Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Take me to the core of The Big Apple - I want to check out the pips

It's been a while since my last proper post. How've you been? I've been well thanks. We've been busy.

We went to the states for ten days, first to New York with our friend Tony from Uni. We went to visit another friend, Pete, who's working out there. He has an apartment in Manhattan, just south of Central Park. Skill-o!

We arrived late on the Saturday night, and endured the taxi ride from hell (well, Newark airport) to Pete's apartment. Then we went out to Greenwich Village for some drinks. Anne, Tony and me faded fast after midnight (especially me!) and had to go back to Pete's to sleep.

Sunday we spent in Central Park, mainly. Central Park is fantastic! I've been to NYC a couple of times, briefly, but have never had a chance to walk around it in a leisurely manner - I've always been there on a short stop-over. It was good to be able to relax and see the park. Despite that fact that walking down NY streets feels like walking through a deep valley, with buildings towering above you, it can be very picturesque, especially in the background of the views around the park.



We also took a walk to a diner which fans of Seinfeld might recognise. We tried to go in there for a chocolate milk, but they wanted to order food or pay a cover charge. Grrr.



A couple of nights we went out with friends of Pete to eat, and one night we stayed in and watched The Stepford Wives (remake) on DVD. The latter is an experience I wouldn't wish on anyone. I won't review it here - that can wait for the next film post - but I warn you it's awful and confused. Avoid.

We walked and walk. Walked for miles. Pete had previously posted on his blog about a piece of cake he'd eaten in Brooklyn. We all demanded he took us there. "Take us there Pete", we demanded. He did. We got the subway to Brooklyn and visited CakeMan Raven's shop (yes, Pete called it Mr Cake but he was mistaken). We ate the biggest bits of (red) cake in the whole world. Only Tony finished his piece and I got quite upset, having been convinced I could eat more than Tony. The cake was lovely and light, but the icing was too sweet. My cake had nuts on, and I think Tony's may not have, so that probably explains it.






Good to know that of all the photos we got, most of them were of us eating cake. It was good cake. We walked back to Manhattan, across the Brooklyn Bridge, and got some pretty spectacular views of the city.



I'm sure we did more. We did do more. We saw Ground Zero (a big sad building site) and did a bit of shopping for clothes (I got in a bad mood as I hate clothes shopping - I threw a small paddy). We ate lots of treats and went to Grand Central Station (an amazing place - worth a look).

After five days we said our goodbyes, and Anne and I hopped on a plane to Atlanta. We went there to meet up with some more friends and go to the wedding of a friend of mine from school, Lee. And his fiance (now wife) Mel.

Lots of photos from there, but I won't bore you with lots of pictures of people most of you don't know. Oh, OK then here are a few:






The wedding itself was in Clemson, a small town in South Carolina. It was very different to New York City. Obviously.

Well that's it for the moment. I think that's enough photos to keep you quiet. My thanks to Ian and Tony for the photos of theirs I've used without their permission.