Our Anniversary Trip-Day 1, Pt. 1 (Bus Trip)

Thursday January 4, 2007

Our first big day!

Today is going to be busy. We have a 10:00 bus tour lined up so no loafing around. Loafing around is what gets us in trouble. We wake up at 7:30, put on the coffee and, holy cow, it%26#39;s 9:15 and I can%26#39;t find my socks. (Not to go off on a tangent or anything, but what%26#39;s the heck with it being still dark at 7:30 am? I%26#39;ve been to northern Europe and I can appreciate the fact that winter days are short over there and all but this is America for goodness sakes! It should be daylight at 7:30. I think I%26#39;ll write my congressman.)

Now, where was I? Oh yeah, late. We decide that it might be a good idea to walk over to our tour at 7th and 50th Here%26#39;s where a little research would have paid off. I knew that Broadway and 7th Avenue were the same street. I just didn%26#39;t know that, unlike the Avenue of the Americas, Broadway was only 7th Avenue for a tiny little bit, and not our tiny little bit. We walk over to Broadway and 50th and see no shuttle and, moreover, no place to park a shuttle. There%26#39;s a brief panic followed by a glance at our confirmation letter, followed by the realization that perhaps Broadway and 7th Avenue were not the same street after all. We didn%26#39;t have time to play a really proper game of Which Way Now, and so just walked the one block east without argument. The check-in guy looked relieved to see us, we were certainly glad to see him.

New York Party Shuttle Tours is a very nice organization. The bus wasn%26#39;t really a bus but a large van with huge glass windows. It%26#39;s very clean and the seats are comfy. There%26#39;s an ice chest up front filled with water and soft drinks But no beer, alas. Scott asked the tour guide how they could call themselves a Party Shuttle without any beer. Scott does have this Larry the Cable Guy air to him sometimes. Our guide tries to laugh it off and herds us onto the bus. He%26#39;s a real New Yorker, born and bred and full of stories, trivia and urban legends. We walked a bit in Central Park, looked at the Imagine thingy and listened to a lot of facts about the history and lore of the park. We drove around and saw the Dakota Apartments (apparently they turned down Madonna when she wanted to move in. I guess there%26#39;s no point in our applying) and the Flatiron, Chrysler and the Empire State Buildings.

My notes are a little shaky here. It was difficult to write on the bouncy bus and I wasn%26#39;t wearing my reading glasses in an attempt to impress my fellow travelers with my youth and chic. So don%26#39;t take any of this as absolute truth. But I seemed to have found the following noteworthy:

';Big Apple Jazz 20s big venue cut apple 5 seeds 5 bugs';

Your guess is as good as mine.

Lunch break was at the South Street Seaport, a tarted up mall. Upstairs there%26#39;s a deck with a fantastic view where we spent some time with a bunch of other tourists all taking pictures of each other. To quote Jane Austen, it is a fact universally acknowledged that the person with the most expensive, complicated camera and the least proficient command of English will always ask me to take their picture. Either I look like someone who knows their way around an F-stop (unlikely) or someone slow enough to chase down should I attempt to run off with their $5000 camera (probable). Since I understand neither their camera nor their instructions it is doubtful that they%26#39;ll be hanging my photo up on the wall back in Baden. Following the photo session Scott and I had lunch at an Irish themed place where we split a hot roast beef po-boy and had 2 beers each. Facts and cameras elude me. Beer and food I can remember.

After lunch we all rode over to the Staten Island Ferry and took the round trip. I%26#39;m afraid that once aboard Scott and I were rather rude and declined to sit in the cabin and listen to our guide. We snuck outside instead. In our defense, it was an absolutely glorious day, temps in the mid 60s and a peacock blue sky with just a few wispy clouds floating by. I mean, would you have stayed inside? Besides, if we had behaved as told, we would never have met the Notre Dame guy.

I guess I should have mentioned Scott%26#39;s wardrobe du jour earlier. Yesterday was the date of LSU%26#39;s great and noble victory in the Sugar Bowl and today he was wearing both his LSU ball cap and his loudly patriotic LSU jersey in honor of the win over Notre Dame. It won%26#39;t be hard to keep Scott in view today. He%26#39;s an explosion of purple and gold. Till now noone has remarked on his outfit. Out on deck someone finally notices Scott and congratulates him on the win. Well, being the classy LSU graduates that we are, we answered his congratulations with witticisms like ';Boy, Notre Dame really s**ked!'; and ';Do ya think Notre Dame%26#39;ll ever win a bowl game?'; (In retrospect we probably shouldn%26#39;t have had those second beers.) Turns out he%26#39;s a Notre Dame fan. Great. But this guy%26#39;s from Minnesota and he%26#39;s a nice guy, a really nice guy so he forgives us. He%26#39;s taking his teenage boys around New York. He tries to travel with them as much as possible and give them the gift of knowing there are other people and places than the ones they see every day. Isn%26#39;t that wonderful? He also spent quite a while down in New Orleans helping people in the Lower 9th rebuild their homes. I live here and it never occurred to me to do something like that. There are some truly good people in this world. And I%26#39;m really, honestly sorry that I implied that the great institution of Notre Dame in any way s**ks.

The views from the ferry are spectacular. We saw the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the Veranzano(sp? Sorry if I got it wrong.) Narrows Bridge. The tour guide (whom we rejoined on the ride back) gave us lots of facts about Ellis Island and the people who passed through immigration there but they escape me at the moment. To be frank, they escaped me then. I was seduced by the gorgeous weather and the beauty of the Manhattan skyline from the front of the boat.

Back onto the bus and I%26#39;m afraid the tour went a little downhill for me from here. It was getting chilly. We spent a lot of time in the Financial District seeing the Stock Exchange and the bull and things like that. Tour guide guy (I am so sorry I didn%26#39;t get your name) pointed out how the horns (or was it the nose?) on the bull are rubbed shiny. (Another tip for the novice: As the bus pulls away take a look at the bull%26#39;s other end. There%26#39;s shiny parts back there too.) Sorry, but that%26#39;s the sum total of what I took away from the Financial District. Fear me Warren Buffet.

I skipped the World Trade Center site in favor of St. Paul%26#39;s Chapel at our next stop. For one thing there was this crazy guy with a megaphone SHOUTING so loudly that you couldn%26#39;t hear yourself think. For another, most of my family lives in south Mississippi and I%26#39;ve seen about all the devastation I ever wish too. The town where I went to high school was almost wiped out and one uncle%26#39;s house was completely swept away. So please don%26#39;t hate me for choosing faith and compassion instead. I really loved St. Paul%26#39;s. It%26#39;s a wonderful historical site in it%26#39;s own right. You can see the pew where George Washington attended services after he was made President. The 9/11 memorials are tasteful and moving. It may not be the happiest choice for people who, like me, cry easily but I%26#39;m glad I went.

Back on the bus the tour guide guy apologized for the megaphone nut at the WTC. He also put a rather slick spin on the whole thing, pointing out to us that this man is truly symbolic of what we stand for as Americans: the idea that any idiot, even you, has all the right in the world to annoy the heck out of pretty much everybody in earshot. According to tour guide guy we%26#39;re actually a lucky bunch of tourists to have seen (and heard) all that freedom in action. In the good old U. S. of A. you%26#39;re free to make a fool of yourself all you please. It%26#39;s in the Constitution, snuggled up right next to freedom of religion and the right to drink. Or something like that. And then he put on Dolly Parton singing ';I%26#39;m Proud to be an American';. (Sometimes I think the tour guides have some sort of handbook that tells them what to say when things go wrong.) I personally found it distasteful and disrespectful that someone would take advantage of such a tragedy to promote their own political agenda. On the other hand, how respectful is it to ride past on a climate-controlled tour bus? It%26#39;s all very confusing.

Okay, off the soapbox. This is supposed to be a fun trip. It was now getting on for 3:30, the tour was pretty much over and Scott and I needed to get back to the room in time to spiffy up for our evening out. The afternoon traffic was beginning to gear up so we chose to leave the bus at the Empire State Building and take the subway back to the Hilton. That way we should have at least a nice, leisurely hour and a half in order to prepare for our big night out.

All I can say is HA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jennifer

Our Anniversary Trip-Day 1, Pt. 1 (Bus Trip)

LMAO!! There are too many hilarious parts and sarcastic parts to point out! I, too, can remember beer and food above all else! It sounds like you are about to have a rather interesting night...greatly looking forward to it!

Our Anniversary Trip-Day 1, Pt. 1 (Bus Trip)

This is a great report. You sound like true LSU fans. There has been some press about the obnoxious behavior of the LSU fans vs. the polite, sportmanslike and dignified Irish. GEAUX TIGERS!!!

Hilarious! Can%26#39;t wait to read about the rest of your trip!

Humour and a Jane Austen quote----right up my alley.

I think you made the right choice with St Paul%26#39;s, it%26#39;s a special place.

I know 2007 is only 10 days old, but I%26#39;m willing to bet this will definitely be one of the top (if not the best!) trip reports of the year. If you%26#39;d told me I%26#39;d still be reading - never mind asking for more - at the end of three lengthy instalments which have still only taken us part-way through Day One, I%26#39;d have thought you were nuts. In fact, I%26#39;m riveted, and can%26#39;t wait for the next - not sure how long you were in NYC, Jennifer, but really hope it was a lengthy stay!

I am trying to smother my cackles because I%26#39;m at work, but to no avail !

You had me at ';I can%26#39;t find my socks....';

The Big Apple notes...too funny

Scott%26#39;s got an excellent point about the Party Shuttle. Since I don%26#39;t drink beer, I think they just oughtta serve cocktails. And yes, I think our Constitution does guarantee freedom of cocktails.

';Big Apple Jazz 20s big venue cut apple 5 seeds 5 bugs'; -- could this have been the guide%26#39;s explanation for how we got to be The Big Apple? Most people attribute it to a jazz term. And we do have five boroughs, or counties, that make up the city. I think we%26#39;ve got more than five bugs though.

It%26#39;s definitely good luck to rub the nether region of the bull. That%26#39;s why it%26#39;s shiny.... lotsa luck going around.

Please come back and visit. I love reading your reports. And if you travel elsewhere, let us have a link to that trip report as well.

';Fear me Warren Buffet.'; - LOL!

Re: ';5 seeds, 5 bugs'; - I%26#39;m guessing that the tour guide was pointing out the coincidence that an apple typically has 5 seeds, NYC has 5 boroughs and NYC is also home to 5 species of cockroaches!

...ok, I just made that last part up.

Re: ';I knew that Broadway and 7th Avenue were the same street.'; For future visitors: in Mahattan, Broadway runs on a diagonal in some parts - particularly in the middle third of the island. In Times Square, B%26#39;way intersects 7th Ave at an angle, and the two streets sorta kinda meld together for about a block. But they are still two distinct streets.

Whew! Ready for the rest of Day 1!

Ah, now I remember. There are two theories about how New York became the Big Apple. The first was that to play in New York was considered a huge venue, a major gig by the jazz musicians of the 20s. I get the Big, I don%26#39;t know why they chose Apple. They were jazz players, maybe they were hungry. In the 70s New York might well have been named the Big Dorito, just a guess.

The second was that if you cut an apple in half you find five seeds, one seed for each of the boroughs. Bugs must have been my creative abbreviation of boroughs.

Thanks for clearing that up!

Jennifer