New York

New York NY

Our USA experience began, as it does with all “visitors”, with a long wait in a super-sized queue through Immigration at JFK, the world’s largest airport.  After being finger-printed and photographed we were in!  New York here we come.

Our first meal, in a burger joint around the corner from our hotel, was again super-sized.   It was obvious some sort of discipline was going to be needed to get us through 2 months of gastro-augmentation.

So Central Park, close to our accommodation, was first destination of choice of next morning.   It was a Sunday and thousands of NY fitness fanatics were running power-walking, roller-blading, cycling and jogging round the park, which is really quite huge, being about 4km long and 1 km wide.  There are numerous ponds and paths, and a large central reservoir with great views across to the city.  We walked a shortened circuit, through some of the great gardened areas, with squirrels everywhere gathering their nuts for winter.  Before heading back to the mayhem of the city, we paid homage to John Lennon’s memorial in the Strawberry Fields, and then walked past the apartment where he was shot.  Yoko still lives there.

To get an idea of actually how big NY is you have to go up to the top of the Rockefeller Building.  All 70 floors of it.   After Immigration, being herded like sheep was like second nature to us.  Naturally, we were fleeced as well.  But the queue and $21 each was worth it as the view is really something.  With man-made buildings as far as the eye can see this is about as far from nature as you can get.

We continued our walk down Broadway to Times Square just in time for one of NY’s famous down-pours.  Despite this, the place was crawling with people, umbrellas poking eyes out, and massive electronic bill-boards lighting the way.  You can’t say you’ve been to NY unless you see a show, so we reserved tickets for “The Jersey Boys”, and went to a diner on the corner not far from the theatre for lunch.  The lunch “special” included a cocktail, and as they say “when in Rome...” 

The show was fantastic, not in any way enhanced by the lunchtime Bloody Mary, just the slick professional act we’d hoped for.  Our first day in NY ended with beer and pizza and a long walk soaking up the city sights at night. 

The crime-rate in NY was “fixed” a few years ago by the then mayor Rudi Giuliani. We always felt safe walking round the city to and from our hotel.

Second day, following a ride on the subway, we took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty and then Ellis Island.  This involved almost as much queuing as Immigration, and to reinforce the feeling of being herded, the crowd control fences look just like sheep yards.

Ellis Island was used to process immigrants from about 1890 till 1926. For millions of people this was their first experience of the USA and 1/3 of US citizens today can trace an ancestor who was processed at Ellis Island.

Following this tour we landed back in Manhattan and walked past Wall Street to the World Trade Centre Memorial site. A new single 100 story tower is being constructed on the site, and the rest is partly garden and partly site preparation for something else.  It was an eerie feeling being there and trying to imagine the scene of 9/11.

A long walk back to our hotel followed, through China Town, Little Italy (yummy coffee and cake), Soho,  & Times Square (again). After 2 days in such a busy and artificial environment, we were looking forward to heading North to the wilderness of the Adirondack Mountains.

Click here to see photos of New York