New York New York
The arrival into JFk airport was a little delayed and its not till just before midnight that we arrive at the taxi line, there are various people hustling to take you into town but we stay with the longer line of the taxi booth. Its not long before we are shown to our cab and for a fixed price we are ushered into town. The taxi driver is very quiet and not what I expected from a New York driver, I try to make a couple of conversation starters but to no avail as the rear seat passengers get to watch mobile TV and can track out progress on Sat Nav. We enter Manhattan from a bridge and are soon in the streets towered over by skyscrapers. We are in the direction of our location when our driver asks again our destination and as I reply he looks up and we are there, more luck than judgement I guess.
The hotel is the most expensive accommodation we have stayed in for the whole trip and as we enter the room we are not disappointed, its just not what we have gotten used to, its very late be now and we have not really eaten anything but we cant face the thought of dashing out to eat so we are rescued by the large supermarket that is open until 1am across the road from the hotel. Its true this city does not appear to sleep.
So with a very basic map we set of to explore this amazing city. The hotel is not far from central park so we head in that direction to cross it then head over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The heat is already starting to tire us and it is still early. The park is everything that I imagined and yet was not what I thought. It is big and covers a huge area and appears well kept and well used. We wander with only a little knowledge where we are going dodging the cyclists, skaters and of course the joggers. When we head out the other side onto 5th Avenue we walk up towards the art gallery with a slight smug feeling having navigated one area of the city. We walk up to the main entrance to find it covered in scaffolding then find the temporary entrance at the side only to note that it is not open on a Monday! SO much for feeling smug and in tune with the city.
So we head off down the east side and head to the next item on our list, the Empire State Building which first involves a ride on the infamous subway. We alight somewhere near Grand Central (I said the map was only basic) and wander with heads looking up looking for the iconic building above the skyline. When at last it comes into view we are excited about the thought of taking a look inside and of course admiring the view. As we draw near we can already see the queues stretching around the corner, so two of us join it then the other two set off to find what it is everyone or at least half of New York is waiting for. As it turns out it is indeed the line for the observation deck and it turns out to be a marathon wait of nearly two hours to et inside the lift and take a ride upwards. We even choose the stair option for the last six floors to avoid waiting for the next lift. The observation deck is crowded but with some useful elbow digging tips I picked up from AL we get some places right up at the railings. The 360 degree views are wonderful and we stay for some time wandering around trying to locate other landmarks and soaking in what is Manhattan and the wider area of New York, it turns out to be a good thing to do early on as we easily get our bearings and can now understand the map far easier. So we head off back down and into the throng that is everywhere and catch up with various sights even buying some tourist items that anywhere else would be just tat but foam models of the Empire State seem rather impressive works of art, oh and of course the fridge magnets were too tempting.
More to follow
Please visit back soon
Thanks
