The Adirondack

I caught the Adirondack Amtrak train from Penn Station early on Saturday morning. What a journey! The journey is about 12 hours and goes from the centre of New York, along the Hudson river, through New York state, across the Canadian border and then into Montreal. For much of the journey the train travels next to a huge river or lake (with quite high mountains on one side)! It was wonderful just staring out the window for hours on end watching eagles flying overhead and herons standing in the rivers. There's some amazing history in the region. The rocky cliff near Schenectady which overlooks the track is "the site where the Mohawks fought and defeated the Mohicans at Kinquariones." Albany was where "Yankee Doodle" was composed in 1768! Hudson was a whaling port ... I wasn't paying too much attention to the history of the region (and missed the on-board lecture on the ecology of the Hudson river). Instead I tried to learn Danish from the four pretty girls that were sitting near me. One fell asleep on my shoulder.

We were very delayed at the border crossing. Three people were taken off the train. Two got back on. One was driven off in a van. Unfortunately we then arrived about 1.5 hours late into Montreal, but mum and dad were still there to pick me up!!

Ottawa's lovely! We've been for a short walk in the woods, had lunch in a pub, went flying (I managed three cross-wind landings with only a little help from dad!), fed a chipmunk, met Christine for lunch, played with some kittens, and took a boat cruise down the Rideau canal. I leave tomorrow morning for Chicago, Los Angeles and, hopefully, will catch my flight to Australia!

Then I have to book my flight to China! :)

Busking in New York

Finally I like New York (I particularly liked the "Let us cater your next affair" note that Joris found)!! On Friday evening a group of us decided to walk through Harlem to find something to eat! That was interesting! We ended up at Amy Ruth's which served lots of very sweet food. The menu explained about Amy Ruth ... apparently "Amy Ruth Moore Bass was a devout Christian Woman. She was a native Alabamian, the wife of Elijah Bass Sr., the mother of 10 children; 7 daughters and 3 sons; the grandmother of 12 grand-children. She was a farmer, a gardner, the world's best cook and a very friendly person." Rutger ordered a beer and was told that they didn't serve that sort of drink here. He got given an iced tea. The food was big! One guy had a waffle covered in maple syrup and a single chicken leg on it! I had a very tasty catfish.

On the last day the conference finished at lunch time and Joris and I headed off for a very interesting afternoon and evening. We first walked through central park (getting lost in the process), went to the Apple Store (very impressive) and tried to find the Gene Frankel Theatre. We had spotted this theatre company on the web and (at least I) assumed that they would be a big company producing something like a broadway show! Our first sight of the "theatre" made us realise that this probably wasn't true. It was somebody's house. We bought our tickets and then continued walking South. We walked down Wall street and then to the water edge. Oh, I forget that walking to the theatre took us through China town and Little Italy which were both great to see. We also ambled past the place of the 911 attacks on the World Trade centre. There was a large building site.

It's going to be a tad difficult to describe the show. We saw Ivanov by Chekov. This was a typical, Russian, miserable play, but performed so amazingly well. There were probably about 20-30 people in the audience and we all sat around the edge of the room. Throughout the performance the actors would come and sit in empty chairs next to us. We certainly felt as if we were part of the production. Joris had to shift hurriedly in his seat at one point otherwise he would have ended up in a very steamy embrace. "We are all heroes at twenty, ready to attack anything, to do everything, and at thirty are worn-out, useless men." Oh dear. "There are a great many things a man cannot understand. Any girl would rather love an unfortunate man than a fortunate one ..."

Maybe it was the result of the play, but coming out in the evening and walking down the sidestreets near broadway did make Joris and I think that New York was an example of a post-apocalyptic city! Look at the photo of the smoke stacks. It's incredibly eerie.

Anyway, it was getting late and so we decided to take the New York subway back to the hotel. We went down and got chatting to an old black guy who was busking on his violin. He asked me to have a go and so ... I did. I played terribly, but did get quite a few people to turn around and laugh at me. Then Joris had a go and had his first violin lesson!

An evening in New York

Bit tired ... just some photos for today (New York is starting to grow on me. It's a lot nicer when it isn't raining!)

I will enjoy New York ... part 2

Succeeded. I was told by Letizia today that you can only enjoy a place with the right people! It worked. First my talk went well and I got lots of interesting questions. More importantly, I went out for dinner at an Ethiopian restaurant with a whole heap of great, friendly people (mainly from Cardiff). Then a selection of us went and drank rather too much beer at the pub. I've decided that I now like New York.

I'm going back to China in August :)

I will enjoy New York ... part 1

failed

China to the rescue

I'm a student again. I'm in Carmen Hall at Columbia University. It is a typical student hall of residence. My day started off well. I got invited to have a holiday in China at the end of July or start of August.

I set off out the hotel in a happy frame of mind. It was raining. Actually it was pouring and I didn't have a raincoat or an umbrella. I got wet. I walked North up Broadway and spotted some more pineapples. Then I ambled around the North end of Central Park in the rain. I found a good second hand bookshop that was closing and spent a happy hour choosing which book to buy. I ended up with one on the Mekong river and then ambled over to Dunkin Donuts to escape the rain and start reading.

After lunch I had to lug my suitcase from 94th street to 120th street in the rain to get to my new 'lodging'. That was fun. I then discovered that Joris' flight had been cancelled and so I won't be meeting him tonight. I decided to go to a museum. I had planned on visiting the Natural History museum, but was worried that I'd be upset if my expectations were not reached. So I went to the "Museum of New York" instead. They had three exhibitions. The first was on "paintings of railings". ummm .... I'm sure that most people find railings fascinating, but I obviously wasn't in the right frame of mind today. Then I went to the second exhibition. This was on the wildlife of New York. Actually it was on the wildlife of New York that existed before all the people came and killed them all. Apparently there were mountain lions here and Times Square was a beaver swamp. The exhibition kept telling me how good the exhibition was and how they'd even used scientists to work some things out. Then there really was a good exhibition. It was about the dutch explorers. I spent ages looking at ancient maps including those by Mercator.

Finally I went to a "real american diner" and met a friendly waiter. He was from Melbourne.

Trying hard to like New York ...

I keep getting told that my blog is always enthusiastic about everything. New York is going to challenge this and it's all because of my silly expectations. Out of all my travels this year I had assumed that the one place I'd really enjoy was NY, but this place is so difficult to like. Even my USA guide-book seems confused: "With its skyscrapers and bright lights, this is a city of superlatives ..." and then ... a few pages later when describing The Bronx: "visitors still frequent the area to escape the overwhelming city concrete for some beauty and quiet". Yes, New York has some impressive views, but it's mainly concrete. I made the mistake of walking from 94th street to the base of Manhattan (basically 3/4 of the island) - this is a long way! Anyway, I don't recommend the walk. I went past lots of sights, but trudged for hours between them.

I think that I've been very spoilt recently. New York doesn't have the spectacular views of Christchurch, it doesn't have the beautiful avenues of Washington DC, it's not exotic like Beijing, it doesn't even have the impressive skyscrapers and water views of Sydney. Wow ... I'm being very negative. Sorry about that. Hopefully someone will read this blog who loves NY and can tell me how to enjoy this city.

Anyway I set out this morning and walked across to the Hudson river. It has lots of rusting pieces of metal in the water. I then walked South. I saw a goose. Then an aircraft carrier. Two men were 'whispering' (American people don't whisper very well!) in awe - "... there's our saviour on the water". I walked down 42nd street to find "Times Square". I missed it. I turned around and missed it again. Then it was pointed out to me. It's not even a square - it's a triangle. And it's tiny. Feeling rather annoyed with myself for dreaming of parrots and palm trees (there were lots of signs advertising Sydney), I had a coffee (mistake .. LEARN ... do not drink coffee in America). I kept walking South to the Empire State Building. Where do people stand to photograph it? I could only get pictures of Starbuck's Coffee and Adult Boutique Establishments. Anyway, it is quite impressive. Then it started raining!

I kept going South. The street names are exciting: "33rd St, 32nd St, 31st St, 30th St, 29th St, 28th St, 27th St, 26th St" and then got to Madison Square Park. That was also small. I cut through Greenwich village which according to my book is a "bohemian haven" and a popular "gay district", through Washington Square (where I rested to watch a very good jazz group), through SoHo historic district which has the "largest concentration of cast-iron architecture in the world", back onto Broadway, past the City Hall and then across to the Brooklyn Bridge. That was impressive. It would have been even better if the New Yorker's would stop shouting at each other for a while. Couples were arguing, office workers were arguing, cyclists were shouting at pedestrians (and vice versa) .... This does not seem a happy city!

I then had another coffee (MISTAKE - No more coffee in America) and was served by a very grumpy waiter. I kept heading down the island, past Wall St and finally reached the base of the island and had my first glimpse of the Statue of Liberty. I wanted to take a ferry to Ellis Island, but the queue was enormous (and would have taken hours). Also I wasn't allowed to take my backpack onto the boat because of all the bombs that it probably contained (by the way, there were signs saying 'don't pick the flowers' in English and Swedish ... no idea why!). So I sat around watching the boats and wondering what to do.

In the end, I took a train to Grand Central and then walked back to the hotel through Central Park. Things were looking up! The clouds started to clear and the park really is beautiful!

Hopefully, things improve tomorrow. I need to check out of this hotel and will go to one closer to the University. Then I want to see some of the museums. In the evening I'm hoping to meet up with Joris.

Okay ... someone tell me why New York is so wonderful! I'm off for a curry ...