New York, New York
I woke up at 5:40am and we'd booked the Fung Wah bus for 7am so the timing was perfect no alarms were required! Melissa and I got up, dressed, cleaned in record timing however we still managed to get there 10 minutes late. Although we did purchase breakfast on the way and caught the 7:30am bus instead.
Matt had kindly given us a map and guide book of New York the day before and it was very useful and almost a fashion accessory as you'll see from the pictures. Matt also told me 'You could spend all day just in Central park', with that in mind Melissa and I were focused on seeing as much as possible. Even if it did mean rushing, leaving things behind, going hungry and getting sore feet. That's right we had embarked on a Urban Hike the mightiest of em all!
The trip on the bus down was pretty cool, Melissa and I were both excited, neither of us actually had talked about going to New York before our trip to Boston so it was a ad lib adventure. The Fung Wah is $15 USD each way and it's non-stop from Boston to New York China Town. On the way down it was four hours and on the way back about five because we stopped to fill up.
The country side was beautiful, it's just turned winter but the leaves are still really pretty, they were red and orange and leaves were scattered all over the show. There were a few towns on the way down Frankfort, Providence and a couple of others. We travelled from Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York that's 3 states in 4 hours pretty cool huh.
Melissa choose the right side of the bus to sit on and we swapped seats about halfway through the journey so I could bring yah all some nice photo's of Manhattan. It looked very grey, but the city is massive, how we would navigate around this city. Our skills, patience, intelligence, charisma and speaking abilities would be put to the test in the big apple. One day of sight seeing, surely we could tick a couple of boxes without too much trouble.
The bus dropped us off in China town which was about 8 blocks away from the ground zero depending on how you count :) Melissa found her feet and started navagiating and shortly I found myself in a little coffee house commonly known as star bucks, incidentally it's also known for its great clean toilets. So we examined our notes and recounted what we wanted to cover
- Ground Zero
- Battery Park – Statue of Liberty
- Rockefeller – Second largest building
- Central Park
- Times Square
- Macy's
Such a small list, but our bus was going to pick up at 8pm and the time was already close to midday, we only had 8 hours left. We both knew that we'd be adding the subway to that list as there was about 15 miles in between everything. Walking wasn't going to be the greatest option and Missy had worn her boots in true New York fashion, things were tricky!
Ground Zero was a tourist hot spot, but to be honest it wasn't all that interesting, people tried to sell pictures and pawn things off to you. There was a public viewing platform where you can see the whole area, it's actually really huge and you can understand how it made such a big impact on the people in America. Somehow after we look briefly at this spot Melissa found New York's best kept secret 21st Century.
The previous day was black Friday when all the USA shops went into the black and made money, so here we were the following day in a clothing store. My mind swilled with all the people. Melissa was very happy and snagged up a black top hat and gloves which you can see in the photo's a great buy. After getting the tags cut off we headed off to battery park.
Battery park is similar to walking along Darling harbour(AU) or perhaps Mission bay(NZ), one striking difference is that you can see the statue of Liberty, it's really small from there though and the sun was in a horrible position for photos. We toyed with the idea of ferrying across to the Island and seeing it up close but we hadn't covered much off our list yet. Both our tummies were grumbling and we sampled some of the local food pizza.
The food was ok and we had a little rest and agreed we'd catch the subway to Central park 96th St. London has the Underground which was really confusing at first, though New York is a complete doddle. Everything is plainly explained and Matt's book had all the maps we needed in it. We purchased a metro card $10 USD which we both used to get to Central park, two dollars a pop. There were no drama's and no navigation issues, Melissa is a legend.
We ended up in Central park at around 3:30pm and it was very pretty again the tree's looked really cool and I just started snapping up pictures. Unfortunately I lost my camera cover and will need to buy another, we spent abit of time looking for it but alas we couldn't find it. Central Park was huge and we only covered a small distance though it was really nice and I'd love to go jogging through it sometime.
The Rockefeller was next on the agenda and by 5pm it was dark, the city lights looked really cool and we couldn't wait to get to the 57th floor and check out the view from the 'top of the rock' as the staff termed it. The day was perfect and so was the night we were both in for a real treat. The tickets cost about $27 each and well worth the cost. The advertising at the start wasn't, it really annoyed me actually I'd just paid a whole heap of money to wait, for a moment there I thought I was back in the London Dungeon.
Although the wait wasn't really that bad and we were soon on this lift that made funny sounds and had holographic pictures on the top of it. People remarked how cool it was, but it did lead to a sore neck, I would recommend ignoring it. Once we reached the top of the lift we went outside to the view, it was remarkable. New York is massive and with all the lights on the town was lit up, I'm sure everyone has a different idea what it looks like, my impression was the death star!
You could just stand and stare for ages on end at those lights, the temperature though was about negative 2 degrees. There were two floors that you could go up and once you hit the top you could just see straight out. On the lower levels you were protected by massive plastic fences, that was nice but not so good for photos. Somehow on the top floor I managed to take a few of Melissa with the right settings on my SLR. I'm sure they could have been better but I was well pleased with them.
We descended to the bottom and realised the time was around 7pm, there was little time left in our day and we decided we'd miss the 8pm bus and go for the 9pm instead. So off we went to Times Square in search of food, there were plenty of MacDonald's along the way but I wanted something better. In the end we settled for a pasta bar where they cooked up what you wanted. Melissa and I both paid for the pasta twice and had a little mix-up with the staff there though everything was eventually sorted out.
Times Square was a busy place and there was a definite hussle and bustle going on. It was cool to be there but I was glad to move along as I'm sure it was a haven for pick pockets and a few undesirables that could hide in the crowds of people. Then we arrived at could only be described as a girls heaven and a boys torture chamber Macy's. Luckily I wasn't tortured to much most guys looked very solemn as we wandered through the many levels that Macy's offered. Melissa walked in and her face just glazed over and she mummed 'I could spend all day here'. Although she wanted a coat and I had no idea where they were, knowing that the place was designed to trick and hoodwink it's captives we asked for directions twice and got two different answers, eventually we ended up in the coat section.
Melissa found a great looking coat and boy was she pleased, I'm sure she was dancing on the inside, she'd come to New York and been shopping not once but twice. Unfortunately it was 8:30 and we hit the subway to get the 9pm bus to Boston. We missed that bus and had to get the 10pm one.
All and all we achieved what we wanted to do, but I was exhausted and slept soundly on that bus, Melissa was tired as well. We arrived at Mel and Matt's at 3am getting a Taxi home from the bus stop, the Taxi was only $10. So all in all we were out of the house for 22hours to do a day trip to New York from Boston. I would do it again if I have the chance but next time book a hotel for a night and turn it into a weekend trip. The trip was not for the feint of heart but me and Melissa managed to finish up happy and tired a good result.
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| USA - New York |
