New York City

Last weekend, Rachel and I headed up to New York City for the weekend.

Honestly, New York City is not one of my favorite places. It is crowded, and the people do not tend to be very happy or friendly. We went this particular weekend in order to meet up with Sarah and Greg Cornell (pictured here) and to attend a New York Mets game at Shea Stadium (Shea will be demolished, like Yankee Stadium, at the end of this season).





We arrived early Saturday morning and began our day with a tour of the Bronx Zoo. Above is a video of the polar bear, who was especially playful. I give the Bronx Zoo high marks. Although it is not large in land area, The Bronx Zoo has high quality exhibits and very good habitat for its animals. The only downfall was that it was a bit crowded, like all other spots in New York City.

Saturday evening, we took the subway from Time Square to Flushing Meadows in Queens to see the New York Mets play the Houston Astros at Shea Stadium. She was built in the late 1950's. It has several seating levels, which results in a lot of restricted view seats (you can't see foul balls due to the overhanging level above you).

Citi Park will open in 2009 and is situated directly adjacent to the Shea Stadium outfield. It looks like it will be a very nice park. The brick facade is beautiful.

Flushing Meadows is also home to the tennis stadium. This is the stadium currently hosting the U.S. Open Tennis Tournament. The tournament began the Monday after this Saturday. It looked like a very cool stadium. I was surprised it was that big. I think it would probably hold every tennis fan in the United States - all 4,000 of them.







Sunday, we took a bus tour of Uptown Manhattan with Sarah, Greg and their friends. We had the worst tour guide ever. He was plenty knowledgeable, but he was certainly not excited about the material. I guess in some ways, he was reflective of the stereo-typical New Yorker - unhappy with life in general.

This is a shot of the Time Warner building.

Our tour took us by the Trump Towers. No sign of "The Donald" nor his hair.















Central Park. It always amazes me how large Central Park is. We learned that every tree, path and hill was planned, planted and created. The original city planners really had foresight to leave that much open space available.




Metropolitan Museum of Art.


My favorite spectacle in the city is always the New Yorkers. It is a sea of diverse humanity. This gentleman is one example. He has great hair. Unfortunately, picture quality is low because I had to inconspicuously shoot this with my cell phone. New Yorkers are entertaining, even if they are not very friendly or happy.





REFLECTIONS - CONSIDER AMTRAK



In order to avoid driving, Rachel and I took Amtrak from Philly to New York for the weekend. It was the first time that either of us had ridden Amtrak. It was actually a very pleasant experience. So, for this "Reflections", I decided I would tell you reasons you might want to take Amtrak, if you have the opportunity, rather than fly:

1) LEG ROOM - The coach class seats have more leg room and more butt room than an airplane seat. Side-by-side seats, so you don't have to worry about being crammed into a row of three or more.

2) Arrive 15 minutes before your train leaves. No more arriving 2 hours before your flight. For short to intermediate trips, Amtrak will often get you there faster than a flight, once you factor in 2 hour early arrival, likely delays and waiting on checked luggage.

3) Use your laptop and electronic devices the entire time. No longer do you have to turn off your electronic devices to take off and land. Best of all, each side-by-side seat comes with its own set of electrical outlets, so you don't have to worry about your laptop battery expiring during your trip.

4) Safety - although Amtrak does not have a perfect record, you are much more likely to walk or limp away from a train wreck than you are from a plane crash. The only way gravity could take effect would be if the train wreck occurred on a bridge.

5) Central location - I can think of very few airports located centrally inside a city. You typically must land and then secure other transportation arrangements to get to your urban hotel. Not so with Amtrak. Amtrak stations are located centrally inside most cities. Our hotel was two subway stops from NYC's Penn Station, where our train arrived.

6) No surcharges or lost luggage. Unless you are packing for a 3 month trip, you don't have to check luggage on Amtrak. You can comfortably stow all of your suitcases above your head in the luggage racks.

7) Although there are some pretty cool airports these days, 19th century train stations are simply beautiful. They are some of the coolest architectural expressions in many cities.






8) No expensive airport parking. We parked at our local train station for free, took regional rail into the city, where we caught Amtrak. If we would have flown, we would have paid $30 to park.

Amtrak is not perfect. It is not cheap, but it is competitive with respect to flight prices.