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Bright lights, big city.  We flew in from Montreal at 8am on Monday and flew out to London at 11pm that night, so had not a moment to lose.

Subway to downtown Manhatten, with a short walk to the NY Stock Exchange, where we were hoping to watch from the visitor's gallery.  Alas not, as the area was swarming with swot teams toting machine guns: looking after some VIP visitor apparently.

So we nipped down to the pier next to Battery Park and took the (free) Staten Island Ferry out and back to soak in the view of the Statue of Liberty and downtown (the latter much changed without the Twin Towers).

Next, we walked about 40 blocks up Manhattan to Greenwich Village, stopping to pay our respects at the World Trade Centre site before cutting back to Broadway so that our route took us close to famous landmarks such as the charging bull near Wall Street, City Hall and the Supreme Court.  

After a lovely and well earned lunch we took the subway to Times Square then wandered back to the Empire State Building (stopping to buy new comfy shoes for Flick, who was suffering somewhat by this stage).  We have to say the ESB still rocks (and we're not talking about high winds or earthquakes here), even 70+ years on:  the speed with which it was built, its Art Deco style, and the fact that the spire at the top was originally intended to dock trans-Atlantic airships.

We only had time to briefly visit one department store (Macey's), before another subway trip to the southern end of Central Park, where we had a pleasant wander past the landmark Plaza Hotel and Zoo to a large lawn where we briefly rested our feet.  Then it was back to 5th Avenue, fortunately (for the sake of the Amex), just as the stores were closing their doors.

Another 20 block walk down to Grand Central Station, the gateway to New York, and a view of the Chrysler Building under lights (above), and that was all we had time for.