In September of 2012 I decided to take my first trip to NYC, alone. To make it more interesting I thought I'd just take the Greyhound bus on friday night, sleep on the bus [or at least try to], get to Manhattan in the morning, walk throughout the day and then catch the midnight bus back to Toronto that way I wouldn't have to find anywhere to sleep in expensive Manhattan.
It definitely turned out to be a way tougher bus trip than I expected. I didn't realize how hard it is for me not only to fall asleep but even to stay asleep while sitting down. I did finally fall asleep a few times towards the morning hours but if I pulled a 15 minute snooze that was a record.
I had a list of all the places I wanted to go and see, of course I was planning on checking off the list by walking throughout the day. It's amazing how everything seems so close when seeing it on the Google map. But it wasn't. Instead of arriving at 7 am the bus was delayed by about an hour and a half. It was due to an international bus being ahead of us at the border and since they were not American or Canadian they all had to go through the finger prints scan so we were stuck sitting on the bus waiting for over an hour.
The first stop I had to make after we got off the bus was a Starbucks to get wifi and charge my smart phone since it used up most of the battery while I was texting before reaching the border. It was really hard to find one with power outlets. I did some research and as it turns out most of the places were making the power outlets unavailable to public due to it being overused by people who work from home that go to coffee shops to work on their laptops. I finally did find one. Bought a coffee and plugged in the phone to charge.
After about an hour I picked up my gear and left. My first stop was a camera shop where I bought a few packs of film for my photography. This is where the adventure began. The next stop was the TV show "Friends" building which I would always see and was curious what that area really looked like. It definitely was different since that's not really where it's filmed. The streets, shops and neighbourhood on the show are not real. But i did find the building and it definitely looked the same. I loved the area and for sure will visit it another time.
Then I decided to just walk down further to the area of the Twin Towers. It was way further than it seemed on the map, plus I was constantly making stops to take photos and that definitely did slow me down. As I was getting closer I noticed there was more and more people walking, unfortunately mostly tourists and people selling 911 books. After seeing the extremely long line up for the Twin Tower area I decided to get out of there as fast as I could. That area really slowed me down.
My next destination was the Brooklyn Bridge. The plan was to walk through the Battery Park but didn't know the paths and after seeing the time was something I couldn't risk wasting I decided to go by the streets, plus I find the streets more interesting. Once I reached the Common Historic District I walked through the park and entered the bridge. It was beautiful. It's something I saw on TV, in movies, videos, pictures, anywhere and everywhere all the time and I finally saw it in real life myself. I loved it. I just wish there was less people. It was packed. I did manage to find a gap in between groups of people to take a photo.
The Brooklyn Bridge was longer than I expected, especially since I wasn't sure which way to go when it separated in Brooklyn. Plus I have to admit I definitely wore the wrong shoes for this trip. Puma slippers. Sure they're comfortable but not for 30+ kms walk, and it was definitely way warmer in NYC than in Toronto. The temperature was in high 20's [that's celsius which is about 80 fahrenheit]. After a couple of hours I decided to change into my flip flops, not sure whether that was a smart move.
Of course with my luck I ended up taking the longer route off the bridge. Walked down a long street before I could turn to go to the edge of Brooklyn to see Manhattan and finally sit down on a bench after walking straight for over five hours. Decided to change back into slippers. Unfortunately that was impossible. My feet were so swollen I couldn't even put the slippers on. Thought I'd sit for a bit and maybe the swelling would decrease. Nope. That didn't happen. After about half an hour of sitting I decided to just start heading back. My original plan was to walk to Williamsburg bridge but after experiencing how off I was with the distances in the city I thought I'd settle for Manhattan bridge.
It was a little bit confusing to find the bridge, I just kept on looking up and trying to figure out where it touched the ground. My feet were already in a lot of pain and due to that I wasn't noticing as much around me as I normally would so I didn't take as many photos as before crossing the bridge. I did see one interesting man by a hot dog stand on an empty street sitting at a doorway reading a paper. I definitely had to stop for that one. I have to admit I was pretty impressed with Brooklyn, I guess my expectations were lower.
I finally found the bridge. I was about to enter it when two people on bicycles were getting off the bridge and gave me a dirty look. Shortly after another person on bicycle came off the bridge so I quickly stopped her and asked if I was going the right way. As it turns out I was entering the bicycle way, the pedestrians had to use the other side of the bridge. Once I got onto the correct side of the bridge I could barely walk. My feet were burning from the flip flops. I was in so much pain I couldn't even think about photography. The heavy cameras hanging around my neck and the bag on my shoulder were definitely not making it any better.
To make long story short it took me more than two hours to get over the bridge since I was walking so slow. Once I hit Chinatown, which originally was one of the areas I really wanted to see and capture, I couldn't wait to get back to the bus terminal. To make things worse Chinatown was packed with some special event, so packed that I couldn't even pick my camera up to shoot any photos, not that it was something that I even thought about at that time.
Reached SoHo and didn't even look around, all I was thinking about was reaching the station. Later on I realized I completely missed Little Italy which was another area I really wanted to see. It took me about two hours to get to a Starbucks on 7th Avenue where I could sit for a bit and use the wifi to check things on my smart phone. Didn't stay long, thought I'd just go to Times Square and sit there until it was time for me to catch the bus back home. According to the map on my smart phone it was supposed to take me 45 minutes to get there, so I thought since my feet were in pain and I was walking slower it would take me just over an hour. Oh boy was I wrong [not the first time].
After passing Penn Station on 34th I was counting the blocks to Times Square, by the time I reached 38th I knew I could only walk a few more blocks so I decided to go back to Penn station and just wait for my bus there, by now it was around 7:30 pm. I turned back and barely made it to the station. Walking through fully packed sidewalks didn't make it any easier. Once I got into the station and found the first row of seats I just sat down and thought I wouldn't be able to get up any time soon. After a few minutes I figured it would be better for me to find where to catch my bus and just chill in that area for the remaining few hours. I found a couple of police officers, they couldn't help me. Found the information booth and asked there. As it turns out I was at the wrong station. This station was for local [within States] trains, I had to go to Port Authority Bus Terminal on 42nd. When I heard that I almost started to cry. I was almost there when I turned around to come back to Penn Station. I had to walk through the same area again which by that time was even more packed with people. I really didn't think I was going to make it.
When I first found out where to go I thought maybe I could hang out at Times Square for a bit after all but by the time I got to the area I couldn't even look in that direction. I was just trying to run [but was crawling] to the station. I finally made it. The first thing I did was found the ticket booths and switched to the next available bus with a penalty fee. It was definitely an exhausting trip. As soon as I got my seat I just lay down and fell asleep, which this time wasn't as hard as the other way since I have been up for just under 40 hours [except those few snoozes on the bus over night]. Once we got to Toronto there was more walking for me to the Union station which took about 20 minutes. All I could think about was my bed, my bed and my bed. I couldn't even think of New York city anymore.
Two weeks later I went again.... but that's for another time, maybe next time ;)
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An AMAZING eye for framing, shadow, light etc. Love it.
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