Beths Pathfinders trip

On my last full day in the US I decided I ought to go do stuff, even though all I really wanted to do was sleep some more. I got the subway to downtown, first stop: ground zero. It wasn't poignant as I thought it would be. All you could see was a big building site as they rushed to finish off the visitor centre which is opening on the tenth anniversary of 9/11 next month. There was a nice plaque to all the firefighters who dies, and lots of tourists trying to be moved. I next bought some lunch and headed up to the park by City Hall to eat it. You can't actually get a view of City Hall which is a bit rubbish, since the security cordons are really far away and there ... read more

A horribly early start as Raju drove me to the Boston bus station to catch the 7am megabus to New York. I slept well on the bus though (so well I missed Devaki's phone call) so it passed quite quickly. One in NYC I got a yellow cab (cue much excitement) to Devaki's cousin's apartment, which is just off Time Square. There I met up with her and dumped my big rucksack (now pretty heavy with souvenirs) so we could go off and explore Midtown. She had decided to try and show me the whole of the city in one afternoon, which was perhaps a little ambitious, but we still got a lot done. Together we saw New York Public Library; Central Station; the UN; the Chrysler Building (she took me up to her office which ... read more

This morning Raju dropped me off back at Alewife tube station and I got the train into Cambridge to have a sneaky peek around Harvard. My visit seemed to coincide with the arrival of all the undergraduates, complete with duvets and fussing parents. More than once I got asked if I was lost and needed help finding my dorm; this was actually quite useful as I was lost, although I hated admitting I wasn't actually a student there. I eventually found the Peabody Museum, Harvard's answer to the Pitt Rivers (although not as good, in my opinion). I also looked around the Natural History Museum which was great fun. There was an excellent exhibition on evolution, which I was glad to see since apparently 70% of Americans don't believe in it... I also saw the very ... read more

This morning I borrowed Mike's road bike and decided to explore the Shining Sea Bikeway, a 17km bike path along a disused railway which runs from Woods Hole to North Falmouth through some beautiful scenery. Unfortunately we couldn't get the seat to go down, so I just had to make do with stretching my legs a little bit with each pedal. This started out fine, but after 4hrs was getting a bit painful. In North Falmouth I decided to take a 5km detour off the path to Old Silver Beach. When I got there there were cars queuing for ages to get into the car park, so I very smugly cycled past. The beach was horribly crowded though, with barely enough room to sit, so after a quick Oreos ice cream I hopped back on my ... read more

Another lazy day with not much getting done! In the morning, Judith and I walked into town to retrieve the bike which we had abandoned in favour of a taxi last night. I also really wanted to see the Princeton Art Gallery, but after a while hunting around campus to find it we read that is is closed on Mondays, so that was that. We then spent the rest of the day watching American films and generally mooching about. I also tried to pack up all my stuff ready for the early start tomorrow, but no all of it fitted in so I had to donate an old t-shirt and a fleece to Judith.... read more