Barking at shovels

Urban hiking

As the bus rolled into the Bronx, we were greeted by a giant black billboard with plain white lettering: "george w. bush: worst president ever". I don't know if this was left over from the RNC, or if someone just really really needed to vent after the election, but I felt welcomed.

I spent the weekend mostly walking myself into a pair of spectacular blisters on the balls of my feet, despite wearing shoes I normally wear all the time. Next time I'm bringing the real hiking boots. New York may be among the best places for urban hiking in the world, but I'm going to have to do it right. If I'd had any sense I would have stopped and got moleskin when I realized I was chafing, but my brain decided that if it ignored my feet, they would go away. Nice one, brain.

I took the subway to Williamsburg to check up on the hipsters, who seem to be doing quite nicely for themselves. There are some splendid murals off and along Bedford Ave. And of course the first shop I went into, Brooklyn Industries, had the T-shirt I most wish I'd bought as a souvenir, but I'm psychologically unable to buy the first thing I look at. I did manage to get a nifty little tile clock in a hole-in-the-wall art/clothing store; am pleased with that. Next time I'm spending more time in Williamsburg (unless it takes me so long that the artists have moved on again).

Had to hike fairly quickly through the Hasidic end of Billyburg because the sun was on its way down and I wanted to make it to the Brooklyn Bridge before sunset. But Saturday afternoon had the Hasidim out in their finest. I'm puzzled by the hats. I'm not up on the details of their beliefs, but I can infer that men are commanded to wear only black, with white hose, and that they have to wear hats. This all seems quite plausible, just the sort of thing a fussy Deity might instruct. But why were so many of the hats these huge furry cylinders? They didn't seem to be mandatory -- there were some men in more conventional wide-brimmed hats -- but it seemed like three-quarters of the men had gone to the same hatter and asked for the biggest, showiest , most imposing (but yet still strictly compliant) model they had.

The Brooklyn Bridge at sunset is not to be missed. There's a raised pedestrian/cyclist boardwalk above the level of the traffic that actually makes a pleasant, though tourist-dense, walk.

After dinner in a fabulously stylish and expensive bar/restaurant in SoHo, I spent the evening wandering from shop to shop up lower Broadway. South of 14th St, it is aligned so that its canyon frames the Chrysler Building in the distance. Then it makes a slight bend to the west, and the view changes to the Empire State Building.

Sunday morning it was rain at times heavy. I had breakfast in Chelsea Market, which sounded cool in my guidebook -- a gourmet food and flower market in an old Nabisco factory that took up almost a whole block. Which it was, and it was very attractive, but it was too sparse and unpopulated to have any life to it on a Sunday morning.

I spent much of the rest of the day in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, sometimes stopping to look at rooms closely, sometimes just wandering at random and waiting for something to catch my eye. Actually, when I first got there I was feeling sufficiently wet and bedraggled that the first thing I did was find the quietest and most obscure corner of the building to just sit and read for a while. This turns out to be the Tibetan sculpture gallery. I think when I went up there I actually caught the guard napping, or at least with her eyes closed.

I love Vermeer.

Did a bit more shopping Sunday afternoon. Bought a belt in a punk shop on St Marks Place. Ate a hot dog from Nathan's Famous, which was disappointing. I'll have to try again with a different vendor, but currently I have Chicago kicking NY's ass in the hot dog department.

Got the eight-o'clock bus, arrived back at South Station a bit before midnight.

Permalink | Travel | Comments (1)