Today has been such a complete and utter scream!

We’d agreed to meet late because we all felt the need for a lie in after last night’s late dinner. After a change of room – to a bigger, more spacious one, we met the gang in the lobby and have subsequently walked our feet off around the streets of NYC.

My opinion of this lively, exciting city has changed 100% since my last visit when I hated every moment of a weekend shopping. I spent the entire time I was here terrified on that occasion so I never count it as a real visit because I spent the time either shopping (which as you know I hate) or cowering in my hotel waiting to go home.

Now I feel confident – I have even been able to direct a New Yorker (Lara) back from Soho to our hotel because she was completely disorientated and lost….I just have a natural sense of direction.

We’ve taken loads of photos (the gallery will have to wait till we get home – loading while on a modem is no fun at all) and this hotel really doesn’t have a broadband connection – now I know what to look for. Every time I’ve stopped, one of the gang has been pointing a camera at me…this photo was taken of Mark, Lara and Jill photographing me and Jeanne sitting on a sofa in a flea market on the way to Greenwich Village.

Unlike my one and only visit to the USA about 10 years ago, this time I have felt really safe and really comfortable. Lara took us to ‘the village’ (Greenwich Village) – now you see I’m talking like a local …..well that’s tawkin leyke a locarl…..and took us to the most wonderful Middle Eastern restaurant. Falafel and salad with Pitta bread (yum) all washed down with about ½ bottle of Blackened Voodoo….I ran out of steam before finishing it….and then ran out of steam quickly afterwards, while we were in Soho, looking at the artists along the street. We decided (well, they all humoured me) to come back to the hotel and have a bit of a rest.

Lara then said ‘I’m lost’ and I said ‘don’t worry, just come along here, follow me’….sure enough, I found our way home. The city is on a grid system (in case you don’t know) so as long as you remember that the avenues run north to south and start in the east at 1st and the streets run east to west starting in the south at first…so I can’t claim to be any great explorer.

The whole trip was about a 3-4 mile walk in the sunshine. At no stage did I feel in any way threatened.

We’re not the only NYC newbies, Jill’s never been here either so she has been walking around open mouthed like us. We’ve all had our cameras out all the time without any problems at all. As we’ve ambled along I’ve been conscious of three things:

Firstly if someone has gone missing they’re usually to be found pointing a camera at something, sometimes above us, sometimes on the same level, sometimes far away and sometimes really close by.

Secondly, it’s easy to spot Jeanne and me in a crowd – just look for the RED hair. The rest of the gang are harder.

Thirdly every so often a shriek of laughter comes from one of us and we just have to have a group hug….Jeanne is obsessed with photographing us all spooning….

Now? We’re in our room and taking a break before going out looking for a restaurant for supper. Who knows where that will take us!

Now I’m signing off for today because I’m missing out on this PotD experience by having my back to them all typing so night night to all, see you again tomorrow.