Friday, June 6, 2008
Monday, June 2, 2008
New York City, take two ...
The hotel rates were down, it was the weekend after Memorial Day long weekend, the car was serviced, the schools were advised. So we left home around 7.20am on Friday 30 May 2008 for the drive up to New York City. We originally had train tickets booked but the cost of fuel and valet parking was less than half the $450 that Amtrak wanted for return tickets for the four of us. We did forget to figure in road tolls. We hit five on the way up for a total of $24.85 and three of these again on the way back for another $11.85. The drive wasn't too bad, only slow part was the Lincoln Tunnel into NYC but even then we managed to keep moving.
We had a morning tea stop but we still checked into the Park Central on 7th Avenue around 11am. Of course our room wasn't ready so we dumped our bags and headed downtown. We ended up having lunch at Applebees and then checking out the shops around Times Square: Toys'R'Us, Hard Rock Cafe; Virgin, NY Yankees, etc. After a long afternoon of shopping, a coffee at our old favourite, Fluffy's Cafe, across from the hotel went down very well.
After getting our room, we caught the subway up the west side of Central Park and walked through the Park to the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum. The attraction was that the building was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Plus entry was by donation on Friday nights! Unfortunately the exterior of the building is under scaffolding as it has been since 2006 to repair the cracks in the external concrete. Of course it would be a FLW building if it didn't constantly need repairs. We seem to bypass the charging area and caught the lift up to the fourth level, the highest we were allowed to go as the top two levels were closed for some unclear reason. None of the permanent exhibition seemed to be available for viewing, which is interesting given the history of the building v the art work in terms of what visitors go to the Guggenheim to see.
Instead it was a range of installations by Cai Guo-Qiang who "is internationally acclaimed as an artist whose creative transgressions and cultural provocations have literally exploded the accepted parameters of art making in our time. This is especially true of Inopportune: Stage One, Cai’s largest installation to date, which presents nine real cars in a cinematic progression that simulates a car bombing, occupying the central atrium of the Frank Lloyd Wright rotunda." His other wonders included 99 wolves running into a glass wall; a series of tigers full of arrows; a suspended wrecked Chinese boats full of arrows; and a series of life sized figures decomposing in cracked clay, just the wooden frame, etc. Very different. The kids weren't overly happy about the shot tigers but took me back to examine them and once they were certain that they weren't real tigers, it became ok.
Of course the exhibits were set up to be viewed by walking up the ramps, contrary to FLW's design. Between not seeing the outside of the building, not being able to go to the top inside, not being able to see the design of the top of the building as it was dark, didn't get a real sense of it being a FLW design. Despite having read a reasonable amount about the building before our visit, think it was one were a tour would have helped get a better sense of the building. Settled for a book instead. Olivia also bought a set of nueve blocks:
We then walked down to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) where our concierge had told us that Friday night was also free. Turns out it was by donation so we just paid one entry rather than two. Had a quick look at some of the armory exhibition on our way to the Super Heroes special exhibition. Yes, Kieren was in his element ...
We caught a bus back down towards our hotel and a late dinner at Lindy's, just down 7th Avenue a bit from the hotel. Nice meal, great waiter, fantastic NY cheesecake, bit overpriced - as normal in NYC.
Saturday morning 31 May 2008 it was back on the subway and down to the World Trade Center site. Last time we got to the Tribute WTC Visitor Center after it had closed so it was on our list to visit this time. We didn't do their tour of the site, figuring the kids were a bit young, but just went through the five galleries. It was a tough experience as you would expect. But with a lot of positive messages from those involved and impacted by both WTC bombings. This culminates in the final 'voices of promise' gallery, where the kids left positive drawings and notes of what they had taken in.
Leaving, we caught the subway back up to 42nd St and rushed over to Pier 83 to catch Circle Line's Full Island Cruise around Manhattan Island:
It was then time to head up 5th Avenue to the kids' stores. So it was into the new NYC Disney shop and then up to FAO Schwarz. In Disney, the kids met Alice and the Mad Hatter. We then hang around for Olivia to meet Jasmine - it was apparently too girly for Kieren!
We had told the kids that they had $50 to spend in NYC. This was the best move we made as they didn't hassle us to buy something in every shop we went into. The dynamic changed to us asking if that was how they wanted to spend their money. Kieren in particular was very thoughtful and reluctant to spend his money until he had seen all his options around NYC. He agonised for ages over a Superman book in the Met before deciding that he didn't really want it.
Saturday finished with dinner at the Playwright's Tavern where we had dinner on our last night in NYC last trip.
We were up early on Sunday 1 June 2008 with breakfast at Fluffy's before catching the subway up to Harlem to the 9am service at Abyssinian Baptist Church. Despite having much more luck with the subway on this trip, we got caught out by waiting 30 minutes for the train north. Even then the line we intended catching turned out being only a weekday service. (Why don't they ever have any printed copies of their subway maps available??!!) Luckily a lady helped us out, making us get on the train that pulled in and suggesting where to change trains to get to the station closest to the church. However all this meant that we didn't get to the church until about 9am. They run a tourist line and were letting in those in the first part of the line just as we arrived. We had to walk around the next corner of the block to join the end of the line. We waited for a while before working out that we had missed joining the 9am service and were also too far back to make the 11am service, even if we wanted to wait 2 hours on a hot humid morning. So a couple of photos later, we headed back to the subway and to the hotel to change into something more comfortable ...
We grabbed some lunch 'to go' at Fluffy's and walked up to Central Park so the kids could play on the playground, including running up and down all the large rock formations there. It was nice to get out of the hussle and noise of the city for a while, though it was still not like being on your own, albeit with the compensation of people watching ...
After dropping some gear back at our room, we headed back downtown to do the shopping thing at Macys. It was then back into kid shopping mode. Kieren desperately needed to get back to ToysRUs to buy a Ben 10 toy, finishing his spending for the trip. The kids enjoyed running into The Naked Cowboy on the way up to ToysRUs! Then up to BuildaBear Workshop, American Girl and Disney for character photos with Meeko and Pocahontas, a survival coffee at Starbucks in Trump Tower, then back for Olivia to meet Cinderella.
Dinner at Applebees, with an off wine that they wouldn't change nearly rounded off the evening. Just a quick visit to M&M's World on the way back to our room finished the day.
The usual breakfast at Fluffy's started the day on Monday 2 June 2008. Our map had an arrow pointing to Lexington Ave between 51st and 52nd Streets labeled 'Marilyn Monroe's Subway Grating'. So we caught the subway over to Lexington Ave, walked up to the site, started looking, kept looking, walked around a bit, wandered up into buildings, looked at the map again, swore a bit, took a photo of Olivia standing on the subway grating, admired the building over the road, took some photos of the church next door (St Bartholomew's) and looked at the map some more to work out how we would spend the rest of the morning. Looking on the Internet later, I'm not sure that the map isn't marked a block higher than where the scene was shot. The scene shows them coming out of a cinema and walking up to where Marilyn enjoys the breeze 'coming up from the passing subway trains' (actually a 'giant blower' under the grating). Anyway, Olivia was excited about the bit of breeze coming out of the grate which moved her dress a bit. She hadn't see the scene at that stage so wasn't disappointed ...
After that excitement, we walked down to the Chrysler Building. We had always noticed the skyscraper, reputedly the most beautiful in NYC, but never been down to the building. Up close we saw the detail of the ornaments on the building which are pretty spectacular. We also went into the foyer where there is also a lot of detail, including the wooden detail on the elevator doors. Thanks to Olivia 'needing to go' we also saw inside the restrooms on the next level down thanks to some friendly security guards. The restrooms were more tired than the entry foyer!
That wrapped up our time and visit. Just a subway trip back to the hotel, final packing, check out, get the car out of valet parking and on the road for the drive home. Fortunately this was fairly uneventful, at least once the GPS finally started working amongst the NYC skyscrapers!
Malcolm
We had a morning tea stop but we still checked into the Park Central on 7th Avenue around 11am. Of course our room wasn't ready so we dumped our bags and headed downtown. We ended up having lunch at Applebees and then checking out the shops around Times Square: Toys'R'Us, Hard Rock Cafe; Virgin, NY Yankees, etc. After a long afternoon of shopping, a coffee at our old favourite, Fluffy's Cafe, across from the hotel went down very well.
After getting our room, we caught the subway up the west side of Central Park and walked through the Park to the Solomon R Guggenheim Museum. The attraction was that the building was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Plus entry was by donation on Friday nights! Unfortunately the exterior of the building is under scaffolding as it has been since 2006 to repair the cracks in the external concrete. Of course it would be a FLW building if it didn't constantly need repairs. We seem to bypass the charging area and caught the lift up to the fourth level, the highest we were allowed to go as the top two levels were closed for some unclear reason. None of the permanent exhibition seemed to be available for viewing, which is interesting given the history of the building v the art work in terms of what visitors go to the Guggenheim to see.
Instead it was a range of installations by Cai Guo-Qiang who "is internationally acclaimed as an artist whose creative transgressions and cultural provocations have literally exploded the accepted parameters of art making in our time. This is especially true of Inopportune: Stage One, Cai’s largest installation to date, which presents nine real cars in a cinematic progression that simulates a car bombing, occupying the central atrium of the Frank Lloyd Wright rotunda." His other wonders included 99 wolves running into a glass wall; a series of tigers full of arrows; a suspended wrecked Chinese boats full of arrows; and a series of life sized figures decomposing in cracked clay, just the wooden frame, etc. Very different. The kids weren't overly happy about the shot tigers but took me back to examine them and once they were certain that they weren't real tigers, it became ok.
Of course the exhibits were set up to be viewed by walking up the ramps, contrary to FLW's design. Between not seeing the outside of the building, not being able to go to the top inside, not being able to see the design of the top of the building as it was dark, didn't get a real sense of it being a FLW design. Despite having read a reasonable amount about the building before our visit, think it was one were a tour would have helped get a better sense of the building. Settled for a book instead. Olivia also bought a set of nueve blocks:
Nueve’s set of handcrafted wooden blocks can be assembled in any combination toWhile we thought they were overpriced, they have both had so much fun playing with them we were obviously wrong ...
create billions of different patterns (68,719,476,736 possible combinations).
There is no right answer or winning move. Nueve is designed solely to liberate
your perception, challenge your creativity and delight your soul.Made of
hardwood and silk-screened in red, the nine cubes are held in a black MDF tray.
Each cube is 1 3/8” SQ, comfortable for both kids and adults. Handsomely
presented in a gift box (6” SQ), Nueve will be appreciated by the curious and
creatively spirited. Designed by newartifacts, a group of artists, designers and
entrepreneurs from Uruguay, South America. Newartifacts envisions integrating
art into daily life and transforming life into art.
We then walked down to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) where our concierge had told us that Friday night was also free. Turns out it was by donation so we just paid one entry rather than two. Had a quick look at some of the armory exhibition on our way to the Super Heroes special exhibition. Yes, Kieren was in his element ...
We caught a bus back down towards our hotel and a late dinner at Lindy's, just down 7th Avenue a bit from the hotel. Nice meal, great waiter, fantastic NY cheesecake, bit overpriced - as normal in NYC.
Saturday morning 31 May 2008 it was back on the subway and down to the World Trade Center site. Last time we got to the Tribute WTC Visitor Center after it had closed so it was on our list to visit this time. We didn't do their tour of the site, figuring the kids were a bit young, but just went through the five galleries. It was a tough experience as you would expect. But with a lot of positive messages from those involved and impacted by both WTC bombings. This culminates in the final 'voices of promise' gallery, where the kids left positive drawings and notes of what they had taken in.
Leaving, we caught the subway back up to 42nd St and rushed over to Pier 83 to catch Circle Line's Full Island Cruise around Manhattan Island:
Enjoy a relaxed and refreshing 3-hour cruise as you discover the secrets of theWe managed to catch the 12pm cruise, getting on board just before the forecast rain hit. This limited the view in the first part of the cruise, which included the harbour and around the Statue of Liberty. Luckily we have a few hundred photos of the Statue from the last trip. Was a very interesting trip, mostly, seeing parts of the city that we hadn't been anywhere near before. Figured it was the closest I was going to get to Yankee Stadium as well!
city. You'll circumnavigate Manhattan Island and see it all - 3 rivers, 7 major
bridges, 5 boroughs, over 25 world renowned landmarks and, of course, a
magnificent close-up of the Statue of Liberty.
It was then time to head up 5th Avenue to the kids' stores. So it was into the new NYC Disney shop and then up to FAO Schwarz. In Disney, the kids met Alice and the Mad Hatter. We then hang around for Olivia to meet Jasmine - it was apparently too girly for Kieren!
We had told the kids that they had $50 to spend in NYC. This was the best move we made as they didn't hassle us to buy something in every shop we went into. The dynamic changed to us asking if that was how they wanted to spend their money. Kieren in particular was very thoughtful and reluctant to spend his money until he had seen all his options around NYC. He agonised for ages over a Superman book in the Met before deciding that he didn't really want it.
Saturday finished with dinner at the Playwright's Tavern where we had dinner on our last night in NYC last trip.
We were up early on Sunday 1 June 2008 with breakfast at Fluffy's before catching the subway up to Harlem to the 9am service at Abyssinian Baptist Church. Despite having much more luck with the subway on this trip, we got caught out by waiting 30 minutes for the train north. Even then the line we intended catching turned out being only a weekday service. (Why don't they ever have any printed copies of their subway maps available??!!) Luckily a lady helped us out, making us get on the train that pulled in and suggesting where to change trains to get to the station closest to the church. However all this meant that we didn't get to the church until about 9am. They run a tourist line and were letting in those in the first part of the line just as we arrived. We had to walk around the next corner of the block to join the end of the line. We waited for a while before working out that we had missed joining the 9am service and were also too far back to make the 11am service, even if we wanted to wait 2 hours on a hot humid morning. So a couple of photos later, we headed back to the subway and to the hotel to change into something more comfortable ...
We grabbed some lunch 'to go' at Fluffy's and walked up to Central Park so the kids could play on the playground, including running up and down all the large rock formations there. It was nice to get out of the hussle and noise of the city for a while, though it was still not like being on your own, albeit with the compensation of people watching ...
After dropping some gear back at our room, we headed back downtown to do the shopping thing at Macys. It was then back into kid shopping mode. Kieren desperately needed to get back to ToysRUs to buy a Ben 10 toy, finishing his spending for the trip. The kids enjoyed running into The Naked Cowboy on the way up to ToysRUs! Then up to BuildaBear Workshop, American Girl and Disney for character photos with Meeko and Pocahontas, a survival coffee at Starbucks in Trump Tower, then back for Olivia to meet Cinderella.
Dinner at Applebees, with an off wine that they wouldn't change nearly rounded off the evening. Just a quick visit to M&M's World on the way back to our room finished the day.
The usual breakfast at Fluffy's started the day on Monday 2 June 2008. Our map had an arrow pointing to Lexington Ave between 51st and 52nd Streets labeled 'Marilyn Monroe's Subway Grating'. So we caught the subway over to Lexington Ave, walked up to the site, started looking, kept looking, walked around a bit, wandered up into buildings, looked at the map again, swore a bit, took a photo of Olivia standing on the subway grating, admired the building over the road, took some photos of the church next door (St Bartholomew's) and looked at the map some more to work out how we would spend the rest of the morning. Looking on the Internet later, I'm not sure that the map isn't marked a block higher than where the scene was shot. The scene shows them coming out of a cinema and walking up to where Marilyn enjoys the breeze 'coming up from the passing subway trains' (actually a 'giant blower' under the grating). Anyway, Olivia was excited about the bit of breeze coming out of the grate which moved her dress a bit. She hadn't see the scene at that stage so wasn't disappointed ...
After that excitement, we walked down to the Chrysler Building. We had always noticed the skyscraper, reputedly the most beautiful in NYC, but never been down to the building. Up close we saw the detail of the ornaments on the building which are pretty spectacular. We also went into the foyer where there is also a lot of detail, including the wooden detail on the elevator doors. Thanks to Olivia 'needing to go' we also saw inside the restrooms on the next level down thanks to some friendly security guards. The restrooms were more tired than the entry foyer!
That wrapped up our time and visit. Just a subway trip back to the hotel, final packing, check out, get the car out of valet parking and on the road for the drive home. Fortunately this was fairly uneventful, at least once the GPS finally started working amongst the NYC skyscrapers!
Malcolm
Take me out to the ball game ...
Take me out to the ball game,
Take me out with the crowds;
Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack,
I don't care if I never get back.
Let me root, root, root for the home team,
If they don't win, it's a shame.
For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out,
At the old ball game.
Content to come ...
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