New York City

After setting a new Australian distance record for the kilometres walked from the arrival gate to the baggage claim I hoped a cab and headed off into the wilds of downtown Manhattan. Arriving about 9.30am local time I checked my bags, grabbed some breakfast and went off forth on my first adventure in the big apple. 

I had always intended on picking up a stray for this leg of my journey and waiting for me in New York was an old mate Martin. He will be my travel buddy for the next 4 days before he heads off to Philadelphia, on to Washington and then back home to Sydney. He wanted to do one of the four big observation platforms being the One World Trade Centre, The Empire State Building, Rockefeller Plaza, or The Edge (recently opened in 2020 and the only one I hadn't done previously). It turned out that The Edge was only about two blocks away so we headed off, paid our $55 US admission and rode up the 100 stories to its observation deck. 

I learned several things while I was up there. Firstly and most surprisingly Martin is a Grade A coward when it comes to height. He barely made it out the door to the deck. Once on the deck there is a set of stairs you can ascend that gives you the impression there is nothing between you and New York City because its top is considerably higher than 2.7 metre high glass fence that surrounds the deck. The second thing I learnt was that he is not as tight as he used to be, as to celebrate our arrival we toasted the city with two glasses of French Champagne.

Even after the heart starter Martin couldn't be encouraged back out onto the cantilevered deck. I don't know why it is only 345 metres from the ground up.  The fact that the deck juts out 24 meters from the building and there is a 21 square metre section that is a window to the ground didn't help in the encouragement stakes either. 

Having safely regained terra firma we wandered onto the High Line. Now The High Line was a now disused railway track that had been used to transport goods into the city. It travelled along much of Tenth Avenue and was known as a death trap with the freight trains killing hundreds on pedestrians. To combat this they established The Westside Cowboys who rode horses in front of the trains waving red flags. The advent of better trucking saw the railways ultimate demise and after many years of neglect and having become overgrown with plants and weeds it was transformed into this oasis in the city. 1.4 miles of repurposed rail corridor that lets you traverse the 2 1/4 kilometres from West 34th Street to Ganevoort St away from the chaos of the city while admiring beautiful art, architecture and gardens.

From there it was off to the Whitney Museum to take in some original Warhol's and many other fine pieces of art. It was now time to check in and after a quick shower and a shave we set forth to The Empire Steak House and enjoyed one of the best meals I think I've ever had. After dinner wand walking back to the Apartment my aching feet and level of tiredness hit me. I had now been awake for over 30 hours and the land of nod was calling. Eleven hours sleep later and I was ready to get up and do it all again.