Day 3 - Kerry and The King

Hello all, welcome to Day 3...

Our adventure today began with a rude awakening from a circular-saw slicing/grinding its way through the pavement outside our window. Ahh... the tranquility of NYC. However, it turned out to be a good thing that we awoke early as today has been jam packed once again.

We first headed down to Washington Square Park to meet up with our Californian friend Arthur Coddington - we're actually staying with Arthur later in our trip and he happens to be in NYC for a few days, so we took the opportunity to say hi. We enjoyed a pleasant walk around Greenwich Village (a small part of the city) and had a good catch up.

After saying our farewells to Arthur (for now), we made our way Uptown to Times Square. A truly fantastic experience indeed... the place was bustling with people, layered with tall buildings to every side and boasted a plethora of mind-boggling advertisement screens. Also situated around the square were many incredible stores. After taking our obligatory tourist photos we headed into a few of these - first stop being the intellectually stimulating 'Toys R Us', which was actually really cool. The highlights for ourselves were a Jurassic Park T-Rex and several huge Lego models - featuring King Kong atop the Empire State, the Statue Of Liberty and Captain Jack Sparrow. However, topping even the 'Toys R Us' store was the distinctly more sophisticated 'M&M's World'. Now this place was special - a dream come true for all M&M's fans - name a colour, they have it (yes, that does include Teal, Electric Green & Maroon). Each colour, was supplied in a 20ft high tube dispenser reaching right up to the ceiling - they even did special mix tubes (our personal favourites being the New York Taxi and Indiana Jones colour schemes).



With excitement pulsing through our veins after the delights of M&M's World, we headed back Uptown again to Roger's house. Before another Central Park jam, we took a quick detour into the Natural History Museum. Due to time constraints we had a whistle-stop tour, but managed to take in such attractions as a life size Blue Whale, a T-Rex (note - our second of the day) and a model of the solar system to name but a few.

When we got to the park, we first spent some time recording for a top secret series of DiscCast specials that can be expected in the coming months. Just as the jams were about to begin, NY jammer Ted Oberhaus made a very welcome visit. Ted's energy for the sport is fantastic and he's got to be one of the best players we've ever jammed with - a great guy.

However, the jams were cut short today as the most exciting event was still to come... we were off to see The Lion King on Broadway, showing at the Minskoff Theatre at Times Square. Luckily our new-found tube (or subway as we've been oft corrected here) experience, meant that we beat a tight time schedule with help from a Downtown C train. The Theatre was stunning, but this was nothing compared to the show itself! A superb musical and a feast for the senses... as one New York critic puts it "Awe Inspiring! A Gorgeous, Gasp-Inducing Spectacle!". We couldn't agree more.

We then made our way across to the other side of Times Square (definitely best seen by night) to the world famous 'Planet Hollywood' restaurant. Our waitress for the evening was a very pleasant girl named Kerry, who served up a great mix of personality, conversation and looks. Talk about a gorgeous, gasp-inducing spectacle! She even kept a lonely John company while Joe made a self-sacrificing tactical visit to the Restroom. Oh, and we had some food as well.

So, it's over and out from us for another day...

Tomorrow brings with it our journey to Jacksonville, Florida, which we're looking forward to immensely. Well, not particularly the journey, but certainly the destination.

As a final note, good luck to any UK readers receiving A-Level results in just a few hours time!

J&J