Walking New York

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OK the theme seems to be …sorry this is a long one…so sorry this is a long one.



We left Vancouver last Thursday morning and managed to negotiate the local taxi (driven by a Fijian) to the seabus and the skytrain and arrived at the airport without incident then flew to New York City. The flight itself was uneventful until about one hour out of Newark airport and the plane hit some “dead air” and dropped a bit causing the usual “please return to your seats and put on your seat belts” message but for some reason the plane seemed to be struggling along in the dead air when the next announcement came over “federal law states that you must be aware of the location of the emergency exits on this aircraft” Hey way to go Air Canada…this really makes you feel good!!!

Landed AOK in Newark and got to our accomodation which is the 23rd floor apartment of a building in Jersey city which is across the Hudson River opposite downtown Manhattan so a really good view of the high rise area of The big Apple. This is a fully self contained apartment with full facilities so a bit better that a hotel room and we managed to catch up on our washing etc…ah it's blimmin hard being on holiday and having to do all the chores!! NOT!



The last time Steph was in NY was 1984 and me it was 1987 so we may notice a few changes.



First day up we had booked on to a cruise to se the Statue of Liberty and a place called Ellis island, which is where all the immigrants into USA would have come between 1892 and 1954. Ellis island was really interesting and certainly gave us a spin on the haves and the have nots when it came to immigration matters. The Statue of Liberty was great and we had pre purchased tickets to get right up on the pedestal which is where the statues feet are so got quite a cool angle looking right up her dress!! Kinda weird really but Hey this is America!!

Headed into Wall Street area and went to find the big brass bull but after we discovered that just us and 20,000 others had the same idea we moved on and headed down to the 9-11 memorial site. So far we have noticed a really strong Police presence everywhere in the city which seems to be normal but around the 9-11 memorial area there was an extra strong presence with SWAT cops walking around openly displaying semi auto weapons etc and cops everywhere. It does make you feel a bit more safe that's for sure. Also there area has permanent road bollards which block any entry at all to the area.

Where the twin towers once stood there are two square holes which are waterfalls all cascading into the middle of the hole and disappearing. All around the side of these water falls are the names of all those who lost their lives on September 11th carved into metal handrails. This place is quite sobering and walking around and seeing all the names, some which have flowers poked into…. fresh from earlier in the week…..it really …..well you can imagine. We had thought we would go to the 9-11 museum but the emotion from just walking around was enough that neither of us thought we could manage it.



Anyway to brighter things!! Our first day started what I like to refer to as the “ let's walk New York” phase of our trip. We then walked all over the place looking at different sights before making our way to the Yankee stadium to watch the Yankees take on the Baltimore Orioles in baseball. So armed with just the bare essentials i.e. game tickets, new baseball cap, large 12 inch hotdog, large fries and super large Diet Coke (gotta draw the line somewhere) we sat down and watched the Yankees smash the Orioles 8-2 in a great game. The atmosphere was pretty amazing with fans screaming and chanting and spitting hotdog and beer everywhere in the process…ah America you gotta live it!!



The next day was phase two of “walk NY” so we started off and found our way to the foot of the pedestrian access to Brooklyn bridge and walked across. A fantastic way to introduce yourself to Brooklyn that's for sure. We rewarded ourselves with a coffee over in Brooklyn before setting off to find a subway back to Manhattan…hey I am human I wouldn't make Steph walk back!!!! (I had bigger plans for tomorrow) we then wandered around and found ourselves in Washington square which was an area of greenery and statues and where all the cool buskers go on a Saturday including one guy who dragged a grand piano into the park and played classical music to the crowds. We eventually wandered to the Empire State Building and Steph found out why I had paid a little bit extra for gold passes into the building as we accelerated past huge queues of people to the front of the line and onto the first elevator to the 86th floor observation deck. As you can imagine we had an amazing view from up here even though it was a little hazy it still is a classic sight to see all of New York stretching out into the distance (including Central Park…more soon). We tried to find Meg Ryan at the observatory and came to the conclusion that Sleepless in Seattle may have just been a movie… the observatory did however have something in common with most of New York so far…..heaps of people!!! But hey it's a big city and we can find somewhere a bit quieter I'm sure” eventually we made it back to our accomodation and sleep at last.



Sunday started off with a bit of a sleep in and we were up and out by 9.30… I really do spoil Steph eh?!! We got into the subway and headed to Central Park where we hired bicycles for a short ride around Central Park…..well it is a big park….we spent four and a half hours cycling all around the place looking at gardens, statues, squirrels and all manner of things until at about three o'clock we suddenly remembered that we should have some lunch so headed to a little cafe we had seen in a movie called “Serendipity” where we enjoyed a leisurely lunch break before setting off for yet another page of “walk NY”. We arrived into an area called The Hudson railway yards” on the banks of the Hudson River which used to be a high line train track but was decommissioned in the late 80s and was due for distruction until two residents said…”hey we could turn this into an elevated garden and sculpture park which winds its at over the city” this is a cool place and we started walking at the beginning of the rail yards and…..yes you guessed it walked to the end. What an amazing place and at 6pm most of the people had gone so it was not crowded at all. The old tracks have been left in some places and in others there are amazing gardens and wild flowers etc interspersed with sculptures. The old tracks run though what used to be a rough part of NY but is now very up and coming. We finally made it home and hit the sack pretty tired and promising to sleep in the following day!

On our next day in NY we went uptown to the Metropolitan museum of art…. or as us locals call it “the MET” We spent about four hours wandering around looking at the exhibits which ranged from art collections to just old every day garden variety museum pieces. The collections here were great with a special showing of Rodin’s work (famous for The thinker) and also some other not too shabby artists like Monet, Constable, Degas and a few others. It was an amazing to wander and just soak up the ambience of the art work and really get a feeling for the meaning behind the pieces and get in touch with the artists impression…….what a load of……. It was good!!

After the MET we headed on down towards the UN building but were unable to get anywhere near the place due to the general assembly meeting at the moment and all the roads were blocked so we walked to the Chrysler building with a short stop at Grand central station. Woah!!! What an amazing building which still functions as the hub of commuter transport. There is a walkway underneath the station which has a large set of arches which if you stand against one and talk very quietly the person on the other side of the arch (which is about 20 metres away) can hear you perfectly. We may have looked like loonies talking to a brick wall but we weren't the only ones trying it out…and it worked!

We headed up to time square just as dusk rolled in and were treated to a spectacular display of neon lights of all varieties and people galore…the place was packed and for every person was a police officer or two to match. We returned to our apartment rather tired after four full days walking NY and have one more day to go.

Last day in NY we decided to just wander and finish off any sight seeing which we hadn't managed yet so we started off by taking a walk over the Brooklyn bridge to a coffee shop which we tried on Saturday and had a leisurely coffee followed by a walk around the Brooklyn waterfront before jumping on a ferry up the East river to 34th street. We thought that if we can't approach the UN on foot then we will do it by boat instead. As you can see from the photo of the coast guard the security is a bit tight on the East river near the UN. I guess they just want to make sure their president is safe from baddies?

We walked around the shops in 5th avenue for a while and had a bite to eat in a local park before continuing and wouldn't you know it…Rain!! How inconsiderate!! So I popped into a souvenir shop to buy a cheap umbrella just in time to see the shop owner marking up all the prices on umbrellas…I don't think so!! So walked outside and a street vendor did me a good deal so all good.

Eventually we headed back to our apartment and crossed the Hudson to Jersey saying goodbye to New York City for the last time this trip.

Impressions of New York….a lot of green areas which are well maintained, the city is definitely dog friendly and a huge Police/military presence. All in all a great stay but looking forward now to getting a bit of space around us instead of crowds…roll on Washington??



We will try to get another blog out once we have been in Washington a few days so until then….

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Comments

[Bruce and Joy]

New York, New York.
Hi guys, enjoying the blogs. This one certainly brought back memories for us having visited NYC in 2011 and again in 2014. Didn't get into the Yankee Stadium in 2014 but had lunch at the Hard Rock underneath it while a game was being played in the park and watched it on the 55 super large TVs in the Café...well it seemed like that many. You missed a great experience by not going down into the 9/11 museum. We went in 2014 just a couple months after it had been opened and it was simply fantastic....something that the Americans really did well. Sounds like you walked about as far in NYC as we did on the two trips...however didn't cycle around Central Park...paid a guy on a pedicab to take us around some of it and walked the rest. Sounds like you are having fun!!!! Make sure you go to the many/various war memorials in DC...something else that we reckoned the Americans did realty well. Try to get to Arlington Cemetery as well...impressive place to walk around. I really enjoyed the 'Changing of the Guard' at the tomb of the unknown soldier. Take care over there. Love from us