New York First Day

Onto the subway to the western side of Central Park. The plan was to get the bus over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the eastern side of the park. The buses come every 6 minutes but after 2 minutes we decided to walk (can you see a pattern here?). A good call as we were in the museum 10 minutes later.

We saw some old friends.

And made some new ones.

After the museum we had a great meal at E.A.T. down Madison Ave. a really nice part of town - posh shops, shady trees etc. Jeez the tipping thing is weird. On your bill you get a little printout at the bottom saying "your bill is $xxx. An 18% tip would be $xx, a 20% tip would be %xx, a 22% tip would be $xx". So using my amazing powers of deduction I can tell that they really expect a 20% tip. Just pay your staff already! Ok rant over.

After lunch we took the subway down to the Brooklyn Bridge. What you do is walk straight ahead halfway across the bridge, and only then turn round and look at the city. On your right you can see the Statue of Liberty in the harbour, and on the left, some very high density housing in Brooklyn.

Back into the city, and a left turn down Wall St and The Bull. We were amused to see how many tourists were queuing up to have their pictures taken for good luck. Most were up at the head end, but some subversives were at the arse end. I think they might have been the kiwis...

It's so easy to get around Manhattan. The subways are nowhere near as scary as you think from movies like The Taking of Pelham 123, The Warriors etc. The city is essentially flat, so there are loads of bikes of all different vintages and degrees of coolness. There is a "Boris Bike" hire system like London which is ideal for visitors, specially ones that don't have to worry about helmet hair any more.

We kept walking south until we arrived at the tip of Manhattan for the Staten Island ferry. This is a free, half hourly service that takes you right past Ellis Island and The Statue of Liberty. When you get to the other end, you just hop off and get the next one back.

We were pretty tired by now, so back on the subway and dinner at an Italian Restaurant over the road.