New York

December 2005

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	We had a nutritious breakfast at the National Coney Island at Detroit Metro Airport before we left.
	William waits and waits and WAITS for luggage at Laguardia Airport.
	We took a "super shuttle" - a van shared by 10 passengers going to a whole bunch of widely dispersed Manhattan destinations. While it took 4 hours to get from the airplane to our hotel in the financial district, we got to see a lot of Manhattan that we wouldn't have seen from the subway.
	Elaine on the super shuttle.
	We passed by the UN on the super shuttle.
	After we settled in at our hotel, we walked to nearby Fraunce's Tavern and had a yummy dinner. This was our first food since 7am - they could have served us gruel and we would have been happy.
	The historic tavern was the site of Washington's farewell address to his troops at the end of the American Revolution.
	It also housed several U.S. departments when New York was the fledgling nation's capital.
	We got tickets to an off-Broadway play, "Waiting For Godot" by Samuel Beckett. It was not our first choice, but almost everything was sold out. This show is an existential drama about two men who wait for Godot. They don't know who Godot is, or why they are waiting, but they keep on waiting. In act II they wait some more. It really was very enjoyable and reminiscent of the rest of our day, but the best part was that Al Pacino was in the audience. The theatre itself is interesting - it is in the sanctuary of St Clement's Episcopal Church whose mission includes fostering theatre arts. The congregation turned the original sanctuary into an off-broadway theatre 30 years ago.
	We had desert at the Roxy in Times Square.
	Times Square after the Roxy.
	Elaine posed by the sign for our hotel. This Club Quarters is very basic, but it's clean, comfortable, has Internet available, and is relatively (for New York) cheap. It is one block off Wall Street, which allowed us to explore a part of Manhattan where we hadn't spent much time before. The Wall Street subway station was about 100 feet from our hotel door, so we were close to everything
	Christmas decorations that were all over the financial area.
	The next morning (Friday) we headed to the TKTS (half-price broadway tickets) line at the South Street Seaport, also near our hotel.
	After waiting in line for about an hour, we secured tickets for Chicago for the Saturday matinee. Elaine was exited because Huey Lewis was starring and we got great seats!
	There we are reflected in a shoe-store window while we wait on line. William had just returned from his expedition to buy a hat. In the gorgeous sunny winter day we were treated to, his poor scalp was baking. The hat was a great sun screen, and it helped when it turned colder later.
	A tall masted ship at the South Street Seaport Museum
	William waits in line for tickets.
	Buildings at the South Street Seaport. These are among the oldest in Manhattan.
	The Fulton Fish Market at the South Street Seaport.
	Cool beer posters at a micro-brewery at the South Street Seaport.
	The best one.
	The barque Peking.
	The Brooklyn Bridge (foreground) and Manhattan Bridge, from the Seaport.
	Tall ship with skyscrapers behind.
	More of same.
	William and Elaine and the East River.
	William inspects the Pilot House from the steam tugboat "New York Central No. 31". The tug would pull barges full of freight train cars across the Hudson River from New Jersey. These tugs were in service for years after the railroads built tunnels into Manhattan.
	Sculpture in the financial district.
	"Group of Four Trees" by Jean Dubuffet. Displayed in front of One Chase Manhattan Plaza. At five storeys tall and 25 tons of concrete and aluminum, it is the largest public sculpture in New York City.
	The New York Stock Exchange. We didn't realize it in the daytime, but they have Christmas lights around the pillars that look like an American flag. You can sorta make them out in this picture but at night it looks pretty stunning.
	Christmas tree in front of the stock exchange
	Trinity Church near the stock exchange and just down the street from the World Trade Center site.
	Trinity Church on our way back from the World Trade Center site.
	Sculpture of the bull on Broadway near the stock exchange.
	The U.S. Custom House, at the Battery. The Custom House was where tariffs used to be collected. Tariffs were the primary source of income for the U.S. government before the income tax was established. They used to have quite a treasury here.
	We wanted to go the New York Unearthed exhibit at Battery Park, but it was closed. It's an archeological dig.
	Lower Manhattan from the Battery. What a beautiful day!
	Building detail
	The damaged sculpture salvaged from the ruins of the World Trade Center plaza, on display in Battery Park. It will remain at this site, in this condition, as a memorial and reminder.
	Street performers near the ferry that goes from Battery Park to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.
	Castle Clinton, part of the series of forts built to defend New York during the war of 1812 (though it got its name afterward, in 1817). They sell tickets to the ferry in the fort.
	Miss Liberty from Battery Park
	War Memorial in Battery Park.
	More memorial.
	The "Bowling Green" subway station at the Battery. We boarded it to go up to the Metropolitan Museum.
	We emerged from the subway hungry and had lunch at a bagel shop at 83rd and Lexington. Mmmm good.
	Big crowds wait in line to get through security at the Metropolitan Museum. We ended up just briefly visiting the jammed Van Gogh exhibit, and spent most of our time in the less crowded Robert Rauschenberg exhibit. We also visited the Met's five Vermeers. Elaine is still working on her goal to see all the Vermeers in the world - there are only thirty-some. (We saw about 10 in Europe in 2004, so we're making excellent headway!)
	After the Met, we went to Payard, a patisserie and restaurant on Lexington nearby. We had heard about it listening to The Splendid Table on NPR just before our trip. The subject was "less expensive elegant holiday dining" in Manhattan. William's ears perked up at "less expensive." The restaurant was lovely and the food and service were great, but it most definitely was not "less expensive."
	Payard interiors. It tastes as good as it looks!
	After dinner we snuck back to the museum for our and got a quick peek at the Van Gogh show. Then it was on to the Iridium Jazz Club in Times Square, where we had tickets to see Gato Barbieri - he's the legendary saxophonist best known for the score of Last Tango in Paris - the show was awesome.
	The next morning (Saturday, New Year's Eve) we slept in, though we had considered going back to the Met for an early-bird viewing of Van Gogh. We foraged for breakfast at a nearby cafe, and then went to Radio City Music Hall to take the "stage door" tour. We were pressed for time so we took our only cab ride from the subway stop in Times Square to the hall. These are chandeliers in the lobby.
	The carpet at Radio City - has abstract representations of several musical instruments.
	More Radio City lobby
	Non-public stairwell at Radio City
	We got a peak in the auditorium while the Christmas Spectacular was in progress. I think this is Old Man Christmas.
	The stage is wide enough for 42 Rockettes - much bigger than most stages.
	The gold ceiling in a private apartment at Radio City.
	Circular dining area in the private apartment.
	We got to meet a real Rockette during the tour.
	The Rockettes' rehearsal room. The barre is higher than the traditional ballet barre so the Rockettes can get better stretches for their high kicks.
	Rockette dolls.
	Rockette costumes plus the little black dress Celine Dion wore for one of her shows at Radio City.
	One of several aluminum sculptures commissioned for Radio City Music Hall.
	The skating rink at Rockefeller Center across 50th Street from Radio City Music Hall.
	The Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center.
	Most of the skaters on the rink were not very spectacular, but the little girl in the middle here seemed to be a budding Kristi Yamaguchi.
	Angel at Rockefeller Center.
	At Rockefeller Center, we lunched on bagels leftover from breakfast, then walked to the Ambassador Theater for the matinee of Chicago. It was great, and best of all it was live.
	Elaine poses with the Playbill from Chicago.
	Watching those dancers in Chicago wore us out so, we took the subway back to our hotel to take a nap. The 50th street station was decorated with mosaics of Alice in Wonderland.
	After our nap, we took the train back to Times Square, which was busy preparing for New Years Eve. They corral all the spectators behind barriers so they can control the crowds. Everybody is checked with a metal detector before they can get in. Once in, you can't move around - unless you have a ticket for a private affair, which we had, and we flashed the ticket grandly whenever we passed a checkpoint. What power!!
	Blurry picture of the Waterford crystal ball atop the Allied Chemical Building in Times Square.
	Our party was in the Olive Garden in Times Square. We couldn't see the ball from most of the restaurant, but we could see these crowds congregated outside. The restaurant let us outside at 11:45 so we could watch the ball drop.
	More crowds outside.
	The Hershey's Times Square store, from our window at the Olive Garden
	Celebration accouterments.
	The view of the party from our table. They had unlimited drinks and a nice Olive Garden buffet. Mudslides are yummy!!!
	William and Elaine on the dance floor.
	Early in the evening we met two lovely young women from Australia - Stephanie and Emma. We ran into them numerous times and enjoyed their company. We met numerous people throughout the evening and had a surprisingly delightful time.
	We went outside just before midnight, and Elaine posed with a nearby New York fire man.
	The crystal ball gets ready for its descent.
	Our balloons got all tangled up.
	The crowd outside the Olive Garden
	Fireworks at midnight. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!
	Confetti filled the air.
	Pontiac got into the spirit of things just after midnight.
	William and Elaine in 2006
	After the ball drop, we went back inside the restaurant to give the crowds a chance to dissipate. We met some New Yorkers at this table.
	Our final look at the restaurant.
	Times Square debris.
	New York's finest.
	We took the subway back to our hotel and were surprised that we were able to get seats. There was PLENTY of room as you can see!
	The next morning, we took the train to Greenwich Village, where we had reservations for brunch at the Blue Note. This was our home subway station, mere steps from our hotel.
	More subway station.
	"W" mosaic is for Wall Street at the Wall Street station.
	Elaine poses in front of the Blue Note.
	We were seated at the Modern Jazz Quartet table - signed by members of the quartet.
	The Blue Note features Asian-American crossover for its Sunday brunch series. The group (Yukijuroshi) featured two Asians and one American (married to a Japanese) and music was pure Brazilian Bossa Nova.
	The drummer sang a sweet "Girl From Ipanema" - in Portuguese.
	After brunch, we headed to Hell's Kitchen (the neighborhood west of Times Square) to get real New York bagels from H & H. It's open 24-7 including on New Years day. We had some extra time and visited the U.S.S. Intrepid Museum which was next door (on the Hudson River) and open.
	The museum has a British Airways Concorde on display, so we looked it over.
	It was very hard to get a full picture of the plane - it was too big and we couldn't get far enough back.
	So I took two adjacent pictures of the plane and "stitched" them together with cool software from my camera.
	The tower on the Intrepid. The aircraft carrier was commissioned in 1943 and decommissioned in 1974.
	Super Tomcat fighter craft on the deck of the Intrepid.
	Grumman A6-F fighter craft on the Intrepid. Elaine is partial to Grumman planes because she worked at Grumman Data Systems in the old days.
	An early warning craft with a radar pod on top.
	The spire in the middle is the Chrysler building, and the Empire State Building is visible to the right. From the deck of the Intrepid.
	The closest we got to the Empire State Building.
	The Intrepid's bridge
	Another plane on display on the Intrepid
	A fragment from American Airlines flight 11 was on display on the Intrepid. The Intrepid was headquarters for 750 FBI agents during the aftermath of 9/11.
	We finally made it to H & H Bagels, and got some to take home.
	We took the 42nd street bus about two blocks on our way back to Times Square, but got out because the traffic was so bad. Pedestrians and the subway really rule in New York!!
	We saw some buskers at the station on our way back to the hotel. They put on a really good show.
	The obligatory New York pretzel, from a street vendor.
	Done with our trip, we got home, and took a picture we meant to take on the way out. Elaine's car was in the shop for service during our trip, so we stuffed one of our suitcases in William's Miata trunk, and put the other one in the footspace on the passenger side. Elaine demonstrates her sitting technique...
	...And ever so gracefully squeezes herself out of the car. Happy 2006 to all!!