I've now arrived at the New York hostel, after an epic 17 hour journey, to find my road trip compadres are all missing presumed lost! Unless they turn up soon I'm going to have to brave the dodgy looking pizza restaurant over the road alone. New York is exactly how you'd expect. Yellow cabs, apartment buildings with fire escapes bolted on the side, fat people... I expected this but I am still surprised at just how familiar it all feels - as if I've lived here half my life. Tomorrow the sight-seeing begins in earnest. [View Full Entry]

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I love New York. Each day I wake up with a long list of things to do but each day, despite my best efforts to stay focused, I keep on getting distracted and wander down side streets. I end up seeing eveything and nothing.... Friday I tried to get tickets to see Shakespeare in the Park, after waiting for 2 hours in the heat of the day they gave the last ticket to the person standing 3 people ahead of me in the queue. Shrugging it off, went to meet up with Rob at the Grand Central Station. For those of [View Full Entry]

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so on my second day in the USA after spending the night in the marriott hotel i took an early morning train right into New York city's grand central station, a truly awesome place... i had no idea of where anything was so the first thing i did was buy a map...i had my breakfast in one of the thousand starbucks and set off on a day of snapshots and being a tourist... i visited the empire state building, ground zero (twin towers), central park, times square and some other famous places. highlight of the day was getting a photo of [View Full Entry]

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The Cloisters, situated in beautiful Fort Tyrone Park in Upper Manhattan. The Cloisters is an extension of the Metropolitan Museum of Art devoted to the art of medieval Europe. The Cloisters, opened in 1938, incorporates architectural monuments carefully transported from Europe and reconstructed in a building specifically designed to evoke rather than imitate the monasteries, churches and halls of medieval times. Two hours is just enough time to engage your creative and imaginative faculties, and not enough time to soak in all the history. This is one of those places you find yourself r [View Full Entry]

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In March I entered a contest sponsored by American Airlines entitled “Why You Fly” in which entrants were required to create videos, photos, or writing telling a story as to why they fly. My entry won the grand prize in the video category. The prize consisted of twelve flights for two people from any American to city to any worldwide destination that American Airlines services. The flight vouchers would have to be used within one year or forfeited. Upon my notification of the prize, I was very excited, as my wife and I love to travel, and have done so frequently [View Full Entry]

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Got up tired again!! Only 2hrs sleep, it doesn’t seem to stop or get any better!! Going to Annapolis, the Capital of Maryland and home to the US Naval Academy, we were all fairly quiet and not particularly energetic. The town was preparing for the Memorial Day Parade. We went for a quick walk then back on the bus, crossed the Potomac and stopped in to see the ‘Rocky’ Statue in Philadelphia. Richard Gere is from Phili. We made our way through Philadelphia where we went and saw the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall, (although it was a little disappointing that [View Full Entry]

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Washington finale -- When in DC you must do the MONUMENTS - the imposing Lincoln; the classically beautiful Jefferson; the understated Vietnem etc are all unforgetable. So on our last full day we went to Arlington, walked over the Potomac to two of our favourites. The Korean War memorial with its 19 larger then life foot soldiers slogging through paddy fields ( 19 cos when reflected you see 38 ='s the 38th parallel). We've been there in the snow, in autumn and now in spring and the impact is always the same and as you walk alongside the struggling determined men, [View Full Entry]

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May 15th 2005 - I land in JFK Airport slightly wiery after a 7 hour flight, to enter a nightmare queue through customs and an even bigger nightmare taking the cab into New York. The cab driver was a rude and it was raining. Our first hostel is a dump of epic proportions, the Bowerys Whitehouse hostel in New York would have been classed as third class quarters on a sailing ship. But never mind I am in New York New York After months of hype, planning, counter-planning, checking, triple checking - my first hours in New York were always [View Full Entry]

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NY Day 2-1 A fresh new start to a whole new morning. Breakfast is served at the Manhattan Inn Hostel every morning. We have cereal, bagels, BIG muffins, fruits, orange, and coffee/tea to choose from. Yummy~ Let me tell u, toasted bagels and butter taste damn good together! Just the thought of it makes me hungry again :p So after filling our stomachs, we're out on the streets again. It feels real good to walk along the streets of New York all by ourselves. Most part of Manhattan is in grid form, so it was really easy to navigate around. It's [View Full Entry]

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NY Day 2-2 We took the subway all the way to downtown Manhattan to see the Statue of Liberty. First we got to go collect the ferry tickets in order to get near to this Wonder of the World. Tickets to go UP into the Liberty Statue were all given away by the time we reach. So no chance to get inside, doesnt really matter anyway. :p When the ferry reached Liberty island (where the Statue is), we didnt get down after looking at the crowd below queuing to board the next ferry back. It was like WOW..look at those ppl [View Full Entry]

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