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So its the last day, It had to come around at some stage and here it was .....we were definitely going home a little heavier than we had started the holiday with both in terms of the size of our stomachs and the size of the luggage that we had now packed up ready to leave the hotel.

Before we did check out though we headed of for our daily ritual being a Starbucks and fruit parfait before going back to the room and leaving the luggage at the left luggage and ending our stay at the hotel New Yorker.

In our quest to try and keep doing something different we headed up 8th Avenue to Columbus Circus and Central Park.

It was another glorious day in New York and as you would expect the park was packed both with New Yorkers out enjoying the sun, a sea of runners flexing their calves and biceps and a few nannies out walking with their charges and the very latest in designer baby buggies. There was actually a really large concert going on in the park this evening, a charity concert in aid of a help the heros type charity. The main star of the show was going to be Maria Carey and it was actually free to attend, the idea that you would donate what you might have paid to the various charity bucket collectors managing the event.

Our first real stop was Strawberry Fields and the John Lennon Imagine memorial mosaic right in fornt of the Dakota Apartment Block where he was killed. Having been here before it was not surprising to find it full of what I am sure is a regular band of buskers that sit around the memorial playing Lennon and Beatles songs on acoustic guitars. It did make you think about the fabulous music that he made and what a terrible waste of an incredible talent the world lost.

Continuing on in the park we walked around to the boating lake and the Loab Boathouse. I had always fancied going to lunch here one day but today was not the day as we headed off towards the zoo and ultimately out of the park. It really is a special place though and it seemed that there was something to see around every corner that we turned. There was the boating lakes to the model boating lakes, statues of bronze celebrating children's characters such as Alice in Wonderland positioned right next door to the children's play park. The area around the zoo was probably the busiest and we didn't go in to the zoo itself but walked through the path that cuts through the middle of the zo, although you do get a great view of the sea lions.

It was inevitable that Jonathan would end up in Abercrombie & Fitch again, this time making a few final purchases before we headed off for another Starbucks coffee stop at the Trump Tower and ultimately Bloomingdales for Lunch. We ate at a place called David Burke at Bloomingdales which had been voted the best burger in NYC fo the last two years. I have to say that it was yummy with the main point of difference being that the melted cheese was actually in the middle of the burger rather than laid over the top and when you bit into it it oozed out of the burger....ummm...yum yum. It deserved the award for best burger.

The last serious shop stop of the day was Pottery Barn where we both dithered over buying some cow hide lampshades. We finally decided that as nice as they were they were just that bit to awkward to get on a plane and through customs in the uk so we walked away.....something that Jonathan regrets!

It was now time to take a slow walk back to the hotel, collect our bags and get a taxi to JFK.

We got in a yellow taxi to the airport takin about forty minites and we both got changed out of our shorts in the toilet before checking in for our saga class seats back to Reykjavik.

We were through security without event and made our way to the B.A. lounge as iceland air had a shared lounge with B.A.

There is no denying that there is something special about flying business class or first class (although we were flying saga class which is somewhere in the middle of the two). You check in at the lounge and then it as much free drink (including alcohol) as you want and loads of nibbles to gorge on. We both ate a few sandwiches and had a few drinks (Trev finally got a scottish whisky). Now it felt like we were sat in the lounge for ages, with only fifteen minites until the flight was due to leave we didn't wait for a lounge announcement that might never come and we headed for the gate.

Flying SAGA class we were one of the first to get on the plane where we indulge in the usual fare of a free glass of champagne (well actually I think it was cava) and settled in for the four and a half hour flight to Iceland. We really needed to sleep on the plane as the time zones would be travelling the wrong way again so after a bite to eat we both tried to settle down managing about and hour and a half each.

We had an hours stop off in Iceland before boarding for Heathrow and a lack of sleep was definitely catching up on us. It's a hop ,skip and a jump from Iceland from Heathrow.and the hour and a half went by incredibly quickly.

And that was it we were home, well back to our UK home.When you are feeling as tired as we both were the taxi ride seemed to take an age but we were determined to try and at least make it to about nine o'clock. Mum and Caroline cooked us an amazing roast dinner (oh vegetables how we have missed you) and the portions were huge.

We caught up on the gossip, nothing had really changed and after a while for a moment it felt like we had never been away at all, our trip was now a series of memories and was confined to what had been, now in the past....there is something quite sad about that, how quickly something goes from the present to the past so quickly.

Next stop our home in the sun........for a holiday !

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