Mad About NYC

Something we enjoy about flying the way in which we do it, is change. There's the change it makes to the psyche, somehow altering time and space as we know it. The change in our perspective on this incredible planet of course. Also though, there's change of plans. It turned out that the airspace was locked up for flyers of our sort (poor), so rather than Linden our best option was Westchester. We connected with an exceptional couple near there who offered two of their places for us to stay, and their many kindnesses enhanced our brief NYC experience exponentially.

Our first night was in midtown in a loft of their business. Dropping our stuff (including the bike which I'd lugged on the subway and partially assembled outside Grand Central to the considerable enjoyment and/or annoyance of thousands), we set off to explore. This scene anticipates our adventures that Herman Hesse might say are best enjoyed by "Madmen Only."

Dinner at Mario's got us off to a great start, then we walked. A lot. Mostly up Broadway. Times Square is perhaps the most descriptive in this size of photo, but if time ever catches up again (maybe in a few days?) I'll post some larger pix on the Photo link.

Meanwhile, there's one detail from the Square that conveys what substance helped us stay so awake at 1am with little sleep and many travails.

Next day with the bike fully assembled we rode from 36th up to the park. Don't do this if you are a fearful person, because the bike lanes are considered hunting preserves. We survived, and actually enjoyed it. These two outcomes might have been partly due to what we were riding: my custom bicycle for two, consisting of two seats and double-wide pedals on a cheap old standard mountain bike. People laughed, did double-takes, stared, took pictures, and perhaps decided to spare us as unique specimens of bike riders. It was also delightful to be riding rather than walking or sitting in a bus or subway, and being able to actually converse about what we saw. The park of course, totally blew us away. There's simply no way to describe how amazing our time was there, as we rode around and through it all the way up to the Reservoir. Lots of pix of course, but here's one I especially like for the size of pix on this blog (remember this from any movies?):

The day continued getting more magnificent as evening approached and our friends joined us for a truly breathtaking flight. With the Hudson now open to us, we four flew down and back. From all the pix, here's one I like in this size:

Here's another, of the Lady who symbolizes so much.

Wish I had time to write and to process/share more pix, but instead I'm going to sleep for the first time in three days (not counting truncated dreamtimes). Tonight we're in Wilmington (change brought us here rather than the several other options we'd planned). Tomorrow we're on Amtrak into DC for at least one night. At least that's the plan tonite...