Let’s start off by saying that we are The TIRED Travelling Taylors!
We have walked over 18 km today, with a fair bit of inclines and so we both have muscles telling us to slow down!
We started off today by getting on the hop On Hop Off Bus – unfortunately, this was a real letdown! We both remembered doing the Hop On Hop Off in CT some years ago with Willliam’s beloved Uncle Theunis, which was really informative, but this was quite the opposite – silly remarks in the audio and not much information.
We left the bus to see Little Italy and Chinatown. What we did not know was that most things around NY only get going around 11.00! So W and I walked around some quite dodgy, very quiet streets. We did manage to buy a few bits and bobs to take home and saw grapefruit about 3 times the size of what we get at home.
We hopped back on the bus and went to the next stop – Brooklyn Bridge. We walked across the pedestrian walkway above the bridge which is 1.8 km. It links Manhattan Island to Brooklyn across the East River. Once in Brooklyn, we walked to DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass). An interesting “Yuppie” are. We went to a market called Timeout Market (thought of you, Neil) and enjoyed a warm hot chocolate and decadent choc cookie while we thawed out a little and rested our weary limbs!
We then walked back over the Brooklyn Bridge and headed off to find Wall Street. Then off to the Charging Bull, which is a bronze statue celebrating the “can do” spirit of NY. While queuing to take a pic of W with the bull, we noticed that the queue at the rear was longer than the queue we were in. So after having taken the pic we went around to see what the attraction at the rear was…. To put it crudely….. everybody wanted their pic taken holding the bull’s balls!!!!!!
The next place we visited today was the Roosevelt Tram. These trams link Manhattan Island to Roosevelt Island, crossing the East River.
We hopped off the subway at Grand Central Station – it makes CT station look tiny! Imagine lights like these in CT station!
Off we went to do some shopping as buying water, etc at the local 7 Eleven is very costly. Our trip back from the shops did not go according to plan. We ended up walking quite a distance (with poor W lugging our purchases).
For supper, we popped down to the Pizza Shop on the corner and bought some delicious pizza slices.
Tomorrow our maximum is -5 degrees – and a minimum of – 11. A little chillier than today’s maximum of 5.
On tomorrow’s agenda are Madame Tussauds, Empire State Building, and a few other places as well. Hopefully less walking!
This last pic is the view from our hotel room at about 17.45 – it gets dark here early! Not a bad view from our bed!
