Advertisement
Wednesday 17th September (Day 23)
It was our last morning in Europe and we managed to make it to the train station on time and without any dramas once again. I bought some breakfast items from a small supermarket there, and we had a munch on that while waiting for our train to the airport. We got to the airport quite early and had to wait for ages in a giant check in queue, because flights going to the USA now have even more check-in procedures than before. This is supposed to be for risk-profiling purposes, but in all honesty (and considering where I work), I really saw no advantage to this, because the information being gathered would not actually allow authorities any further insight of high risk passengers before they arrived, compared to methods already undertaken.
We made it on to the plan fine, but it was a budget airline, without any food or drinks, as well as smaller seating space, so Vaughan was ready to get the hell out of there by the time we arrived at JFK airport in New York. Luckily we had been here before and so we knew how to get to our
destination, as we were also staying in the same place. Despite our baggage, we didn’t look like lost tourists in the slightest, and we made it to the hostel easily. After checking and unpacking a few things, we went out for a short walk to see what was going on, and ended up having Subway for dinner, sitting by the fountain in the middle of Columbus Circle (a big round-about, near the bottom of Central Park). Some teenagers were playing tag in the fountain, as well as out in the traffic, which was amusing (although dangerous of course), so we watched their hijinks for a while before strolling back up to the hostel for a catch up on some emails and washing.
Thursday 18th September (Day 24)
We started the morning by getting up late and taking a walk down to the supermarket that we remembered from last time, and bought a yummy fresh breakfast which we then took to Central Park so we could sit on the grass to eat it. It was sunny, but not humid or half as warm as the last time we had visited New York. Because of our previous visit (which
you can see
here), we had also seen many of the tourist attractions before, so we weren’t necessarily in a big rush to get out there and see them again. We walked down to Times Square at dawdling pace, and just kind of milled around for a while before heading over towards the Flatiron Building, which we had missed last time. I wanted to visit Chinatown again so we wandered down there and had a quick look at the shops. Vaughan went to get some money out but had huge hassles at the ATM, so we weren’t quite sure what to do (apparently the card company had flagged the card as being used unlawfully, despite the fact we had just used it all around Europe), but hadn’t bothered to actually contact Vaughan and find out what was going on. Luckily I also had a card so we managed to get sorted and we were off again, heading over the rise, away from Chinatown and towards Little Italy. Suddenly we found ourselves in the middle of a street festival. I don’t know how we always manage to find random free festivals, but we weren’t complaining. The Festival appeared to be called
the Feast of San Gennaro (2008). There was heaps of Italian music blaring down the street, as well as (mostly) drink and food stalls, and also heaps of decorations everywhere - people were in high spirits. There were loads of police around too, but mostly they were just standing in groups as there didn’t appear to be much trouble going on. The roads were all closed for about 4 blocks, and there were people everywhere - the smell of all the Italian foods cooking was amazing. We walked up and down several streets, and also stopped off in this random gun shop, to look at all the merchandise, as of course, we don’t really have stores like that in New Zealand. It was pretty odd for us.
After spending a few hours at the festival and sampling the local food, we headed for the Brooklyn Bridge, via Columbus Park (an Asian Park), where we stopped to watch some older men play Mah Jong. Last time we were here I had had really bad blisters and could hardly walk - although I had gone to the same park and then over the Brooklyn Bridge, I had not enjoyed it as
much as I could have, so we decided to do it again. We had also wanted to stay in Brooklyn this time, but had difficulty finding somewhere to stay that we knew to be reliable and safe. We have heard that many parts of Brooklyn are really nice, despite its reputation. It was starting to cool off and the sun was heading for the horizon, so we had a really nice walk along the bridge as the day came to a close. After we reached the other side we made it down to the waterfront area and took some photos back across to the buildings on Manhattan Island. From there we wanted to walk along the boardwalk but couldn’t find it - we found a local jogger who sent us in the right direction, and we helped out some fellow tourists who were also looking for the boardwalk.
The boardwalk was pretty nice, and we managed to make it there just as the sun was setting. We sat on a bench for a while and just watched the colours in the sky change from blue to yellow to orange. We could see as far as the Statue of Liberty
(although it was pretty far away), and it was interesting to watch the local joggers and walkers, as well as a few homeless people all out on the boardwalk, enjoying the same sights. Once it was dark we headed away from the boardwalk and had no idea where we were, but found ourselves in an area with beautiful brownstone homes that seemed to house a lot of students. We found a supermarket and bought a drink and something quick to munch on, before having a further wander of the neighbourhood and eventually making it back to the Underground, bound for Times Square. We had another look around the square at night, and found a little Italian restaurant that seemed to do a cheap dinner, not far away. It was pretty quiet so we just chilled out there for a while, and relaxed after another day of walking. We could see people bustling by outside, coming and going from the square, and we just enjoyed being in New York again. Such a short visit this time, but we certainly hope to be back in the future - we love NYC!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.231s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 12; qc: 28; dbt: 0.1444s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb