In late August 2011, we took my well awaited trip to New York. We stayed in the Holiday Inn in Manhatten, and planned to stay there for a long weekend, before continuing our USA trip to Las Vegas, Nevada. Little did we know once our plane touched down in JFK, that our stay in the Big Apple was going to be longer than first thought!

For the first few days of our stay, the sun shined down on the vast city, allowing us to sight see - and sight see we did! We took an open top bus ride of the city, and sat on the stands in Times Sqaure, we went to the top of the Empire state building and took a boat ride to the Statue of Liberty. We even got a bit of shopping down in the midst!

It wasn't until Sunday that our plans started to change. 'Hurricane Irene expected to hit New York!' So we found ourselves in the midst of our first tropical storm. So as recomeded by the trusted news anchor we braved the storm for some much needed supplies - which consisted of a hell of lot of beer and a few bags of crisps. On arrival back to our rooms we filled up the bath tub and added some ice from the ice machine, before we pilled up the bath with our supplies. We had this hurricane prep down to a 'T'

The hurricane hit and as we sat in our room staring down at the Manhatten street bellow, waiting anxiously for the road to turn into a river- or a big whirling tornado to race down the street, we soon became disapointed that there was nothing more than wind and rain. We being British were not un-familer with this kind of weather so we decided that we'd spend the day braving the storm instead of shying away from it. Having said that we where soon to find out, that this wind and rain we where now walking through was enough to shut down the 'city that never sleeps' as we walked through the deserted times square and wacking out the poncho's for central parck, we decided we needed to find somewhere which was open. Turns out the only place braving the storm like we where was a Irish Bar!

Of course though it wasn't all laughs, our flight to Las Vegas was cancelled meaning we'd have to spend an extra 2 days in the City. and in this time we where able to get a bit more shopping done and saw Priscilla Queen of the Desert- the only show which had tickets left, seemed like everyone else was having the same idea as us!