Distance Traveled: 16.5 miles

It was a gorgeous day as arrived in the city; for me it was a relatively lazy day. With no concrete plans I headed over to the Hudson River Greenway. It seems as though every newspaper in the country has been singing praises of the newest ship in our naval fleet, the USS New York. Right now she is docked at Pier 86 accommodating visitors and honored guests. The ship's bow is made of at least seven tons of steel salvaged from the World Trade Center. I got a fine glimpse of the ship from the Greenway [depicted left]. They were not giving tours at the time, so I decided to come back on Sunday.

From there I headed to the other side of Manhattan. My destination was not really specific, but I did want to head past the United Nations. This is the global capital of the organization. as I discussed previously, the U.N. First met in Queen's Corona park. Now it resides here along the East River. Right across the street is Trump World Tower [depicted left]. What an interesting choice of location! I couldn't help but think of how much money was walking around inside of that building as I road past with my thrift store jacket and hand-me-down scarf.

I remembered that a couple friends of mine were up in the city for their New York class, so I gave them a call. One of them was in a previous class I had in New York. The other two have worked with me and collaborated on an independent study of Brooklyn [depicted bottom right]. We also did a project concerning the collegiate outreach program at the New York Historical Society. I met them up in Central Park up by the 72nd street entrance. We strolled around the Park for a while and then headed to back to where we met so they could go do their class work. I then headed back downtown for a smooth cup of hot chocolate at Cafe Reggio in the Village.

I decided to head down 9th because that was the closest avenue. On my way I had another epiphany about biking in New York. In Manhattan the avenues are generally wide and one way (below a certain point and above the financial district). This gives riders a great deal of freedom. Whereas in Philadelphia I tend to gravitate to one side of the road or another, in New York I found myself rushing in and out of the center lanes, with plenty of room to do so. That being said, I had a great ride down to the village. It was rush hour and I had to get through midtown. The traffic was brilliantly thick. Things were moving fast, so I had to keep up. It's been a while since I had a ride that fun. You simply can't have that kind of freedom anywhere else. Even before I reached the protected bike lane I found it easy to navigate around because of the width of the street. Whereas in Philadelphia I am regulated to one side of the street or the other, here, you can navigate in the middle, where it is often times safer than riding along parked cars. Fortunately (I suppose) I had the sense not to take any pictures or video during this ride. Oh well, it's the readers' loss!