I Love NY!!

Hi everybody,
sorry for the long silent but it is true that in NY the people doesn't have time!!
At the moment I am in Niagara Falls where the life is more slow and relaxing and I have some time to write.

Back to the NY stuff:
as you know I landed here on Friday evening and the flight was good because on the plane I had my own screen to watch movies, music and play some stupid games...oh, I suggest you to watch Gran Torino, the last Clint Eastwood movie. Very good!!
Anyway, I took the shuttle to the hostel "Chelsea International Hostel" located in the middle of Manhattan and went to sleep.

Day 1: Saturday 02/05/09

I took a walk in the Chelsea quarter, just to worm up, and breakfast in Starbucks...veeery original!!!
After breakfast I started walking and God knows how many kilometers (oh, miles not kilometers) i have been walking!!!

Here is my itinerary:

1) Little Italy and China Town:
very nice areas even if they don't look as Italy and China (i guess) at all but if you are look for food, well you're in the right place!!

2) US Court House and City Hall Park
Nice area with nice buildings but i preferred the parks...I was so tired that I tried almost every bench of every park!

3) Broklin Bridge
During the morning the weather was not the best, cloudy and some rain but when I got to the Brookilin Bridge the sky cleared and and the sun come out :)
Crossing the bridge was just great. It takes around 15-20 minutes depending on how many picture you'll take and on how many people ask you to take a picture of them.
The view is amazing as you see Manhattan getting far and far and finally you can take some picture holding the camera horizontal and not vertical...oh, and you can also see the Statue of Liberty from the bridge even if it is quite far.
In Brooklin I stopped in one of the park under the bridge to have sandwich before coming back in the noise of Manhattan.

- Financial District
This part of the city is fantastic but is not a good place to take pictures, in fact it is impossible to make fit and entire tower in the 1,4" screen of my camera. I will need Photoshop to make a collage :D
I also went to Ground Zero but there is not much to see there now, just people working in a big hole and even if the towers are not there anymore you can feel that in thet place there was something big...very big. Strange feeling!

After that I had only the strength to get on the subway and go back to the hostel and sleep!

Day 2: Sunday 03/05/09

The day started very early...let's say around 4:00 am. The world should have only one time zone!!!
Anyway, at 4:30 I was completely awake and already walking for the room so I decided to go outside and was funny to see people having the last slice of pizza or the last hot dog before going to sleep.
This time I decided to have a walk in the central part of Manhattan starting from Madison Square Garden and walk Broadway street in north direction passing for the Empire State Building and ending in Time Square, where I stopped for the breakfast around 7:00.

After the coffee I went back to the Hostel to contact Carla end Ivo to go together to Harlem to assist to a celebration in the Abissinian Church (a kind of gospel mas). When we got there there was almost 200 meters of people standing in a row and waiting to enter. It turned out that that church is presente in almost every tourist guide in the world...conclusion, we did not go in!
As consolation prize we decided to find a place to eat the tipical Soul Food (chicken and waffels).

The day almost flew away and after a brief visit to the Closter Museum (medioeval stuff from europe..not very interesting for me) we went back to downtown and In the evening we went to a dinner party in the Queens with some Ivo's friends. Fun night and good people :)

Finally back to the hostel to pack and get ready to fly to Buffalo in the morning!

P.S.
Sorry for not posting any picture this time but I will post some as soon as I can download them!!!

FOLE IN AMERICA!!!

Hello to all,
here I am once again ready to go and ready to cross the ocean!
This time the destination is the USA and precisely the northeast with a small tour in Canada in Toronto.

This is my travel plan:

- May 1st: Departure from Bergen at 15:15 and arrive in NY at 20:20 (local), with a stopover in Amsterdam.

- May 2nd,3rd: NY City

- May 4th: Flight to Buffalo in the morning and transfer to Niagara Falls

- May 5th: Niagara Falls

- May 6th,7th: Toronto

- May 8th: return to NY by plane and then transfer to Boston by bus

- May 9th,10th: Boston

- May 11th-17th: After Boston, I will go south of NY city to visit Washington DC and Philadelphia, but the program is not yet defined :P

Unfortunately, or fortunately, this time I am gonna travel alone but in America there is a lot of people so I guess it wont be so hard to meet somebody on the way!
Indeed Berga and Giò dumped me this time... not for their desire but for "acts of God" ;)

Ok, now I am going to finish the bag because the plane will leave in a few hours.

SEE YOU IN AMERICA!!!