Merry Christmas from Scott, Nancy and Sam

A Merry Christmas from Scott, Nancy and Sam.  We hope you and your family have a fantastic festive time this year and we wish you health, comfort, and prosperity this holiday season.  Season's Greetings from Vancouver Island.

Last Adventure to New York

I'm back on the blog.... it has been too long and there is no excuse, just the pressures of work.  One of the happenings since I last updated the blog is my trip to New York to stay with Neil and have Ross join for a visit.  Neil has been living in New York for the last couple of years thanks to a role with Citigroup - yes, he is one of those evil bankers that brought the world to its knees in 2008.  However, at the end of December he returns to the UK to be reunited with his family and a job in London; so this was the last adventure for the three of us to be together in New York.

As you can imagine fun times were had by all.  I arrived a couple of days earlier than Ross and had the opportunity to experience the city at its best with a pre-Christmas feel.  I walked the city and saw all the major sights, including Time Square, Wall Street, the United Nations building, Madison Square Garden, the NBC television studios, Central Park, Brooklyn Bridge and even managed to find time to pop into Mercedes-Benz Manhattan.  One disappointment was not being able to take the ferry over to the Statue of Liberty, as the recent super storm Sandy had meant it was closed to tourists.

The evenings were spent with Neil looking for places to dine and chat - some of the topics of discussion being how to fix American politics, which including gun control (how apt following recently incidents).  On the Friday, Ross took the bus up from Washington DC to join us and Neil recommended a great Italian place for pizza and drinks.  Saturday was a day of walking and touring the west side of New York including the Highline and a wharf of shops.  The time together was spent chatting and making jokes at each others expense, the main focus being Neil's obsession with pink trousers (as you can see from the photos).  The final day was spent walking across the Brooklyn Bridge in the rain - great cityscape views but the weather got in the way.  The trip highlighted the fact that as always life is improved by sharing it with great friends, but New York certainly provided an amazing backdrop.