Rhonda Bracey: At Random

We started our Sunday tour of New York City with a stop at Grand Central Station. Matthew was our tour guide (http://www.citywalksny.com), and he gave us a lot of history of the place, its architecture etc. — stuff we would never know just by looking at it.

We then wended our way in our chartered bus from mid-town to lower Manhattan, with Matthew pointing out places of interest, various neighbourhoods, and some of the history and stories associated with them. Our final destination was the 9/11 memorial area, where we stopped and walked around for quite some time. Again, Matthew gave us insights into some of the personal stories. If you’ve been, you know that this is a place that you can’t talk about too much.

Our next stop was Pier 61 at the Chelsea Piers for our 2-hour champagne brunch/lunch cruise on the Bateaux ‘Celestial’. The weather was just perfect, as you can see from the photos, and the cruise took us as close as we were allowed to get to the Statue of Liberty. However, the food and the seating arrangements left a lot to be desired. Let’s just say that if you’re on a buffet cruise with a bunch of hungry Americans, ask for seating that gets you to the buffet earlier rather than later, and check that the staff replenish the dishes often and with hot food, and have put out CLEAN plates with no food residue from previous use… I have no doubt our tour leader will be having words with the Bateaux people as I KNOW she had booked this more than 12 months ago and had asked for window seating for our group, which we didn’t get.

After lunch we spent the afternoon on the tour bus with our guide Matthew. Our only stop was Strawberry Field in Central Park, the memorial to John Lennon, who was shot at the nearby Dakota building in Dec 1980.

We had a most magnificent day — both for the weather we experienced (about 22C), and for the great tour given by Matthew.

Oh, one final thing — Matthew pointed out the hot dog stands and mentioned that a stand outside The Met would cost the stand owner some $250,000 to $300,000 a year, to be paid to the City!!!

I took well over 100 photos today — just a few are here.