General journal/diary entries
Because our tour tickets had expired we didn’t have any solid plans for our last full day. We took at walk back up to 42nd street and had an expensive but delicious lunch at Applebee’s, afterwards we just spent the afternoon walking around the Times Square are until our (my) feet were sore. Then we spend a couple of hours in the hotel before going to The Majestic Theatre to watch The Phantom of The Opera. Such a stunning show! Truly breathtaking and had me captivated from beginning to end!
We started the day a bit earlier and caught the Downtown tour to Ground Zero. We were there for much of the day and visited the 9/11 Memorial visitors centre and Gallery. I was very moved by the whole experience of just viewing the gallery, and that was before we even started the guided tour around the Ground Zero site. The centre is run by many volunteers who are one way or another connected the the WTC and 9/11 and so are the guides. There were 2 guides on our tour and it was very informative and thorough, about an hour and half. Near the end of the tour our 2 guides told us about their connections with the events of 9/11 and the first guide lost nearly all her belonging as she and her husband lived in a block of flats 2 blocks away that had caught fire, the second guide lost her cousin Joe only 40, a husband and father to a 9yr old girl. It was interesting and saddening to hear how the days progressed for family of victims in the days and months following 9/11. It was months before the medical examiners got in touch with Joe’s family when they had found a piece of his elbow, and a total of 8 pieces of him in the further months. I welled up as she was telling us about it. It’s inconceivable to imagine what the families went through.
The site itself is a construction site at the moment. We could just see the footprints of where the Twin Towers stood from where our guides took us and the trees that have been planted. The new towers being build are coming on and new Tower 1 reached the half way mark of 52 floors a few weeks ago. The progress is interesting and I would certainly love to visit in a few more years when the site is complete and the memorial museum open. The tribute centre creates a great spot to see artefacts from the tragic events and connect with people who were directly affected by that day.
We walked a bit further south with the plans of taking the Brooklyn tour but it was running that day, but we did see the damaged monument that used to sit between the feet of the 2 towers at Ground Zero. It has been left in it original tattered state as it was recovered from the site. We got back on the Downtown Town for one stop (same annoying tour guide from the day before, what are the chances!) and had dinner at Pier 17. Very disappointing food that was over priced! But interesting views anyway. We caught one of the last tour buses back up to Times Square then took a subway to Macy’s. What a store! So big and so much choice and variety! We only looked at the first 3 of the 9 floors as we were getting quiet tired. Then headed back to the hotel to relax and get an early night for our last full day.
We stayed in bed late and Pete procured nourishment from a local pizza shop. The biggest pizza I have ever seen! Had a nice afternoon relaxing in the hotel and taking a long jet bath. Finally got ready
and took a tour bus on the Downtown Route to China Town. We walked around a bit then stopped in a restaurant to eat some of the best beef and vegetable Chinese I have ever tasted. Caught a subway back to our hotel and relaxed some more. A very lazy day, but I think we needed a day off from all the walking!
Decided to activate our 3 day travel ticket and take one of the bus tours and the boat cruise. Picked up our tickets in Madame Tussauds, then went for lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe. Had possibly the best burger and chips I’ve ever had, and surrounded by guitars and equipment previously owned by world famous rock legends. Brilliant. Afterwards we made our way to catch the tour bus for the uptown tour.It didn’t come after 20 minutes though so we decided to walk to the Rockerfeller Centre and go up to the observation deck. Being scares of heights I was incredibly nervous while we waited for the elevators but I soon got over it when I saw the amazing view! Truly breathtaking. We exited Rockerfeller Centre and viewed the famous massive Christmas tree and outdoor ice-skating.
Afterwards we walked to pier 83 for our 2 hour semi-circle cruise around the south of Manhattan Island and viewed the Statue of Liberty and Went underneath Brooklyn Bridge. The views of the city from the Hudson river are quiet spectacular. We then moved our luggage to our next Hotel in Madison Square Gardens. We relaxed and drank our Buds before heading out to drink and bring in the New Year. We sat at an Irish bar just around the corner from our hotel and drank a few cocktails and mixers. We headed onto 7th avenue Madison Square Garden to bring in the new year. We hoped to see the fireworks from Times Square, which we did but the view was pretty disappointing really so we just headed back to our hotel room.
In the morning we booked a 3 day tour with the Concierge in the reception of our hotel, and also tickets for Phantom of the Opera. Hit the streets around 12 and went for lunch at Dallas BBQ on 42nd. A young guy cane to serve us and I detected a South African accent so asked and sure enough he was from Durban! Pinetown to he exact, we told him we were from Hillcrest and he said he actually went to Kearsney, the same School as Pete! What are the chances of that? Afterwards we took a walk up 5th Avenue to the Apple Store then into Central Park. Stunningly beautiful place especially covered in snow. I was completely in awe! We saw ice skating and drank some delicious hot apple cider with a foot long hotdog. Then continued to walk up through Central Park. We took the subway back down to our Hotel and enjoyed the free drinks again then chilled in our hotel room for the rest of the evening.
After getting up at midday, we hit the streets of New York for the first time. Piles of snow all over and slushy puddles on every corner. Seething crowds keeping the pace moving and weaving between congested traffic all over the place. It sounds like hell but it seems to work quite well nonetheless and doesn’t feel threatening of intense. We ate Burger King and visited Ripley’s Believe It Or Not! Now that is my idea of a museum! Fascinating, weird and wonderful items. Ranging from bizarre to disgusting. We saw a sward swallower blasting flames from the sword, half a human skull and shrunken heads. Afterwards we made our way to the very very busy Times Square. Quite a sight to behold! We didn’t stay too long thought because it was pretty busy and they were setting up for new years eve. We made our way back to our hotel and I has to buy a new pair of boots on the way as my feet were killing and wet from the slushy snow. We did a bit of shopping before heading back to the hotel. Budweiser and chips. Awesome 🙂 We went downstairs in the hotel for their “guest reception” with free drinks and snacks. We met a lovely couple, Sandra and Robert (Bob), from Ottawa Canada and chatted to them for a few hours. They had just got engaged that day and hadn’t told family yet so we were the first to find out! A very nice couple. After that we retired to our room to drink a Bud and watch some TV. We both conked out pretty early though as Pete was still feeling under the weather.
So I should be blogging this from New York, but actually we are in Minneapolis!
Yesterday Pete and I were obviously apprehensive that we would actually even get off the ground in London. We’d been been following the weather firstly for London and then on Boxing Day for New York because of the massive storm they were expecting. London ended up very clear yesterday, and it seemed out Delta airlines flight was the only one leaving for New York that wasn’t affected by New Yor’ks weather. We kept checking the status of our flight and it was on schedule the whole was. Awesome! We were met by the valet parking service right at the front door of our terminal, and we managed to find our check in desk and check our luggage within 30 minutes! Awesome! So far our journey had been a piece of cake and Pete and I agreed that if we managed to get off the ground and get to New York the gods would have been smiling down on us. We found a Starbucks to leech the free wifi,
then moved to the viewing windows after a while. We waited patiently for our gate number to come up and when it did we realised we were already sitting at the correct gate. Awesome! Boarding started and we took our seats and set off on schedule. Awesome!! 🙂
About 2 hours from landing the Captain comes on, oh no. Sure enough our flight is being diverted because JFK is now closed because of the snow. Oh no! We were diverted to Minneapolis, a good few hours inland! Thankfully Pete had world Atlas on his ipad so we could quickly look up where we were actually heading. Pretty much mid-America in my view. The fun didn’t stop there. Pete started getting sick. Not long after our diversion news, He started getting a stomach crap and had to go throw up within half an hour. The nausea continued for about an hour but thankfully subsided and he was feeling ok again by the time we started our descent. We’d really had visions of him being as sick as I’d been a few days before. We landed at 2am-ish London time and 9pm-ish local. Thankfully Delta had already arranged for everyone to be put up in a local hotel and a flight back to New York the next da. Phew! We waited in the freezing cold outside for our shuttle the the Hotel Inn Bloomington which eventually arrived and we finally managed to check in and get to bed around 11pm (4am for us! Tired!) and got some sleep, but not before watching some American TV adverts and a bit of The Late Show with David Letterman 🙂
It’s now just before 8 am so shower time and then get some breakfast with our Delta meal vouchers and maybe see a glimpse of Minneapolis before our flight to NYC (hopefully) at 2:30pm
Later…
Took a taxi from Hilton Bloomington Minneapolis to Mall of America, a huge mall with a theme park in the centre. Afterwards took a taxi to the airport at about 12:30 for our 2:30 flight to JFK. Flight kept getting delayed and we eventually boarded and too off at 8:30. We didn’t know if we’d have to circle JFK for a while waiting to land but it turned out there was a medical emergency on board so we were pushed up the queue and landed at 12am, same for being taxied to the terminal, It took 1hr for us but a plane the day before had made news for waiting nearly 12hrs on the tarmac! All because the airport had practically no staff because of the snow. Anyway we disembarked quite quickly after the ‘medical emergency woman’ and made our way to baggage collection where we all waited for over 3 hours for our luggage! It truly was travel hell. We queued in a long queue in the cold for a taxi to take us to the airport which cost $50, but was sell worth it because we were exhausted! We finally hit the sack at about 4:30 am!
When I had my hip surgery in 1991, there was a little girl in the hospital that the media had nicknamed “Fluffy”. Her father had gone psychotic and had set this poor little girl and her mother alight, and then shot himself. Her mother unfortunately didn’t survive, and little Fluffy was left with extensive burns. She was on the same ward as me. She was a terrible sight to see and was covered in bandages and being only about 3 or 4 years old was in a cot most of the time. One day we were in the ward alone together and she started asking me something, but I couldn’t understand her. She was saying the same thing over again, trying to tell me what she needed, and it was heart wrenching because I couldn’t help her. I was only 11 myself and didn’t really know what to do so I eventually buzzed for a nurse and they took care of her. But I’ll never forget that poor little girl, all alone in the world and suffering. I still think about her and wonder where life took her after her recovery. Down a very happy path I hope.?
I often feel that I could drop everything from”normal” society and live a fairly simplistic and spiritual life. I feel that consumerism, working 9-5 and social intensity are poisoning my life; and as a believer of this life being our only one and when you are dead you are dead, that’s a terrible waste.?
When my parents where here in August for my birthday I snapped at my Dad because he wanted to take a video of me while I was driving. I still feel really bad about that, as he got upset by it. In his eyes all he wanted was a video of us in the car driving somewhere and his little girl all grown up and driving her parents around. Which I can completely understand. I love photographing things to capture moments too. Unfortunately he likes to video everything and that day I just wasn’t in the mood for it. But I still feel really bad about it. Especially because I’m so far away from my parents and thus we don’t get to see each other often. I wish I could go back to that moment, and instead of moaning at him, rather just turned to him and smiled. I love my Dad.