Tuesday 27 December 1983 – New York

Tuesday 27 December 1983 – New York City

Well, all is fine now. No problems. We slept for over eleven hours – lights out at 20.15 and were awake at 07.30. that was much needed rest which put a new light on everything. We had a light breakfast and finished our packing for our short trip to NY. We took two flight bags and a minimum of clothes.

Nora got us to the bus stop about half an hour before it was due. It was still about – 7°C so we sat in the car with Nora, chatting with her until the bus was due. We got out and then had a freezing wait until it turned up about 20 minutes late. There was quite an assortment of people waiting with us including a real Al Jaffee character with the most incredible set of whiskers. He was hawking away furiously to Matt’s disgust.

We clambered aboard the big silver NJ bus with it’s darkened windows, paying the driver $11.35 for the three of us – very reasonable, we thought. We sat right at the back where we could all sit together and had a good, comfortable trip into the city. We found the bus very hot, but could open our window a little, which kept us cool. We got to Manhattan via one of the tunnels – not sure which one, but that was quite an experience.

The bus station is vast – hope we can find our way back there! It is in a very ropey area – E42 I think – where all the porn shops etc are. Nora had told us that the NY Information Centre was in Times Square at 47^th, so we made our way there but couldn’t find it. Turns out that, for a change, Nora, our usually reliable guide, was wrong – it was further down.

No problems though – we had a simple map which guided us and we had an interesting walk. Some of the shops are fascinating and there are some great T-Shirts, although everything is very expensive there. (I was a great buyer of T-Shirts at this time – mainly as souvenirs. When we moved from South Africa I had over 85, some of which I was told would have to go. I still have a couple from this trip!) We walked all the way to our hotel which is at 49^th and Lexington. Quite a long way, but fascinating – the people you see!! Matt was nearly bowled over by a Humpty Dumpty lookalike who must have been about seven foot tall and about 160 kilograms and was muttering to himself as he strode by. So many people we have seen converse with themselves – some actually shouting rather than just muttering.

The hotel is very nice and is much better than we thought it might be. And it is right behind the Waldorf! Many very nice places in the area too. As far as I remember we are paying about $280 for the three nights and it seems very reasonable. The room is not very big – smaller than our cabin on the QE2 I think – and there were only two beds. They brought in a cot for Matt and managed to get it into the room somehow. Colour TV of course (which is distracting me right now), nice bathroom but too warm for us as most American places are.

We dumped our goods and were off on foot for the heliport. On the way we made our first mistake. We stopped for lunch at a “Bun ‘n’ Burger” which was awful and expensive. If we had only waited a few minutes we could have had one of Matt’s favourites – a Burger King. I had a chicken burger which consisted of a piece of fried chicken about two inches by four inches on a dry roll with a thimbleful of coleslaw.

We  enjoyed the walk down to the heliport – down Lexington to 34^th. The area changed a good deal as we walked and became quite scruffy at one stage. (Some years later, a dyed in the wool New Yorker told me that one of the aspects of the city that visitors didn’t appreciate was how quickly they could move from ‘safe’ areas to ‘dangerous’ areas. Perhaps we had the luck of the innocents. There were parts he would never go into – ironically, he was mugged in one such no-go area when he took a short cut.)

We had noticed, both going to the hotel and now how many ambulances and fire engines there are, hurtling around lights flashing, sirens howling and they seemed to be getting thicker on the ground as we got closer to 34^th. The reason was quite simple – there was an Emergency Hospital there.

 

It was somewhat overcast, but still thrilling to be over the city

The weather had changed a little by the time we got to the heliport just before 14.00. It was a bit overcast, but we felt we should still go because the weather forecast is for rain tomorrow turning to sleet and followed by snow the day after. They say it should clear by Thursday – but we didn’t want to rely on that. We had to wait for about an hour -  it was a strange little organisation called Island Helicopters. They operated out of prefabricated cabins and are all very casual. We finally got into our chopper which, to our amusement, was piloted by a black man. We laughed to think of the reaction from some of our reactionary friends back in Zimbabwe.

Liberty

And then off we went! What an experience!! Absolutely marvellous despite the conditions. I sat up front next to the pilot, so I could see through the floor as well as out of the windscreen. We went up the river, over Central Park, over the docks and out to the Statue of Liberty, then back to the Empire State Building and the heliport. About twenty minutes for $40 each and absolutely well worth it.

After buying a couple of souvenirs, we narrowly avoided being run over and then caught a cab back to Times Square to see if we could get any cheap tickets at TKTS. The ride wasn’t expensive at $3.80 and was quite quick. Rab was fascinated going up 47^th Street between Madison and Sixth because so many jewellery shops were concentrated there.

It was a little before 16.00 when we got to Times Square only to find that the line was about one hour and forty five minutes long. None of the shows which were available was one that we really wanted to see. Standing for almost two hours and then paying $22 each for a ticket was not on, especially as it was still very cold – 4°C. so we just wandered through the shops again and bought another suitcase – a wheeled Samsonite at half price; we haven’t been able to find out why it was so cheap yet.

We walked all the way back to the hotel carrying the case and dropped it off there, watching TV for a while (Channel 7 was the New York Station and was very good I must say). I called Uli to see if he had been able to cancel our bookings for Denver. (We had planned to go there in case there was no snow in Europe or New Jersey) The temperatures are still – 20°C and colder and we feel that since we have seen snow everywhere we don’t need to go to Aspen to see more.

All was well, according to Uli so we set out for another trip up 47^th street to admire the jewellery, but of course it had all been taken inside for the night. While we were in the area we thought we might as well check on availability of tickets for Radio City. On the way we were diverted by coming across a fascinating book store with discounted books!! (There was very tight control on the selling price of books in Southern Africa, resulting in very expensive books!) We managed to find several very good books at amazingly cheap prices. Hope it will not cost too much to get them home!

What a tree!!

Laden down we trudged on to Radio City to find that they are fully booked until the end of the season. On the way back to the hotel we stopped off at the Rockefeller Center to watch the skating. It was a cold crisp evening and there were Christmas lights everywhere – what a spectacular experience. We toyed with the idea of heading back to the hotel in a horse drawn carriage, but they wanted $22.00 so that was not on. By a majority vote (i.e. excluding one - me) we decided to dine at the Burger King near the hotel. So we walked back there and had our junk food – very reasonable but not my idea of a dinner.

We were back in our room just after 21.00 and watched TV until the 23.00 news. Big news was a helicopter crash at Newark Airport and an enormous explosion in Buffalo. And so to bed, happy that it wasn’t our helicopter that went down.