Well here we are! The flight was pretty straight forward, watched movies to pass the 20 hours.
New York lived up to it's chaotic state right from the start. We arrived at JFK late Sunday afternoon, the cab ride from the airport to our apartment which should take about 30 minutes took well over an hour due to freeway traffic!
The apartment's fine, a basement floor so it's below street level, in a 3 storey brownstone in Chelsea which is on the west side of Manhattan. One big room called a studio apartment but suitable for these first 2 weeks with access to a lovely garden courtyard.
Chelsea has a wide range of eateries so we found a nice Italian place for our first meal - small pizza the size of a large dinner plate and a huge bowl of pasta - their sizes are crazy. Lots of people out and about but not too noisy or chaotic around this area.
The body clock is a bit out of whack so we were up at 4am the first day working out our plan of attack for those tasks that need to be sorted for our 7 month stay. So here we are at day 4 -
the phone and internet are changed over
bank account's opened and
we've sourced a few agents to find an apartment.
Took in a baseball game between the Yankees and the Blue Jays, afternoon midweek game not school holidays with a crowd over 50,000! The man at the ticket counter must have liked our accent as he gave us complimentary tickets in a perfect position (face value over $100 each) when we said it was our first time at Yankee Stadium. Best of all was that the Yankee's won.
Getting around is a breeze with the subway and available bus routes, all run 24 hours, set fare regardless of distance and free transfer when you move between routes. A weekly pass works well.
New smoking bans have been introduced here so no smoking in any parks or large public areas (like Times Square), policing may be challenging but all heading in the right direction!
We've got a few outings coming up -
Special dinner organised for tonight at Colicchio & Sons which is nearby and recommended by Shannon Bennet (his New York book) pre booked over the net before we left. 27 years married who'd have thought!
A concert on Friday night with a variety of artists - Jackson Browne, Bruce Hornsby, Dr John and others - at a theatre just up on Broadway, should be great.
Watch out for the next update
Till then
Pam & Terry
