5.32am

Well it’s that time again, I’m all checked in and through security sitting in Newcastle airport ready to jet off on my next adventure! I’ve made my naughty duty free purchase of the beautiful new Marc Jacobs Daisy Dream Blush (I literally buy every single variant of daisy when it comes out I’m obsessed)

Now I’m sitting waiting to be given a boarding gate, hoping that the horrendous fog that has settle in over night doesn’t delay us. I’m going to download some last minute books on to my kindle and drink my orange juice – hardcore.

Next stop is Paris!

10.19am (I’ve went an hour forward now)

I’ve literally never been on as small a plane as the city jet which took me from Newcastle to Paris, but I was sat next to a lovely lady who I chatted to and kept occupied.

Charles De Gaulle has definitely had a facelift since I last visited it is literally so posh I’m a little bit gutted I didn’t have time to check it out I literally got off a plane found the next and boarded.

There was a little bit of a kerfuffle about who was sitting where but I’m now on board, seated and just waiting for takeoff. Eeeeek next stop is New York City!!! I’m so excited.

6.23am (I’m cheating catching up the next day)

I’m so mad right now I just spent about 40mins writing a blog and it had an ‘error when publishing’ so I’m about to write it all out again…

It was my first time flying United and I was little bit pessimistic not sure what it was going to be like, but overall I was impressed. The staff were all lovely (although kept speaking to me in French I didn’t know I gave off those vibes) the food was alright (my sandwich did have little frozen bits in it though…) there was a good choice of films (I watched Spectre, Home & Amy – the Amy Winehouse documentary), then best of all, they had wifi!!! Anybody that knows me should fully understand that I for sure paid the $29.99 to access the Internet in the sky! The flight managed to land an hour early (I think it was something to do with unusual pressure in the jet stream that I saw on the news) but there was some mid-Atlantic turbulence. I also found it strange that even though it was a day flight they told you to close your window shutter thing.. I had a good view whilst it lasted though.

There was then the typical long passport control line which drives me insane. Then I didn’t have a blue form so had to move to one side to do that (luckily a lovely lady saw me rummaging for a pen and gave me one to use), the one good thing about the line though meant that when I got through my bag was ready and waiting on the carousel for me.

If you’ve ever googled how to get from JFK to the city you will no doubt have seen lots of warnings about not being taken to independent taxis etc. Yeah vulnerable young girl moment as a man practically steals me and security had to scare him off (thanks guys) before I found I was in the right place anyway! It was yellow taxi time (whilst singing Counting Crows in my head).

My super sexy yellow taxi selfie

What a surprise – traffic was bad. And although I was a little bit gutted we got to the island via a tunnel, through the foggy rain there was still a silhouette of sky scrapers you just wouldn’t see anywhere else. Driving through the streets it’s quite overwhelming being surrounded on all sides by high rises; just not something you really experience in the UK. Looking down every side street for a glimpse of something you might recognise.

I was just desperate to get to the hotel though and reunite with my long lost Texan loves – Gemma & Jen; who of course were at the bar getting the first New Yorken round in  

We had a dramatic reunion with hugs and girly squeals, it’s crazy I talk to these girls everyday about everything yet they live so damn far from me!

We’re staying at the Crowne Plaza and after Gemma found the right floor they showed me our room which is pretty sick! It has a big corner window and you can see the Hudson River out of one side and a little slither of the lights from Times Square looking out of the other.

So after a quick freshen up we hit the streets and had a mini adventure around Times Square.

–insert angry face because it failed to publish again–

Times Square is pretty much what I dreamed it to be. It’s right on our doorstep and the lights are so bright it’s crazy, what’s even better is it has 3 of my favourite shops lined up in a row – Mac, Disney and Forever 21. The ball drop stuff is on the roof as well which I don’t know why but for some reason I envisioned only being there for new year.

Then as if to prove what amazing friends they are the first place we headed was the Hard Rock Cafe so I could mark it off my list and buy my charm for my bracelet. I must say I was a little bit underwhelmed by the HRC NYC, there was something missing in the atmosphere, I don’t know whether it was just because the music wasn’t very loud or what but there was definitely something missing. Despite that though, the cocktails were amazing and so were the burgers so hey ho! Jessica our waitress also pointed out a good bad for us to go to next called the Iron Bar.

I think we were maybe ahead of the game in a bar at 7pm on a Monday night as it was pretty quiet, however Gem was occupied with the sports on the tv, I was happily singing along to the cheesy music and Jen was enjoying people spotting. I had a lush Apple cocktail too.

 It’s maybe somewhere to go back to at a more exciting time. The warmth was making us a little sleepy, so we headed back out in the rain to adventure a little bit more around Times Square.

We went to the Disney Shop – I also get so excited then remember they’re always the same wherever you go and get a little bit disappointed.

We also went to m&m world, the Hershey store (you got a free chocolate on your way in) and Superdry, before I literally couldn’t take anymore and at 8.30pm had to sleep – 21 hours awake is more than enough for me. Within minutes of my head hitting the pillow I was asleep. Hence getting up so early this morning (5.35am was attempt at blog number 1) my body is going to take a while to adjust, I’m now going to try to get a nap in before we get up and go adventure a bit more!