Monday July 6th

Rose in plenty of time to get the cab to Buffalo airport, which was just as well as despite doing the USA immigration thing on the internet we had to do the finger and photo thing at the border which took about 20 minutes.

Short flight to NY, Michele having to readjust to average class, then a cab to the hotel, our first experience of NY traffic. The hotel is really well located only about 50 metres from the Duffy Square end of Times Square.

Boy was NY a shock, the noise, smells, traffic, people everywhere, bus touts, comedy club touts, Obama condom sellers (see below). We wondered why we had come! Michele in particular was less than impressed on first impression.

Spent the arvo booking theatre tickets and taking in the atmosphere and getting used to the bustle. Michele was most taken by the young guy selling the Obama condoms (1 for 5, 2 for 7, 3 for 10), his spiel was “Obama condoms, election erection protection”, Obama condoms, the ultimate stimulus package, were just two I can remember. He was selling them on the corner just up from us, I stood and listened, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, I thought it was hilarious. Just as an aside, I love the way Geoff says, I had to adjust to cattle class from Buffalo to New York (he didn’t of course, he liked the sharp end of travel as much as I did. Ho Hum!)

After an early dinner at the restaurant attached to the hotel (tapas style and much better than chain steak house), went to see Avenue Q at The Golden Theatre. Really fantastic, a contemporary musical involving puppets as well as actors. It seems that most of the theatres here are pretty old and dated, the Golden held 800 (in old style narrow seats, don’t know how many Yanks fit in them), but seemed smaller than the old Suncorp Theatre, for those who remember it.

Despite all our good intentions after ogling at the crowds in Times Square and having a drink or two it was after midnight before we hit the sack.

We have decided that the only way to really cover the territory will be by the open top bus.

Tuesday 7th

Really slow morning, after sleeping in, breakfasting, attending to the washing it was noon before we ventured out. Caught the Red Bus and got off at the Empire State building (loved the marble) and re-queued. We hadn’t appreciated that once off it was impossible to get a top level seat again, and after letting three buses passed settled for a lower seat (upgraded in little Italy). Also had not appreciated how slow the tour would be due to traffic and the surprising distances between everything. Having decided that it was not worth get getting off at ground zero (still a massive construction site), but really developing a feel for the immensity of what happened, then found out we were too late for Ellis and the Statue of Liberty we stayed on the bus for the full circuit, under ponchos as it began to rain.

(to be continued)