Have had a busy weekend. Lovely weather here in New York, perfect for tourist sightseeing! We took the subway to Rockerfeller Centre and went to the top and did the tour. Rockerfeller was the richest man in America in the late 1800’s from oil. The Simpsons character Mr Burns is based on Mr Rockerfeller! The centre is a a group of nearly a dozen sky scrapers built in art deco style just after the great depression when the Rockerfellers lost 50% of their billions! There is a lot of art work on the walls due to Mrs Rockerfeller! Cara met after the tour , we had lunch and Rick and Cara went to Madame Tassauds and I went shopping at Maceys and bought comfortable shoes to add to all the other comfortable shoes I already have! We decided to go see another show, so went and lined up for tickets while Cara did some shopping. We caught the subway back to our apartment to have a quick shower and home cooked omelet for dinner , then straight back to Broadway for the 8 o’clock show.The show was about the Cotton club which was a club in Harlem New York from 1923 to 1940 which was a whites only club but featured all the best negro musicians. The orchestra was excellent and there was a lot of Jazz songs and tap dancing. We then went to Swing 46, a bar for Swing dance. Cara and Rick hand a few dances and I did a couple dances but was worried about my hernia repair falling to bits so sat out.
On Sunday we met Cara at High Line which is a 2km walkway and gardens where there used to be an elevated train. The weather was perfect again so we wondered around Soho, Greenwich, and ended up having a picnic lunch at Washington Square garden which is a lovely lush garden with lots of mature trees like Central Park . There is a large fountain and arch in the middle, and lots of tables with shade. We were sitting on a longish table and this white and black guy came to sit next to us to play chess. There were lots of other people playing chess also. Anyway the white guy brought the chess set with pieces that were pink and black. The black guy was making fun of him and the white guy said ” last time I had white pieces and you accused me of Chess racism” ! There are lots of lovely lush small parks all over Manhattan! There is only one free standing house in all of Manhattan and which belongs to the Mayor. The parks are crowded with people because they all live in apartments with no yards! After lunch Cara went to have a singing lesson and we wandered around and walked down to Battery point which has another lovely garden area. We took a sail on the Clipper City – our third in the harbor – the fee of which was covered by the New York Pass! It was 4:30 when we sailed off and there was a breeze of 10-15 knots at times. We sailed out past the Statue of Liberty again which is absolutely a beautiful Copper green, and had a spectacular view of the city sky line of Brooklyn, Jersey City and Downtown Manhattan! Rick got to help pull up the Mainsail! When we came ashore there was still plenty of light so we wandered into Wall st where there is a gigantic Bull statue and some beautiful modern sky scrapers along with plenty of gothic looking buildings. Being Sunday there were just tourists clicking cameras around !
