The City That Never Sleeps
Once again opportunity knocks... I was invited to do a keynote speech in Philadelphia at a Video Game Expo in November. Just so happens, the week before my speech, the Canucks are on a road trip in New York. Just so happens, it's only a 1 hour train ride from Philadelphia. Looks like Norine and I are going to have to go to New York City for a couple of Canuck games.
Manhattan Central
Once I knew we were going, I waited for the first day tickets went on sale and got pretty good seats for the Rangers and Islanders games, and then went into sticker shock when I saw how much the hotels were in the city. We could stay outside the city, but it's so much more convenient to walk from our hotel. After a lot of hunting and surfing, I managed to find a room for only $200 a night at the historic Pennsylvania Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. Across the street is Madison Square Gardens, Macy's, the world's largest department store, is one block up the street and the Empire State building is around the corner. Right underneath MSG is the train station to Philadelphia... perfect, or so we thought.
New York's Hotel Pennsylvania is the fourth largest hotel in Manhattan, built in 1919, it has hosted many dignitaries over the years including presidents and movie stars. None of them would stay here anymore. Interestingly, the hotel has kept the same telephone number since 1919, which was immortalized in the 1938 Glenn Miller hit "Pennsylvania 6–5000". Apparently they still have the same phone lines too, since there is no Internet access in the rooms. After checking in I find out that if you want internet access, there is Wi-Fi available in the lobby... the worlds slowest Wi-Fi.
Everything looks great as we pull up, big hotel, impressive lobby aglow in Christmas lights, friendly check-in staff... but when we get to our room, it is tiny, and there is a huge moldy stain on the ceiling, they must have seen the discounted room rate I got from Agoda.com. I immediately head back to the lobby and complain, so they move us to another room, it's bigger, and doesn't have any gross fuzzy stains, but the bed is rock hard, and the wind blows a nice little tune.
We didn't arrive in New York until midnight, so it's time to crash, and we soon discover why it's called "The City That Never Sleeps". The taxis and trucks honk their horns a lot, they do it all night, and they are lined up across the street waiting for patrons from MSG and Penn Station.
The view out the window is impressive, with Madison Square Gardens and the garment district.
After a lousy nights sleep with the worlds hardest bed, and a constant cacophony of beeps and blasts, we crawl out of bed at 10 to a sunny but cold day. We bundle up, and head along the 7th Ave. fashion district and straight for Times Square, it's only 8 blocks away, no subway needed.
We did discover that packing a good jacket and gloves was a great idea, as it was zero degrees (32 Fahrenheit) with a lovely wind chill that made it like minus ten... brrrrrrrrrrrr!
TIMES SQUARE
It's a little overwhelming as you come up 7th Ave or Broadway and enter the Time Square area, there is huge signs and neon everywhere, it will be interesting to come back when it's dark. Every product from booze to perfume is advertised, stock tickers the size of a double decker bus are scrolling by, but mostly it is dominated by billboards for TV series, Movies and Broadway shows.
For such a little chocolate store, the Hersheys store has more signs and neon than anything I have ever seen. From the madness of Times Square we continue heading north to the Lower West Side.
As you move from Midtown across 60th Street where Central Park begins, the city changes from massive modern towers to more quaint and historic apartment blocks.
In the Lower West Side (Central Park West) traditional New York dwellings are mixed in with old churches, museums, and the huge Lincoln Center for the performing arts... it's currently going through renovations. May as well head into Central Park.
CENTRAL PARK
As we walk up to Central Park the first thing that greets us is an army of police cars and trucks, a typical Sunday in the park? We couldn't see anything going on, but headed to another entrance.
After walking past the police and seeing the movie "The Warriors", and many episodes of "Law & Order" it's a little intimidating to walk into the park. But after walking past a couple nuts and squirrels it's really quite a beautiful and amazing park.
A carousel had been in operation at Central Park since 1871. The original carousel was powered by a blind horse and mule, the 50's replacement features hand painted horses and a Wurlitzer organ playing classic tunes like blue bird. Since the horses on the historic Carousel weren't moving we headed for the real horses and took a carriage ride around the lower half of the park.
Our carriage winds it's way through the park, and the driver points out all the locations where movies have been filmed... too many to list. Games of flag football are going on, dogs of every size are being walked everywhere, and joggers circle the trails.
Our carriage ride takes us past Strawberry Fields, and the driver points out the apartment where John Lennon was shot by Mark David Chapman on December 8th in 1980. A musical genius was taken from the world at the age of 40. When our carriage ride is over we head back through the park to Strawberry Fields memorial gardens and the "Imagine" memorial square where 100,000 people gathered to mourn his loss. Today a collection of musicians gather and play Beatle songs.
You could spend an entire day just wandering the park, it has an incredible variety of park areas with sports fields, Ice rinks, a zoo, and all kinds of statues, ponds, lakes and reservoirs. The biggest risk of walking in the park is that sooner or later you're going to step in dog-pooh.
The wildlife in the park is varied too, all breeds of dogs are led around the trails, squirrels are everywhere, ducks, pigeons and little birds happily share seeds and bread crumbs together... and the near extinct roller skaters flock together in one area of the park. Apparently this rare breed of dancing homo sapien is attracted to paved squares and loud ghetto blasters.
As we work our way through the park towards Harlem, we decide to cut out to the Upper West Side after passing "The Lake". A view that shows just how Central Park blends with the city.
Upper West Side
The Upper West Side, aka Central Park West, is a highly desirable and expensive area of Manhattan. It's mix of classic structured condos and apartments, with old churches thrown in.
As we wander up the Upper West Side, we pass more and more historic architecture, none more impressive than the Museum of Natural History. The NY home of "Night at the Museum"... even though it was filmed in Vancouver. If we had more time, we would have spent the afternoon here.
Cathedral Church of St John the Divine
The reason we decided to walk all the way north to the area known as Morningside Heights (west of Harlem) was to see the the cathedral that is claimed to be the largest Cathedral and Anglican church in the world (although the title is disputed by Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral). The cathedral is nicknamed St. John the Unfinished, it was designed in 1888 and begun in 1892. In its history, it has undergone radical stylistic changes and the interruption of the two World Wars. It remains unfinished, with construction and restoration a continuing process.
From outside it's gothic style reminds us of many churches we have seen in Europe, large and spooky, something out of a dracula movie. When we head inside we realize why it is nicknamed St. John the Unfinished... it is one of the least decorated churches we have ever seen, very few religious paintings on the walls, little to no gilded statues, and construction/restoration continues at the back of the church where a fire from last year caused some substantial damage.
TIMES SQUARE Again
Not wanting to walk all the way back, and as it was our first day we weren't familiar with the subway yet, we decided to jump into a cab and head back to Times Square.
In the very middle of Time Square is Father Duffy's Square, a large statue of the Roman Catholic Priest is the centerpiece, he was an American hero of World War I and the Spanish-American War, and a key figure in New York's early 20th century... not bad for a guy born in Ontario, Canada.
Behind Father Duffy rises a backlit set of red stairs that not only gives a great perspective of Times Squares madness, but is also home to TKTS, an organization that provides discount prices for Broadway shows that haven't sold out on the day of the performance. You simply look at the board to see what shows are available, and how much of a discount you will get... then line up and get them. We heard horror stories of waiting in line for hours to get discounted show tickets, we never waited more than 5 minutes for discounted tickets to Avenue Q and Spring Awakening.
From the crazy lights and neon of Times Square we wandered over to the Christmassy display of Radio City Music Hall, and the soon to be completed Christmas tree of Rockefeller Center. A world famous tradition of New York is the lighting of the tree at Rockefeller Center, a massive tree setup beside the outdoor ice skating rink. Nestled under the tree is a golden Prometheus statue bringing fire to mankind. The tree and the statue are covered by scaffolding as they prepare for the official tree lighting ceremony, which will take place December 3rd... I'm sure it will be lovely.
Avenue Q
Based on recommendations, reviews and the massive "not voting sucks" billboard in Times Square, our first Broadway show would be Avenue Q. We took our half price tickets and headed to the Golden Theater on 45th Street, not quite sure what we were in for.
The best way I can describe this show is "it's Sesame Street for adults", a group of muppets and humans live in a small New York housing complex with Gary Coleman as it's superintendent, and deal with a variety of situations that Big Bird and The Count never had to deal with... well maybe Bert and Ernie did. With characters such as the "Bad Idea Bears" and classic musical numbers such as "It sucks to be me" and "The internet is for porn", this show is highly recommended!
As we make our way back to our historic (OLD) hotel, we pass more traditional New York, the mounted police, and the seasonal street meat vendors, roasting nuts, or falafels, or mystery meat.
It all seems so quaint, the steam is rising from the vents and manholes as the temperature warms up to freezing. Back to reality as we pass the National Debt Clock... Noticing the recent changes where the "$" symbol had to be replaced with a "1" as it has now climbed to 10 trillion dollars.
Tomorrow morning we would head for the symbol of New York made famous by a great big ape.