Statue of Liberty!

When my Mom and Tami came to visit they wanted to go see the Statue of Liberty so we planned a trip! We are only about 4 hours away so it was a great trip! It was truly amazing to be there and see the statue, what an experience. We were so excited when we were driving up to look across and see the statue and realize we were seeing the real thing! We hadn't really planned to go there but when my Mom wanted to go we were excited. We went to the train station to get on the ferry to the islands, inside the train station they had a flag hanging that was one of the only flags recovered from Ground Zero when the Trade Towers fell, it was very sobering to see that. We got on the ferry and the kids loved that, it was really fun! There are two islands, Ellis Island which has the immigration facilities on it and then Liberty Island with the Statue of Liberty on it. We went straight to Liberty Island because we didn't have enough time to do both islands before the last ferry left to go back. But the ferry did stop over at Ellis Island so we got to see it, we just didn't go in and tour it. Then we went to Liberty Island and it was so beautiful! We even got passes to climb up through the stone pedestal! There were 156 steps, it was quite a good climb for everyone! The kids did great, they loved it! We weren't allowed to go up into the statue but when we were in the pedestal we could see up into the statue, it was really cool! There was a small museum before the climb and the kids loved seeing the replicas of the face and foot to see the real size. Seeing the Statue of Liberty was on my Mom's "bucket list" so it was neat to share that with her! My Mom told us a story about her mother's brother that had been away at the war over in France and he lost many friends and saw the horrors of war. When he came home he came through the harbor with the Statue of Liberty and when he saw the Statue of Liberty he was so grateful for our freedom and to be home! He was very humbled and grateful and knew that he was in the land of the free. It was awesome to have my mom share that story with us as we saw the statue and realize what a blessing our freedom is! I loved seeing the statue and I'm so grateful we had the opportunity to go there! As we caught the last ferry back to New Jersey the lights came on in the torch and around the statue and it was so beautiful! We had a fabulous experience there!