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Published: August 7th 2007
We booked this flight to New York last year in November as there was a really cheap flight deal. Now, you all know that I've never been keen on visiting America, pretty much cos I figured I'd get into a fight 5 mins into the country. But everyone said that I'd love New York and this city really did transform both our opinions.
From the time we got there it was like visiting a movie set. We landed in Newark in the state of New Jersey which is just across the river (on the west side) from Manhattan (the main borough of New York, which divides 2 rivers) and caught the train to Manhattan going past absolutely MASSIVE yards and yards of industry and what looked like power stations.
NY is made up of 5 boroughs: Manhattan Island (it's not really an island, but a peninsula, but they call it an island) which is the main city area with all the famous attractions. To the north is Harlem (Jazz central) and above that is the Bronx (old Jenny from the block, South side Bronx). Across the river on the east side is Long Island (not sure if it's actually
an island or just another peninsula). Two boroughs of New York are on Long Island, Queens (the Nanny) and Brooklyn (Taxi Driver, are you toakin' ta me?). The rest of the Island is just known as Long Island.
We were staying on 17th Street in Manhattan in a cute little hotel that Woody Allen made a movie in and Madonna stayed in a few times, I'm guessing during her early years as when we got to our room it was missing a window (which was covered over with a black garbage bag!) with a 20mm dia. pipe running from ceiling to floor in the corner that apparently fed the radiator. Thankfully it was still quite cute and warm & dry despite the missing window. Plus group bunk bed rooms in hostels that were further out of the city were going to cost the same as this, so we couldn't really complain too much.
Time to explore...First up a slice of New York pizza :D We managed to stumble on the "best pizza in Manhattan" as awarded by Oprah and her friend Gayle. Next the seaport, right down south on the tip of Manhattan where the largest of those
old ropey sail boats is moored. Then a walk through Little Italy, where we saw two movies being filmed - had no idea what they were, but it was still quite surreal to have lights and cameras all around us. The streets are huge too, massive tankers careen through the city centre, bizaar when compared to the windy streets of the centre of London.
I thought that it would be really weird being surrounded by American accents, but the thing about New York is, it's probably the most multi-cultural city I've ever been to. It was like being in a much friendlier London! And people really were lovely, you could ask anyone on the street, subway, shop anything and they'd do their best to help you out. You so much as make eye contact with a stranger in London and they look at you like you're a psychotic freak whose obviously out to stalk and kill them. And the other thing that we noticed was how interested people were in who you were and where you were from. If you asked someone a question, they'd answer you, then almost always ask "so where you from?" and then start up
a conversation. For such a big and multi-cultural city, I thought it would be a very lonely city, like London, where everyone just gets on with their day and it's all "me, me, me" and cultures would be very separated. But in NY, it seems that everyone has their own culture, but it's been morphed to fit in with each other and everyone is still really interested in everyone else.
And the food! Again, my culinary expectations have been stamped here in Europe, fresh produce is always a few months old. Meat is very rarely any good, fruits & vegetables are always tasteless and seafood is either frozen or unaffordable. We had dinner in Little Italy the first night and it was fantastic, clams, conch, lobster all fresh and cooked perfectly. That night we had a wander around the East Village of Manhattan where all the rock stars hang out. We met an Irish band who were supposed to open for The Pouges that night, but Shane MacGowan got trashed and passed out so they couldn't go on!
The next day we were up at 5am, not sure if it was the excitement or the espressos we'd had
View from the Empire State Building
Manhattan Bridge and Brooklyn Bridgethe previous night, but we decided to go straight to Time's Square and soak in the rush hour madness. So many flashing lights and cars. It's funny cos we noticed that probably a good 60-70% of traffic on the road are yellow cabs and NYPD - we got photos of both. That was weird, definitely felt like we were in a movie! And they have yellow school buses driving everywhere too.
After b'fast at a NY deli it was straight up The Empire State Building (we got there early so we didn't have to line up, apparently it can take up to 3 hours!). That was quite cool, very interesting hearing about how it was built. Really good views, so bizaar to look down and recognise so many things like that Wedge shaped building that's always on sitcoms (they used it in Veronica's Closet with Kirsty Alley, among others) and looking over at Central Park, the Chrysler Building, where the World Trade Centre used to be....then we took a wander down all the famous streets & avenues: 42nd Street, 5th & 6th Avenues, Madison & Park Avenues and of course Broadway. Then we walked down through Greenwich Village (the
restaurant district), Soho (more edgy/arty district) and the finance district (Wall Street, NY Stock Exchange etc) which took us back down to the Seaport where we got discount tickets to Chicago on Broadway for that night. We had a really lovely fresh seafood lunch on the pier, B had a whole fresh lobster (for about £10) and I had a massive seafood platter (for about £15). I wish I could bottle that happiness ¦)
After that we took a ferry out to Liberty Island, the home of The Statue of Liberty - it's quite funny how the US bags the French considering that the individual citizens of France actually donated money to fund this statue. It was supposed to symbolise the union of France & America after France helped them win their independence from England. How things change. Pretty amazing feat of engineering too, Mr Eiffel was the engineer!
After this it was time to go home, get changed and head off to Broadway...Chicago was pretty good. More expensive than watching a musical in London and probably same quality but we couldn't come to NY and not see a Broadway show! It had the little lady from Cheers
in it. The tiny one with curly, dark hair whose married to Danny Devito.
We had planned to go out on the town after that but when we emerged it was bucketing down. So we caught a cab - with an authentic Brooklyn taxi driver, born & bred. Been a Nu Yoarka oall his life! And so it was that we discovered our local diner, with everything typically American you could think of...sloppy joes, pecan pie & Boston cream pie plus unlimited coffee & ice water.
Our second day started with waking up to discover the streets were covered in a blanket of snow! Now the night we arrived it was 17-20deg C, it was now -1. It was also blowing a gale so sleet, snow, rain & wind didn't encourage too many outdoor activities. So we decided today would be shopping day :D We went down to see the site of the World Trade Centre, which is now a building site where they're building the Freedom Tower, which will be the tallest building in NY. Conveniently, across the road from this is Century 21, a designer label discount store - now they have shopping tours that take
you out to the HUGE discount shopping malls in New Jersey & Queens, but we didn't have time 😞 Neither did we have time to do the Sex & the City tour, but I wasn't too heartbroken.
So after shopping up a storm there, we headed over to Macy's... Service in NY is fantastic, everywhere had really friendly & helpful service. I know I've definitely had my expectations for service skewed by the rude, brash "service" offered here in Europe, but these staff genuinely seemed interested in you. It's customary in hospitality to tip 10-15%, which I had a feeling I might resent. But not at all. Here in Europe they whack on 12% "service" charge on the bill and are rude and hurried and half the time pull your plate away while you still have a fork full of food in your hand, then charge you £50 for the privilege. In NY, it's customary, but not mandatory, to tip and you really feel that it's justified. Even the shop assistants are lovely and they don't work on tip. They actually go out of their way to help you - one even walked us down 2 floors to help
Ellis Island
Where all the imigrants were processed us get an out of towner's discount card! Then, he did a refund and resale of the items I'd bought the day before so that I could get the discount on those too. And I didn't have to ask him to do it, he offered! That was at Macy's, which is the most heavenly department store I have ever been to. It's also the largest department store in the world. Where every single shop assistant was only too happy to help you with anything. The store layout, cleanliness everything was just how you'd want it to be.
That ended our day's adventures as it was time to drop shopping off at the hotel and head over to Madison Square Gardens to watch the New York Knicks play the New Orleans Hornets (basketball). All the sound effects that you hear in movies, they play - no, really and all the songs! The crowd sings! So a foot-long hot dog & Budweiser in hand, we headed into the arena - like everything in NY, it's Massive! Even this experience was like being in a movie...so the Knicks were thrashing the Hornets through 3 periods of play. The whole stadium was cheering
for the Knicks, when Hornets had the ball the crowd booed, when they took a penalty shot, the crowd behind the basket made such a racket to distract them, when Hornets made a basket the crowd was silent - you could hear crickets. But when the Knicks had the ball the crowd cheered, when they made a basket they went bananas! Then, in the 4th period, the Hornets caught up, it was even steven. Then in the last 20 seconds Hornets made a basket, they were 2 points in front - the whole stadium gasped! (Even us!) Knicks called a time out with 14 seconds to go. When play resumed the ENTIRE stadium - I'm not exaggerating - stood up and cheered louder than I've ever heard cheers at a sporting event (and this wasn't even a final, this was an early game in the season!). Knicks shot once, twice, third times a chaaaaarm???? NO BASKET! You could feel the building deflate, every single person sighed in shock horror. Quite funny when you're not a New Yorker, although we kept our heads down and faces straight and sombre just like everyone else as we exited the stadium - before erupting
World Trade Centre Memorial
This sculpture was in the lobby of one of the towers, it's well beat up. into uncontrollable laughter when we were out of earshot :P
The streets were covered in at least 10cm of soft snow, so we wandered up to the bottom of Central Park to a little place you may have heard of...Hooters. Pretty much just a restaurant where the girls wear tight, low cut tops and bum bearing, lycra undies. Lots of pics on the walls of what it was like in earlier days, I think it was a lot more controversial then - the girls also looked a lot hotter than the waitress we had, but B still got a photo with her boobies ;D
So endeth the 2nd day, thankfully yellow cabs are dirt cheap so we didn't have to trudge home in the snow. The subway also runs 24hrs but reduced service after 11pm, although during the day it's wonderfully frequent and not nearly as crowded as the tube (we couldn't help but wonder how they did that).
We woke up on the third day to even more snow! Although it had stopped actually snowing, but there was a good 30cm cover on the ground. Now, the streets of NY are heated, that's why you often
see steam coming out of manholes and drains in movies. So the snow doesn't stay there for long, it melts. Unfortunately, what they failed to do was provide adequate drainage, so at every single intersection a lake resembling the Arctic Ocean laps at the curb, complete with ice bergs. Splashing in puddles was never this much fun! Stupidly I hadn't waterproofed my shoes and I knew this because I was already suffering foot rot from walking around in the snow the day before. But did I learn? Of course not. The first day I arrived in NY I laughed out loud at all the girls wearing designer, yes with designer labels & logos on them, gum boots. Complete with ribbons, bows, sparkles and heels!!! "I'm so glad I'm not a slave to fashion" I chortled....2 days later and I really, really NEEDED a pair of designer gum boots RIGHT NOW. But of course, old Murphy had decided to visit NY the same weekend as us and not one shoe store that we passed sold designer gum boots, not even the designer stores.
Never mind, our trip happily co-incided with St Patrick's Day. And you may or may not know,
but NY hosts the biggest St Paddy's Day parade outside Ireland - how unusual for NY to have the biggest eh? Actually NY has a massive Irish heritage and they love it. So we started the day with breakfast in a diner (pancakes with bacon, whipped butter & a jug of maple syrup!) sitting in a booth next to 6 black ladies who talked like they were on Ricky Lake (insert accent here): "You know, he 'ain't all that!" "I told him, You don't Own me!" And when I heard one of them say "OH, Heeelll NO" my pancakes came out my nose as I stifled my outburst of laughter - this whole place was a tv show. So much fun and entertainment.
A little wander through the ice stream that ran next to the Paddy's Pde, a perve at some boys in kilts and some very, very fit looking firemen & NYPD officers, we decided that Central Park in the snow would be quite magical. And it was. Oddly enough Central Park is ENORMOUS, with a very hilly centre that families had crowded on to take their kids tobogganing on - it was a picturesque Simpsons' Snow Day!
Rivers & streams had frozen over and the ice rinks were in full swing. It really is a beautiful park and once in, you have no idea that you're in the middle of one of the busiest cities in the world. We spent a good 3 or 4 hours wandering through, checking out all the little spots: boathouses, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Guggenheim, Natural History Museum (we didn't go in, but they all have entrances off the park), Strawberry Fields (tribute to John Lennon). Actually there are tributes to many poets, writers & musicians. Central Park spans from Middletown Manhattan all the way up to Harlem. We didn't get that far up as after walking around the Jacki O reservoir (which actually feeds NY) it became very clear that the strange sensation in my right shoe (my feet were numb from cold) was actually the water moving from under my heel and collecting under my toes - eee. What do you do in NY when it's cold outside and more than 1 million people have lined 5th Avenue for the St Paddy's day parade? Well, seek warmth & solace in Macy's of course :D We did discover the 3 level
Hershey's and M&M's stores just off 42nd street as well. The whole of 7th Avenue is called the Fashion District and you can and will find anything and everything in fashion that you could ever want there. However, due to my desire to defrost and dry my feet, street shopping wasn't as appealing as it may have been on a sunny day. But you can find everything in Macy's too.
That night we had intended to go out in the Meatpacking district, which demands fashion & beauty at the door. But my vanity doesn't extend to wearing heels in the snow only to be ruined by the lakes & rivers I'd need to wade through to get to the door of each club. So we had a late dinner at our local sushi restaurant and decided to fuel our internal radiators with sake in the hope that we'd dry from the inside out.
Sunday, our last day...snow still covered the streets but it was mostly compacted ice and most of the lakes had found a drain to trickle through...Brooklyn Bridge...the bridge that unsuspectingly connects Manhattan & Brooklyn was the largest suspension bridge to be built at the time.
There's now another suspension bridge that you can see from Manhattan that connects Brooklyn & New Jersey that's the largest in the US. But Brooklyn Bridge is still very cool. The pedestrian walkway is a wooden slat walkway that's built above the cars so you really fell like you're walking inside the bridge and when you look down you can see the water :D
So after reaching Brooklyn we met some very friendly locals on their way to mass who were more than happy to direct us to several diners that they recommended for breakfast. The one we went to was even better than the other 2 we'd been to. The thickest French toast I've ever seen, no joke about 4cm thick!
A wander around Brooklyn, along the promenade with great views back over Manhattan and it was time to stroll back over the bridge. We spent the rest of the day wandering around and soaking in our surroundings a little more and finished up at our local diner for some Boston cream pie and unlimited coffee before our taxi picked us up and took us back to Newark airport. We of course stopped along the way so
I could pick up the famous NY overstuffed pastrami sandwich for the airport wait...we measured it at 6cm thick of pastrami ;D (We saw a programme at the gym last night about a guy who was 500Kg who had been hospitalised, guess where he was from....)
We didn't get a chance to check out a jazz club or a jazz cafe in Harlem, although the buskers that play in the subway have more talent than 90% of the musicians who are being played on the radio. We really wanted to walk through the Bronx and watch some street basketball, but we figure the snow may have reduced play somewhat. We didn't get anywhere near Queens and we barely touched Brooklyn. There is so much to do and see there and all of it is so much fun.
Definitely a recommended place to visit.
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