So off to New York....................

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The end of the Summer holidays is nigh (though Ivor has already been back for a week of training days!!) and I went off to New York to meet my mum.............yes it is 10,329 miles (16,623 kilometres ) from Hobart (.........and why not meet somewhere mid-way??, I hear you cry) but for a variety of reasons, our last trip was aborted -and we thought that if we didn't go back now, we never would. Needless to say, after 8 plane journeys and over 44 hours of flight time/ more than 60 hours travelling (return) - it was a bloody long way to go from here!!! I think my Aussie friends/collegues thought I was cracking up "You're from the UK.........living in Aus........and you want to go to New York from here?? In the space of 48 hours I had been to New York, Los Angeles, Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart!!!!-on two occasions!! I had to force myself not to worry my head off about connections and being stranded in Los Angeles or somewhere. The whole journey - because of the latest terrorist threats- was also subject to loads more checks, searches and body-checks. I was singled out to have all the extra tests - both going and on my way back - must have that kind of face!!!! In both Melbourne and Sydney - the gates were cornered off and everybody underwent both a body search and a hand luggage search. No liquid of any form was allowed, and we all had to get rid of any drinking water.

Nevertheless, we had a great time. We had been to the hotel before, and unbelieveably, the staff could remember us - particularly in the bar for some reason (!!!?)
The weather was -10 degrees on a daily basis, with a biting wind- making it seem ten times worse. We went to visit Central Park one day -and soon gave up with the realisation that we needed more and much warmer layers - it was even colder than some of the Winter Scottish mountain walks I have done in the past. It was also a shock to my system - having come from an Aussie Summer !!

Macys and Bloomingdales were two of our main destinations - I don't usually enjoy shopping-but over in New York, there was something quite enjoyable about it!!!
We walked everywhere in an effort to combat our holiday food and drinks - but it was also quite interesting to people watch and take in the atmosphere - I couldn't help but think what a mammoth contrast to my previous trip to The South Coast Track with Ivor!!!!

The people generally are actually quite friendly- though very different to either Aussies or the Brits. The tradition of tipping is one to get used to - and we had to make sure we always had pockets full of $1s or $5s.

Having not seen my mum for over 10 months, it was also really good to catch-up with her. We put the world to rights over a seven night stay.
Jet-lag was a bit of a problem - NYC is 16 hours behind Hobart - and on more than one night, I found myself wide awake for several hours ,however, I was determined that I wouldn't let it spoil things, and every morning we were up and about for 9am.

Before very long - it was time to make the mammoth journey home - we were lucky in that both our airlines had check-in and departure gates adjacent to each other. Our departure times were also only 10 minutes different from each other.
We were not too sad to say goodbye - mum, my Aunt and Uncle are coming over to stay with us in two weeks - for two weeks. Looking forward to that!!! - and finally, back to school- 8 deaf children (rather than 5!!) -and a very busy new school year on Tuesday.

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