sandra had never been there.  So we started pricing flights and hotels.

Flights were OK, not great, but not too bad.  We got a pretty good deal on a hotel considering the time of year.  The Credit Cards were put to work and we were on our way to DC.