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13.06.08
New York
I’m most definitely a country girl. New York
was
the most amazing, scary, ginormous,
dirty, busy, beautiful, ugly, mind-blowing
place I have ever been in my life!!
Dad
and I drove to the town of Dover,
about 8 miles from where we are staying.
Here we bought our round trip tickets for
the
hour and a quarter trip to New York.
Imagine Richmond (Nelson) being 50 miles
wide. That’s
the scenery I could see from
the window. Malls, plazas, housing, car
dealers, businesses, it just went on and on.
It
wasn’t long after I saw the first tall building
that the surroundings began to change
dramatically. We began to
drive under a few
overpasses and then all of a sudden we were
in a huge tunnel. This was the Lincoln Tunnel
UNDER
the Hudson River. About 2 miles of
what seemed to me to be totally unnatural
road travel …… under a river.
Sheesh, I’m
glad there were no leaks!
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| Enter here to drive UNDER the river! |
Once out of the tunnel we were travelling on
what looked like the worst tangle of concrete
and
asphalt I had ever seen. Roads were
going in all directions and worst of all, they
were all at different levels. You
really
needed to put all your faith in that
bus driver sitting up front.
Through the concrete spaghetti and then
we
were in the NY Port Authority BusTerminal.
Imagine a huge parking building full of buses
coming and going and
then put that all on
top of the Subway.
Once off the bus you walk with masses of
other people who unlike you,
actually know
where they are going and how to get there.
This is all done in tunnels around and under
the bus station.
I was beginning to feel like
a lost and bewildered rabbit!!
We had to find the right subway train to take
us
to Ellis Island. Subway No. 1 to the end of
Manhattan Island ..... sounded so simple.
Once we had figured out exactly
which
direction to head (thanks to a very helpful fellow
traveller.
The metro employees are not at all happy
to be asked directions of!) we then had to battle
an
extremely unhelpful revolving gate. The
swipe tickets for the gate that we had been
issued were faulty so we then
had to ask
help of that extremely unhelpful employee
again. The whole "I'm lost in an enormous city
on the other side of the world" feeling was put
firmly
into perspective as I watch two new
guide dog owners being shown how to
navigate the stupid revolving gates with
their
dogs in order to get to the platforms.
And we thought we had problems!
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| looking across the tracks to the opposite platform |
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| Subway walls are beautifully tiled like this. |
Riding the subway is quite an experience.
I watched a woman opposite me standing
and
crocheting. We reached her stop and
the last I saw of her, she was walking down
the platform still crocheting!
Our
stop and we emerged from the building
into sweltering heat and hundreds of people.
I then had my very first sight of
the Statue of
Liberty as we walked towards the bank of the
Hudson River. A short walk past street
venders to Battery
Point where we were to
buy the ferry tickets that would get us
to Ellis Island.
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| My first sight of the Statue of Liberty |
Not sure what this statue's about but it looked nice
and
heaps of people were photographing it so
I thought I should too!
I thought the 20 minute queue at Battery
Park for ferry tickets was bad enough. Try
lining
up for 1 ¼ hours in the sweltering heat
with hundreds of other people to actually get
on the ferry. Dad and I devised
the plan of
taking turns standing in the line while the other
sat in the shade. Very clever I thought.
No point in
both of us dropping with
heat exhaustion!
This sight took my interest as we waited
to board the ferry.
I have no idea what this building is but I thought this
showed
the American fascination with flag flying
rather well. I don't think you'd ever see this many
NZ flags flying all at
the same time at home!
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| Dad, the famous lady and another flag! |
I have never thought 'I really want to see the
Statue
of Liberty' but I felt a bit obligated in
taking heaps of photographs since it was
right
there in front of me!
The ferry crossing took us to the feet of the
famous statue
where the majority of
passengers disembarked and we continued
on the short distance to Ellis Island.
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