New York, New York: Pt 2 (Irene)

It’s official: I am a hurricane survivor. So are Lucy and Matt, apart from the inevitable psychological trauma caused by two days’ confinement with me. Physically, we’re fine. Well rested, even. We slept right through the main event. The whole thing failed to live up to my expectations. It was, in Lucy’s words, “a lame storm.”

Despite Fox News’ rational and entirely non-sensationalist predictions, New York survived Irene. When Lucy and I escaped the apartment for twenty minutes on Sunday afternoon, there were some scattered branches around, and that was it. There were, however, a million police cars on patrol, about twelve for every pedestrian in the neighbourhood. I think we may have chosen the dodgiest possible area to live in.

The worst part of the hurricane was the fact that the whole city went into hibernation for the whole weekend. No subway, no Broadway shows, no restaurants – nothing. It was severely uncool. We spent the whole time reacquainting ourselves with the internet, skyping people until they made up bad excuses to leave, repacking our suitcases, eating stuff, watching youtube videos, etc, etc. Below is an accurate depiction of how we spent our time: plugged in and silent.


It felt really, really good to leave our crappy flat and do something today. After spending hours battling post office queues – you’d better appreciate your birthday present, Mel! – Lucy and I made our way downtown to Ground Zero.

It was covered with cranes.

So instead, we went to this mega-awesome store called ‘Century 21,’ which contained many pairs of cheap shoes, most of which we bought. I now have double the amount of shoes that I originally brought. I’m still trying to figure out how to dupe the baggage check-in people on Thursday.

After a trip to Starbucks – and a random chat with an Aussie ex-pat, who recognised our accents – we visited the 9/11 memorial museum around the corner. (The real memorial site is opening on the tenth anniversary in about two weeks.) Afterwards, we took the Staten Island ferry to get some good (free!) views of the Statue of Liberty, and then met up with Matt in Soho. More shopping ensued. We ended the night with dinner at a Thai restaurant.

The most notable feature of this restaurant was the one-way mirror bathroom. It freaked me the hell out. I went in, fumbled for a light switch, failed to find one, asked the waiter how to turn on the lights, and was told that turning on the lights would allow everyone in the place to see me use the toilet. So I left the light off. Trouble was, even if nobody could see me, I could see everyone outside, and it was an incredibly unsettling experience.

Also, the thai green curry burnt my tastebuds clear off.

And so ends my New York adventure, and my travels with Matt and Lucy – unless, of course, my train is cancelled by Irene-related nonsense tomorrow morning. Boston, here I (hopefully) come!

New York, New York: Pt 1 (Claire)

We’ve had an interesting first few days in NYC. We arrived on Thursday, met up with Claire that evening for dinner near Times Square and traipsed around the area, visiting Bryant Park and the M&M World and Fifth Avenue and the Empire State building and Toys R Us… It was an appropriately busy introduction to New York.

Next day took us back to Times Square for a spot of shopping, a two hour long wait in the queue for Broadway tickets, and a viewing of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Daniel Radcliffe starred. Pity we didn’t come a few months later, or we’d have seen Darren Criss – aka ‘the more awesome Harry Potter’ – in the lead instead. Turns out DanRad can sing and dance fairly well indeed. It was a very fun show, definitely an enjoyable night out.

Day three consisted largely of strolling through Central Park. The weather was gorgeous – the quiet before the storm, if you will – and conditions were perfect for a piece of aimless wandering through the park. We were audience to some incredible street dancing in a show performed by a bunch of guys in wigs called ‘The Afrobats’ or something similar. They were highly exploitative, and their humour walked a thin line between racist and hilarious, but it was great fun nonetheless.

Claire and I then left the others to see Hair, both of us preferring to save money. Also, Claire let me use her gorgeous hotel shower, so it was really a very luxurious night for me. We had a good time just chillaxing and chatting and watching all the sensationalist Hurricane Irene predictions on Fox News. As Claire was leaving NYC the next morning, it was a really great chance to catch up before the final leg of her US trip.

So, a pretty standard New York trip, right? More on that later (if the munchkins let me leave Oz.)

By the way, if anyone's interested in Lucy's point of view of all this, check out http://lucyfyffe.blogspot.com/

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia! Land of vintage shopping and earthquakes, of milling crowds and baseball games, of Philly cheesesteaks and tummy aches.

We left D.C. in the early afternoon and headed northward by our beloved Amtrak system. And oh, how we loved climbing up the Philadelphia hostel’s four flights of stairs with our suitcases in our arms. Instead of doing the obvious tourist trek, we strolled down to South Street – Philadelphia’s answer to Smith Street – and found ourselves a little diner specialising in Philly cheesesteaks. For those not in the know, cheesesteaks are basically baguettes stuffed with shredded ‘steak’ and covered with melted cheese. They were… special. Hey V, at least we tried them!

Lucy and I then spent a good hour wandering through the nearby retro shops. I bought a great skirt for $7. Nice. We then met Matt down the street at the Magic Garden, an outdoor mosaic gallery composed of assorted junk, including bicycle wheels, wine bottles, dolls, plates, and car parts. Matt told us it was amazing. He also told us that the place had peremptorily chucked him out and locked its doors due to the earthquake.

What earthquake? The one that had taken place while we were too busy shopping to notice. Apparently it was 5.8 on the Richter scale at its epicentre in Virginia (where we’d been the day before! Shock! horror! we missed it!)

We then made our way into downtown Philadelphia in order to visit the City Hall and assorted statues of Benjamin Franklin. The streets were crowded with people: students, business folk, everyone who’d been evacuated from their building in case of aftershocks. Everyone was clinging to their phones and chatting endlessly about the quake. There were police everywhere. I’m not exactly sure why. They weren’t really doing anything.

So, bereft of things to do indoors, we wandered through Love Park (apparently a famous park, the one with the LOVE sign) and then tracked down the Philadelphia Farmer’s Market. It was food heaven: fruit everywhere, nuts and dried fruit stacked on the shelves (including intensely green dried kiwi), pretzels, giant cookies, fudge, cheesesteaks (ugh) and everything salty and sugar-filled. We had a lot of fun tracking down cheap strawberries, bagels and cookies.

Next stop was Ben Franklin’s grave. Nearby was the Liberty Bell, which we saw from the outside, and the Independence Hall, which we likewise viewed externally. We were more interested in collapsing on the grass and eating our strawberries and relaxing for a bit.

And then that night: the baseball! It was the Phillies versus the Mets, and it wasn’t really a competition so much as a systematic destruction of the Met spirit. I spotted a grand total of one Mets fan in the entire stadium, and he didn’t have much to cheer about. But for us, it was great fun. Matt clarified the rules for me and Lucy, and then for me again, and then I just listened to the running commentary from the people behind us. Baseball is a thousand times more exciting than cricket, thank goodness, but really made me miss the footy. We dined on pretzels and hot dogs and, in my case, an ice cream the size of my face. I’m not quite obese yet, but I’m working on it.

Next day we headed back to the Magic Garden and got to look inside. Pretty spectacular. And then it was off to the train station, and then – New York, New York!

Washington D.C.

We’ve just completed two very full days in Washington DC. Having failed to sleep well on the Amtrak service from Fayetteville, we recaffeinated at Union Station, dumped our stuff at the hostel, and staggered out in the direction of the White House.


Obama’s on holiday, can you believe it? But instead of the President, we spent the day with a wonderfully knowledgeable ex-history teacher, who gave us a free foot tour of the major National Mall monuments. It lasted a good three hours, encompassing the Washington Monument, the White House, the World War II, Vietnam and Korean Memorials, and the Lincoln Monument. It was fantastic to learn about the symbolism of each monument’s design. We even got a sneak peek of the soon-to-be-opened Martin Luther King Memorial.

The walking tour was exceedingly worthwhile, apart from the horrifying blisters that resulted from trekking for three hours in thongs. My feet did not appreciate all the touristing we did in the afternoon, visiting the American History Museum (and Lincoln’s top hat), the National Archives (with the Constitution, Bill of Rights and Declaration of Independence) and the view at the top of the Old Post Office. We gave up around 6:30pm, when the lack of sleep and blisters finally did us in.

But not to worry! We got everything else on the list done today. We set out for Arlington Cemetery this morning, and visited J.F.K., the tomb of the Unknown Soldier (and the interminable changing of the guard), Taft, and the beautiful Robert E. Lee house. Next stop was the Smithsonian, where we had unfinished business in the form of the Air and Space Museum (‘there’s no air in space!’) and the Natural History Museum. Both were extremely worth the cost of entry: nothing at all.

I remember visiting the Air and Space Museum at around the age of seven, but it was fantastic to go back and actually appreciate all the Cold War Space Race stuff. And the Natural History Museum! Unbelievable. I could have spent another three days going through all the exhibitions. There were the dinosaur fossils, of course – Hev, you would have loved it! Then there was a fascinating room dedicated to modern and historical issues of racism in the US. We completed our tour with the mammals exhibit, which felt a bit like entering an incredibly well-stocked zoo with a no-cage policy that had been frozen in time.

In other words, we did absolutely every single thing I’d written down to do in Washington. And tomorrow: Philadelphia!

Wilmington & Fayetteville, North Carolina

We left Savannah on Friday morning and caught the northbound train to Fayetteville, which we immediately deserted in favour of the hometown of One Tree Hill. It was an exciting trip. We rented a car at the Fayetteville airport, shoved Lucy in the driver’s seat, and set off down the wrong side of the road to Wilmington. It all went very well: we survived, the car survived, and despite my very special navigation skills, it was all very smooth sailing.


Wilmington is an easy breezy riverside town. It’s rather bigger than we expected, but still very pretty and quaint, with a local market and everything. We caught a ferry across the river to reach the basketball court that featured on One Tree Hill. The court, the posts and the bleachers were plastered with fan-graffiti, mainly consisting of proposals to Chad Michael Murray and ‘One Tree Hill saved my life in high school’. I didn’t add to this graffiti, but I can’t vouch for Lucy.

Back on the town side of the river, we strolled through the streets and found, amongst other things, a man dressed as a mannequin dressed as a man. Lucy and I failed to realise that he was actually alive, and lost all dignity by screaming when he started moving. Or maybe that was just me. It was horrifying. We also found Karen’s Café from One Tree Hill, and the bridge that Lucas crosses in the opening credits. Thrilling stuff.


At some point, we decided to head back to Fayetteville and explore the town for a couple of hours. Thirty minutes turned out to be more than sufficient, and, stuck with essentially nothing to do for five hours, we went to the local cinema and watched Stupid Crazy Love (with Steve Carrell and Emma Stone). Mum and Dad: you’d both enjoy it, go see it! Mel: Michael from The Office; nuff said. Michael: it’s got enough chick-flickiness for you to enjoy it.

And now we’re at the Fayetteville Amtrak station. We still have two hours to wait for our train. It leaves at 12:45am. And we arrive at 7am in Washington DC.

Awesome.

Savannah, Georgia

Welcome, y'all, to sunny Savannah. It's a gorgeous place, all Waffle Houses and salt water taffy, and the most beautiful houses I've ever seen. The shutters! The countless US flags! The pastel colours!


It was all lovely and quaint - once we'd arrived. Before we managed to get to our Quality Inn (which surprisingly turned out to be fairly decent), we first had to contend with incompetent baggage handlers at the train station. And by we, I mean me. Lucy and I had been forced to check in our suitcases at the Orlando train station, which meant that we were supposed to get them back when we arrived in Savannah. Unfortunately, someone forgot to unload my case, which then led to a car chase (me in the passenger seat of a baggage handler buggy) and a last minute dumping of my case on the platform from a moving train.

Exciting times. I felt like Indiana Jones.

We got to the hostel and admired the Quality, then set out to the diner next door for a typically American dining experience. The menu seemed to be written in a different language, and included such things as (free!) grits, savoury biscuits, chilli (under the soup option; the other soup option was 'soup'), coke floats, etc. After much confusion, I daringly decided on a philly steak omelette with complimentary grits (which turned out to be slimy white stuff) and pankakes. Lucy got a chicken strip dinner, and Matt got a steak sandwich. Boring.



I regretted my choice.


But it was very cheap.

This morning we caught a bus into downtown Savannah and took a street car tour of the town's many historic sites, which included the deathplace of the US founder of the Girl Guides, a Civil War battle site, the First African Baptist Church, and twenty-two pretty little garden squares - including the one where Forrest Gump talked about boxes of chocolates. It's an incredibly picturesque place. And it's worth coming purely for the sweet shop. Mmm.


Lucy and I visited the local mall this afternoon. I failed to find shoes that fit. The highlight was eating a cinnamon sugar pretzel: awesome. I am now very fat. And happy.

Orlando, Florida

Humidity, Harry Potter and heat rash: these are just some of the things I discovered in Orlando. I landed in the airport and soon met up with Lucy and Matt. We bussed to our hostel – insanely good value! We paid $25 each for two nights at a motel of decent quality with a pool and free breakfast. On the downside, it was 35 degrees and humid as all hell, and basically stayed that way till Tuesday afternoon, when it released a good few hours of drenching rain.

I spent Monday in a murky state of jet lag. Not much fun. I’m still not hungry at the right times, though I somehow managed to sleep twelve full hours last night. The others went in the pool while I read in the shade and attempted not to black out with exhaustion. From the patchy red burns on the feet, it appears that I mustn’t have successfully avoided all sun.

Today we went to the Islands of Adventure theme park, home to Harry Potter World. We got there ten minutes after the park opened, and the queue for the Hogwarts Castle ride was already 120 minutes long. Lucy kept our place while Matt and I bought some butterbeer(!) in special novelty mugs(!). Mine was $10.50(!!!) That’s more than I paid for my dinner (at TGI Friday, where the waiters really care about your well-being and bring you home remedies for hiccoughs). But that’s okay, because the mug is totally awesome. I shall send it home to Mel. The butterbeer itself was delicious – for the first few mouthfuls. Then it was sickening. Might have had something to do with the obscene heat, and the fact that it tasted like 98 per cent sugar.


Anyway, during our many excruciating, humid hours waiting in the queue, I got really freaked out by all the signs attempting to deter pregnant people and dizzy midgets from riding. Some unhelpful person told me that the ride was like a rollercoaster; the second person I asked told me it was a simulation ride. So I cheered up.

The ride turned out to be pretty cool. It was by far the best simulation ride I’ve ever been on. You sit down on in a set of seats that move along a track, then get elevated and start going crazy. There was a ‘mini-adventure’ involving Aragog-type spiders, Dementors (for no reason), the chamber of secrets (for even less reason), and a really awkward ‘celebratory feast’ type moment. Pretty much what you’d expect. I screamed a lot. We went on it four times. Awesome.

Hogsmeade was amazing! There were all the shops mentioned in the books (though some were from Diagon Alley – naughty!) as well as a few others, like ‘___ Maestro’s Music Shop’. A lot were just shopfronts, but they had stuff moving in the windows – very cool. Zonko’s was pretty sweet, with Extendable Ears, U-No-Poo and Filibuster’s No Heat, Wet Starts Fireworks. Honeydukes wasn’t as cool as I expected – fairly standard sweet shop with a couple of unimaginative vaguely Harry Potter labels. Olivanders was frankly crap. Kind of hilariously bad. This creepy old man (presumably Olivander, though he seemed to have gotten over all that torture fairly well) got a young child ‘volunteer’ to test wands, and then imparted wand lore wisdom of an uninspired variety.



There were a couple more rides – the Flight of the Hippogriff and the Dragon Challenge – but I didn’t go on either, as they’re rollercoasters. No thanks. Also, the Dragon Challenge was closed. Lucy cried. She’s crazy. She went on this upside down rollercoaster of high-speed variety: insane. I went on some awesome rides, don’t get me wrong. Most were in the Dr Seuss World, and most were intended for three year olds, but I greatly enjoyed them. There was also a Jurassic Park World, a Toon World with a water-rafting ride, and a Superhero World. The water-rafting ride was great while the sun stayed out. You got completely soaked. We also got completely soaked when we started getting pelted with gigantic raindrops. This continued for the next three hours, during which we were mostly outside in various queues. Wonderful. We gave up on attempting to be dry right from the start due to the lingering heat, but this turned out to be a really sucky idea whenever we went indoors and got blasted with crazy air-con.

It was a fun day. I have an intensely interesting tan on twenty centimetres of my leg, starting at sock level and ending at leggings height. Very attractive. And it’s more of a burn than a tan. And I’ve developed a strange rash on my inner elbow and shoulder. On the plus side, Harry Potter World was totally awesome and I ate a free banana this morning.

LA -> Orlando

I've now been in the US for a couple of days, but it feels like a whole lot longer. Time crawls when you're forcibly delaying sleep. Jet lag is killing me. I get hungry at strange times, I'm obscenely exhausted... Not fun.

I landed in LA on Sunday morning (14th), having had very little sleep. I decided to check into a hotel and sleep through the ten or so hours before my domestic flight to Orlando that night. The hotel was expensive but worth it for the shower and the bed. The (free!) shuttle bus between the LAX and the hotel was all I saw of LA.

I flew into Orlando this morning and met up with Lucy and Matt at the baggage checkout. I'd been worried about managing to find these two as I still lack an international sim card in my phone. We hopped on a bus and headed for our hostel, which turned out to be less of a hostel and more of a motel - definitely a step up! There's a pool, and a free shuttle bus to Harry Potter World - tomorrow's destination - and free breakfast!

This morning, trying to fight the effects of jet lag and a sleepless domestic flight, I took off with Lucy to locate the Harry Potter World gates. We made it despite the crippling heat/humidity, and spent quite a bit of time browsing in wonderfully air-conditioned shops. I can't wait till we move up north on Wednesday.

Time to end this: I'm using the free wifi in the hostel lobby, and my eyes keep closing. Sleeeeeep.

Does this thing work?

Thirteen days till lift off. Cue panic.