New York

Statue of Liberty - 93m from foundation to tip of torch

New York, New York - plenty of charm and heaps of friendly people that will go out of their way to help you, give directions or just stop and share their Australia story with us. The other thing we love about the Big Apple is that it is such an assortment of backgrounds and cultures reflected principally through a variety of languages spoken and the cuisine.

As you probably already know, hotel accommodation prices are horrendously expensive in Manhattan so we decided to stay in a small first floor apartment in East Village. Whilst far from spacious, our accommodation was spot on in so many ways. Within just one block in any direction we could have easily dined out on cooking from literally all over the world.

Exploring Peru in East Village

Our good friend Mandy flew all the way from Sydney to join us for our week in New York and another 3 days in Washington and we immersed ourselves in as much of what this amazing city had to offer as we could squeeze in. Some of the standard "must do" highlights included catching the Staten Island Ferry just on sunset, circumnavigating Manhattan Island, walking across Brooklyn Bridge, taking in the view from the top of the 260m high Rockefeller Centre Building as the city lights appear and riding push bikes around Central Park. All wonderful memorable moments!

Downtown Manhattan

Brooklyn Bridge

Central Park

Since the Yankee's were playing the LA Angels at home, we there we took the subway to the 65,000 seat Yankee Stadium and tried to understand the nuances of this very popular game. Unfortunately we didn't catch the ball to bring home as a souvenir. The atmosphere at the ground is quite similar to a one day (day/night) cricket match except for the mexican wave. Yankees supporters are very loyal - around 80 - 90% of the patrons come wearing Yankee colours of some description especially caps and shirts. The on-screen content during changeovers is full on entertainment itself with lots of crowd involvement.

Yankee Stadium

The World Trade Centre site is now a massive construction zone as the Port Authority builds the $3.1 billion Freedom Tower on the northwest corner of the WTC site. Rising from its square base and soaring 540 metres into the sky Freedom Tower tapers into eight tall isosceles triangles, forming a perfect octagon at its centre. An observation deck will be located 415 metres above ground (105 stories) with a square glass parapet at 417 metres, the heights of the original Twin Towers. Memorial pools are being completed to commemorate the 10th anniversary of this horrendous act of terrorism next month.

Freedom Tower

We felt privileged to visit St Pauls Chapel immediately adjacent to Ground Zero and were quite moved by the tributes on display around the walls to the volunteering effort that became its focus for almost 12 months following 7/11. We were proud to spot a NSW Police badge amongst the hundreds of badges representing the hundreds of interstate and overseas recovery teams who came to NY to lend a hand.

Rescue & Recovery Team Tribute

NSW Police Badge

Miraculously, this historic church building remained untouched during the collapse of the North Tower despite it being located immediately to the east of this massive structure. Many other adjacent buildings were not so fortunate and suffered considerable damage from the falling debris.

WTC Tower Building Element

The NY Fire Department's memorial is located in the fire station just across the street from the site of the South Tower. Here amongst the many stories of those who sacrificed their lives trying to rescue the occupants of the WTC buildings was a room set aside for people to write and post their tribute around the walls or on the web. Many visitors (especially children) were participating. The collection of remnants of the personal effects, the stories (on video) and the walls filled with photographs of the victims evoked still evoked tears amongst many of the those present.

9/11 WTC Victims

9/11 Victim Memorial

Aircraft window found during search/recovery

We witnessed many dramatic contrasts in this city that never sleeps. Times Square was the most amazing gathering of people. Thousands of visitors were milling around amongst the neon and plasma promoting every conceivable category of consumer item, service or entertainment. The subway also - very modern, clean and information rich trains but appallingly dirty, run down and HOT station platforms and passageways. The reason for the higher ambient temperature as we entered the underground stations was not obvious - please let us know if you have any idea?

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That's all for now BUT before you leave -
Have you seen the previous page titled " Las Vegas / Grand Canyon " yet? (click on the link to take you there).