Day Nine - NY

(Spoiler alert: Full-blow RANT STORM APPROACHING)

I started the morning with a phantom phone call at 2.10am from someone in Australia. I could hear the person but could not understand due to the bad signal from Slater City Mo.

Woke up at 5am to be ready for a 6am departure. (I really knew that this was not a possibility but hey…. Ya’ gotta live in hope – this is the same family that was late to my own wedding!)

Sooooooo, we left at 6.20 to basically appease me.

We made our way in the truck to Marshall, and then took a bypass to avoid the centre of town. (Please note, I use the term “town” as loosely as I use the term City. Mo!) So we avoided the town and also the road that gets us back onto the highway. As tar became gravel and gravel turned to dusty mud, we were cheered up by the phrase. “Hmmm. This doesn’t look right. Oh well. Just keep going and we’ll probably hit the highway soon.”

We e.v.e.n.t.u.a.l.l.y. hit the highway, but the gas guzzling behemoth, that is the town car, needed satiating. We stopped for fuel ($3.34 / gal – you do the maths) and Tim (God bless him) decided he was STARVING! We could have gone to any number of drive-through diners but we had to do the Golden Arches thing.

As the time ticked away and I had visions of driving up to the airport to choruses of , “Oh I’m sorry, but you really needed to be here 5 minutes ago. There’s absolutely nothing we can do for you”,  we  pulled up just in time to join the endless clueless people lining up to join two flight leaving at the same time – OK I’ll put you out of your misery – made the flight with 5 mins to spare.

 

Flew to Chicago – cannot believe the way that the suburban houses look like a circuit board (There you go Ben – something for you!) Neat straight rows with equidistant lump after lump etc all in neat rows.

Had 45 minutes wait then on to New York. You may not be aware that New York was built on the old "Green Acres" film lot when they finished filming all those years ago. You can still see remnants of the Hooterville set sticking out in places!

Landed in New York and had a short taxi ride to our hotel. Streets blocked and food vans feeding make-up people because they are filming an episode of “Royal Pains” from our Hotel Restaurant. I’m a STAR – thrice removed. (I saw probably someone who probably saw someone who was probably a star)

We sat at the local Irish pub to have a beer and plan our trip. Found an interesting little restaurant. Apparently Sue and I have been eating there quite a lot over the years.

Ate at an Indian / vege / not-really vege /  restaurant  but the dish was very nice.

Went back to the pub after dinner and had a beer watching the baseball. Amazing how you can become an expert in another sport so quickly just by watching 10 mins of it.

 

Back to the room for an early night and an early wake up.

Here are some shots of the streets.

The compulsory fire escape.

Flower shops and food vendors to prove that this is a residential place - not a city place like Sydney and Melbourne.

The flowers were incredibly perfumed. Much more so that to ones I can buy to keep Sue in the style to which she has become accustomed.

Saw this woman come speeding around the corner in front of me (she was about 65-70 years old) on a kid's scooter. I was a bit slow with the camera.

They box in all of the trees with little gardens that people tend.

There are little hand-made signs all over the place asking for people to keeps their dogs out of the gardens.