When I last visited New York nearly
five years ago, we bought a
New York Pass and did our best to knock off as many tourist to-dos as possible - Times Square, Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn Bridge, Central Park, Rockefeller Centre, MoMA, The Met, Guggenheim, etc. It was exhausting, but we managed to get through most of it.
Despite this, we simply couldn't pass up the opportunity to pop down to the Big Apple the first chance we could. Why? Well, it's
New York, and it was only a 3.5 hour drive away from Boston. I mean, that's like driving from Auckland to Turangi. Don't get me wrong, Turangi has awesome pies and the best mini golf course in the country, but we don't exactly get the chance to drive to cities like NYC for the weekend back home.
So what do you do in New York if you've already seen the main sights? While I would have loved to have gone up the
Top of the Rock again, we decided to save the $27 per person and spend it on something else. Discount theatre tickets, perhaps! Unfortunately that idea went out the window as soon as we got to the
TKTS booth at Times Square and saw the length of the queue. Of course, we still climbed the famous red steps to take a few pics
Have you ever wondered what it would feel like to be Justin Bieber or One Direction? Perhaps a little bit like
this? We got a taste when we were standing on those very steps and a group of teen girls were let loose in Times Square. They spotted the top of the steps, and simultaneously decided they all had to get there as quickly as possible while screaming at the top of their lungs. It's probably always terrifying to have a horde of people run at you, but the fact that they were teenaged girls made it that much scarier.
After that, we decided to decamp to less touristy locations and visit the
High Line park, another place we missed last time. On the way, we went past Madison Square Garden. For some reason, we both had a mental image of it looking like this:
So imagine our immense disappointment when we got there and saw this instead:
Now, I'm sure you think it's absolutely ridiculous that we thought a real life building would look the same as how it's portrayed in
a cartoon set 1000 years in the future, but we seriously did look for a cube shaped building for several minutes before we realised our mistake. Oops. I just hope that in 3014, they really do have a Madison Cube Garden, because it would look a heck of a lot more impressive than the current structure!
In some ways, the High Line was also slightly less impressive than I'd imagined it, probably because it was winter and all the plants were dead. Still, it was an interesting walk above the street level, and yielded some awesome views down the various streets and avenues criss-crossing Manhattan.
With plenty of seating and things like an outdoor projector, I could also see how it would be an amazing space for the community in summer - when it wasn't covered in snow, of course.
At the southern end of the High Line stands the imposing
Standard Hotel, with floor to ceiling views of the city, and cultural events like art exhibitions featuring
abstract sausage sculptures and
talks from guests like Benedict freaking Cumberbatch. Needless to say I would've loved to have stayed here, but unfortunately it was a bit out of our budget. At least I got a photo.
There's
been talk of converting the disused Nelson Street motorway offramp in Auckland into a similar park, which would be brilliant. As long as they also include some crazy art, like this.
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| Wut. |
Later, we ventured to Central Park, where the plants were also mostly dead, but the frozen ponds gave it a winter wonderlandish air.
One thing we'd done before but certainly didn't mind doing again was walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, especially as our hotel was actually in Brooklyn anyway. It was bitterly cold, but worth it to get some amazing views of the skyline at night.
The next morning, we actually did it again to get into town for the 9/11 memorial, since we had the time to spare anyway.
One major change since our last visit was that the 9/11 Memorial was now open, so it was a definite must-visit on this trip. Unfortunately, they don't exactly make it easy for everyone. I suppose it's all for security reasons, but it all seemed a bit over the top, really. First, you have to pre-book tickets
online (or queue for hours to get one on site). Upon arrival, it takes a good five minutes to even find and get to the actual point of entry. It doesn't end there, though - everyone is corralled into a twisty maze of crowd control barriers, and eventually get to the security screening. Apart from having to remove your shoes it's pretty much the same as US airport security, all coats and bags go through an x-ray while you walk through a metal detector. After another long walk around the block, you finally get to the memorial itself.
The first thing that hits you is the sheer scale of the memorial pools - which makes sense, as each one is the actual footprint of the original World Trade Centre towers.
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| The people on the other side look tiny, which gives you a sense of scale |
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| Catching a reflection in the pool |
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| The largest man made waterfall in the US, apparently |
The names of the nearly 3,000 victims, including those on the flights and at the Pentagon, are inscribed around the pools. It's very sobering to realise that, on that fateful day, they were all just going about their daily lives. They had no clue as to what was about to unfold, and that one day their names would be carved into stone at a memorial.
It's a shame that the Freedom Tower is not yet open for visitors, as it would've given an amazing new vantage point for the city.
After the visit, we headed to Rockefeller Plaza to find some lunch and check out the famous ice skating rink.
One thing which was either a new addition to the area or merely something we overlooked last time was the Lego store. I absolutely loved this amazing recreation of the surrounding area - just look at all the detail!
By now we were winding down and preparing to head back to Boston, but not before also swinging by the extremely impressive NY Public Library (again, missed it last time).
And because I couldn't think of anywhere else to put them, here are some random pics of steam stacks creating a bit of atmosphere.
Even after this, there still plenty of new things to do in the city, so I'm sure we'll be back again in the not too distant future!
[Flickr set
here]
The food was okay but not mindblowing, however I doubt it would have mattered anyway as we were both struggling not to doze off during the entire thing. We did mention it was my birthday in the booking though so they delivered a candle with dessert, which was a nice touch.
If you've ever read photography advice articles, particularly for travel, you'll know that great shots are easiest during the 'golden hour', i.e. just before sunset, as opposed to, say, noon, when the sun casts harsh shadows and colours tend to be more washed out. Turns out it also pays to take note of what direction the thing you're trying to shoot is facing, too. Because in the morning, Notre Dame turned out to be fairly backlit by the rising sun.
By now, the queues for climbing the tower were substantially long enough to put us off, so we decided to leave that for our return trip to the famous cathedral. Next up, three other Paris must-visits - the Louvre, Arc de Triomphe and Eiffel Tower.
Given I'd already been both inside the Louvre and up the Eiffel tower on my previous visit to Paris about 14 years ago, James was happy to avoid the discouragingly long queues for entering both, opting to do more external sightseeing instead. Once at the far end of the park next to the tower, we were excited to check out UNESCO's actual global headquarters, which was only a block away. Disappointingly, they were closed and there were no UNESCO logos visible whatsoever, so we had to make do with this fairly sorry looking sign.
Soon it was time to head back to the Notre Dame for some better-lit photos of its front, and we were duly rewarded with these shots, showing the building bathed in the golden glow of sunset.
However, this turned out to be far from our last trip to the cathedral, as we ended up back here after dinner for yet more different shots, and managed to catch the awesome ending of a fire dancing busker's performance.
I love subway/metro systems for their speed, convenience and relative economy, so I always relish using them when travelling overseas, given how deprived we are of such reliable public transport back in Auckland. I understand that my hometown's relative newness and lack of density makes it a bit unfair to directly compare it to a city like Paris, but it's still annoying to think that Auckland's Western Line (my local) is still encumbered with slow, loud, diesel-powered trains, while Paris managed to get their first metro line running all the way back in 1900.
One thing the Paris metro could really do with though is a liberal application of air freshener. Almost every time we descended to or ascended from any station, we would catch the awful and unmistakable reek of urine. In fact, I don't remember being in any other city where I'd caught whiffs of horrible odours on such a regular basis - not even in Italy or Spain. It certainly detracts from the romantic image, but you could also argue that it's part of the city's more 'gritty' charm?
Then, it was off to the Sacre Coeur - when we spotted the funicular, of course we couldn't resist taking a ride!
When we got to the top, we were immediately hit with two things - the beautiful sight of the Catholic basilica in the morning light, and the most horrific odour we'd encountered so far in the French capital.
It was as if a horde of hobos had had a party there a few weeks ago, and all the decomposing remnants had slowly ripened like some sort of super-strong brie. Looking around, it soon became clear that there had been some kind of party at the site not long ago, and now rubbish trucks and cleaners were doing their best to clear the mess.
Despite the smell, the Sacre Coeur turned out to be one of our favourite sites, mainly due to the fact we hardly saw any other tourists there - a vast contrast to the day before. Plus, the hill provided a great view of the city.
After that, it was back to the Notre Dame (again) to finally make the climb up the tower, given it was too late to do so when capturing our sunset photos the previous day. On the way, we stopped off at the gothic chapel of Sainte-Chapelle to check out its impressive stained glass windows.
Despite the fact that we arrived at the entry to the Notre Dame bell tower climb about half an hour before it opened, there was already a sizeable queue and we had to wait a while to get into the tower itself. Still, a lot more appealing than waiting the two to three hours to get into the Louvre or Eiffel Tower!
After this, we couldn't resist swinging by Paris' version of the Pantheon, given the original was one of James' favourite buildings ever. Unfortunately this one required paid admittance and was also not nearly as impressive as the Roman one, but we still got some cool pics.
Nearby were the beautifully kept Luxembourg Gardens, which was full of families and tourists enjoying the outdoors. The sun was blisteringly hot though, and we soon had to seek respite under some shade ourselves.
Originally a palace created by Marie de Medici in 1612, the little sailboats floating around the pool in front of the grand building made it all very picturesque indeed.
While some may scoff at the way the French like to cling to tradition, it's been nothing but positive in terms of maintaining the historic integrity of Paris' architecture - one of the things we appreciated most about the city.
Our last dinner in the city was spent at a fairly touristy spot, Trocadero - despite the fact that 90% of the diners were other tourists, it was still an enjoyable dinner, and was a handy walk across the road to watch the Eiffel Tower at sunset and dusk. The firedancer buskers we encountered at Notre Dame the previous evening were even on hand to once again ply their (no doubt lucrative) trade, and we captured some great shots of them in front of Paris' most famous symbol.
[Flickr set here]
