We travelled to Manhattan courtesy of Messrs. Amtrak. It was a relief to let the train take the strain & not worry about driving. I've never travelled on a train in the US before (can't remember the last time I was on one at home either) so this was another new experience. They really do shout 'Board & I was quite impressed with that.
Also with the steps to get on the train. Little things like this fascinate me. It was very clean & comfy inside too, different to the ones at home.
On arriving safely at Penn station we thought about hailing a cab to take us to our hotel, the Howard Johnson. As luck would have it my brother pointed across the road from the station exit & asked "What does that sign say?" Believe it or not it was our hotel. We were born lucky as there must be at least 4 exits from that station. We booked into the hotel & phoned my brother's friend that we had come all this way to see - only to find that he was in Florida visiting his sick father.
Ah well, never mind. We'll go & do some sightseeing. I don't have too many shots of NYC on this trip as we'd both visited before. Pity I didn't have a digital camera back then. My memory is a tad hazy & I get the visits confused. I remember we went to the WTC & I took these pics from the top. It still saddens me that this would not be possible today. I hope they don't upset anyone from that fine city.
Maybe Rotty or Dave can tell me which bridges these are.
The Statue of Liberty & Ellis Island.
I took this one of the Goodyear blimp. There were light aircraft & helos buzzing around all over the place. I don't know if this is allowed these days.
I think we walked from there to the southernmost part of Manhattan. I recall wandering through Battery Park & this ship taking tourists to Ellis Island & the Statue.
We decided against it as the queue was about a mile long & my brother suggested we visit Pier 17 instead. This was a hive of activity with all sorts of things going on.
A great little New Orleans style jazz band.
Intriguing but I never did figure out this lot. Very weird music. ???
It was a very enjoyable day & we went back to our hotel on the subway.
I really can't remember how long we were in NYC. It seems I'm fated never to get on board USS Intrepid. We had a fantastic night out in the "Village" & got back to the hotel about 4 am. We met some nice young girls in the coffee lounge who from all accounts had also had a fun time. Everything goes fuzzy after that. No, the girls had nothing to do with it.
It was almost time to go home but one thing we had always hoped to do was to visit Old Rhinebeck for the air show. This would make our adventure complete. Sunday was our last day in the US so we bought train tickets from the station just across the road. Things had worked out fine so far...........
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