New York

I'm staying at the Waldorf Astoria in Park Lane. This is another of the famous Art Deco style hotels which I tend to look at. The public rooms are grand and the facilities and fittings are fine but it doesn't quite do it for me. American rooms always seem small and low ceilinged. First order of business was a shower then curiosity about the city got the better of me and I decided to go out exploring. The cab ride in from the airport had shown me that New York is large, scruffy and tall. City centre streets are like canyons because the buildings, even the older ones, are invariably tall.

The hotel directed me to the nearest subway station which I found without difficulty, but purchasing a ticket proved a little harder. Although there are staff in booths, tickets are dispensed by machines which only give limited change. Since I'd have lost out if I'd used a twenty dollar bill, I first walked a block to a Pharmacy (more like a small supermarket) and got change by buying a block of Cadbury's Dairy Milk. Incidentally, in the USA Cadbury's is made by Hershey. It tasted very good, but was nothing like Cadbury's at home. At last, armed with a day ticket, I set off downtown. I'll try to keep the 'railway talk' for another post. The system appears run-down but very well-used. It was the Friday afternoon start of rush hour. My train terminated at City Hall so I came 'up top' and decided to walk for a while. Boy, it was cold! Puddles of water were freezing. To the East, I got my first view of Brooklyn Bridge but I walked South on Broadway, skirting the Wall Street financial district, and headed towards Battery Park. By this time, it was raining and starting to get dark. The street vendors around Battery Park were packing up to go and what I took to be the last sightseeing boat of the day was docking. Looking out over New York Harbour, I was struck by the similarities with Liverpool. The Statue of Liberty was visible, with the light in the torch. It was quite moving.

The esplanade took me towards the East River and a large modern building which turned out to be the new terminal for the Staten Island Ferry. Years ago, I saw pictures of the Staten Island Ferry and so I was keen to try it out. I was even more keen when I discovered it's a free ferry!

There were hundreds of people waiting to board but they're large ferries and I got on without difficulty. The ferries are 'double ended' with two wheelhouses to minimise manoevring at the dock. A few keen types moved to the small open deck that would become the bow when we left, and I joined them, at the price of getting a little wet. The experience of crossing New York Harbour in the gathering dark, passing fairly close to Governor's Island, Ellls Island and the Statue of Liberty was worth a little dampness. After twenty minutes, we were docking at Staten Island. They've built a posh new terminal here, as well.

I disembarked but, feeling a little tired and damp, went back into the departure side and queued to catch the same ferry back. I had another great, but damp, trip. Manhatten looked like a mirage in the rain - the dark sky suffused with an orange glow and the faint outline of tall buildings drifting in and out of view. When we docked, I decided to have a hot chocolate drink at a takeaway in the terminal building. The very nice lady who served me said "Where y' from? You've got a great accent - just like Katherine Hepburn!". I didn't know whether to be insulted or flattered, so I settled on flattered.

I caught a 'One Train' from South Ferry Subway Station which is part of the ferry terminal (or will be when all the building work in progress is completed). I got off at 34th Street to look at Pennsylvania Station. The terminal building has been rebuilt but the 'tracks' (we'd say 'platforms') are largely unchanged. I looked at a couple of New Jersey Transit trains before continuing North on Seventh, past Macy's to Times Square. It was still raining hard but Times Square was full of tourists. The sheer amount of light from all the advertising displays was amazing. For blocks around, the sky is light like a false dawn from all the diffused light. Finally, I walked East to Grand Central and made my way back to the hotel, to sleep a little before more fun on Saturday.

My New York pictures.

Atlantic Crossing

We board via gate 10 but instead of the usual airbridge, we walk down a long ramp and stairs to travel on a fleet of buses to an outside stand where our 747, 'Charlie Victor' is waiting. I'm on the upper deck, in business class. This aircraft has been re-vamped as 'New Club World'. The paired 'love-seat' arrangement I've previously remarked on is retained but the seats are new and restyled and the electric recline now gives a completely flat bed when required. The table is larger and there's a new entertainment system which offers video-on-demand with 22 new release films, 25 older films and scores of other things, all controlled by a touch screen and provided with a high-quality noise-cancelling headset.

Soon after take-off, the ground is lost beneath cloud. By the time this clears, we're already over the Irish Sea. As usual, I watch, fascinated, from our vantage point six miles high as we run along the Irish coast, pass overhead Cork and finally leave land behind near Killarney. Now we settle in to the Great Circle track across the Atlantic, travelling at five hundred miles an hour.

After drinks (I stick to my customary orange juice), they serve a reasonable meal. I have Buffalo Mozzarella cheese with salad as the starter, followed by salmon fish cakes with parsley and caper sauce. The dessert is creme caramel with poached sultanas and it's excellent. The cup of tea, by contrast, is foul. I decide to watch 'The Queen' with Helen Mirren and enjoy it. The only time I get to see new releases is when I'm on an aircraft.

As I write this, we're about midway across the Atlantic in bright sun, fluffy white clouds below and blue sky above. A lot of the passengers are taking their post-prandial siesta in the comfort of our cabin but outside the air temperature is 50 degrees below zero.

Later in the flight, as we approach Newfoundland with about 1200 miles left to run, they serve a little tub of ice cream - not any ice cream but Purbeck Award Winning ice cream. In the old propeller aircraft days, most transatlantic flights would stagger into Gander, Newfoundland to refuel but now, it's just a name on the map displaying our progress. For a while, I can see the broken sheet ice as we skirt the coast, before low-level cloud obscures the view.

Soon we're landing at a rather grey JFK and disembarking. There's a queue at immigration but it doesn't take too long and the immigration officer is friendly. By this time, my luggage has arrived on the carousel and customs formalities take only moments. I decide I'm too tired to do anything but sit in a taxi and within minutes I'm on my way to the hotel in a yellow cab.

Click for photos of Heathrow prior to departure

The Game's Afoot!

Greetings from Heathrow Terminal 4! A new adventure starts! Well, I've got as far as the British Airways Lounge, having checked in on the BA175 to New York so, as you'd expect, not much has happened yet. As possible, I'll try to update you as the journey unfolds. The hardest parts were actually getting packed and then leaving my dog, Tai. But, now I'm committed, I'm starting to feel a tinge of anticipation. I'm not really a natural traveller: I have to screw myself up to actually go anywhere but, when I do, I normally arrange a fairly packed programme so that there's no chance of me getting bored. This trip is another round-the-world, mainly Southern hemisphere job, once again heading West.

We are now so blase about long-distance air travel but this kind of journey would not have been possible for my father and would have been incredible to my grandfather. What a shame that mankind's technical mastery of the skies has not been matched in other areas of human endeavour where we seem to learn so little over the centuries. We now have the additional guilt that these very flights are believed by many (but not all) scientists to be destroying our environment. Some years ago, I acquired a small area of woodland and I like to think that the carbon dioxide being absorbed by the crop is "offsetting" the damage my travels may produce.