Manhattan or Bust

Fall Odyssey 2006
September 30, 2006--Farmingdale, NJ to Sussex, NJ (206 mi)

Up at 7:30am and out the door by 8am today. I was excited to see the Atlantic shores in the morning sun. Also, I fully intended to go into Manhattan today--I was really looking forward to that as well! I drove the 10 miles to the coast from my hotel--first thing. It was a perfect morning to see the Atlantic Coast for the very first time. I walked out on a pier (above) at Ocean Grove, New Jersey and down their boardwalk for awhile and just breathed in the beautiful morning. I felt maybe a little like Lewis & Clark or something. I know that's a ridiculous comparison, but after 12 days of meandering travel along the backroads of America I had kinda' "lost" myself and any notion of "home" and had become a little mini-explorer. If there had been no ocean I would have just kept on going. Ocean Grove was my very random selection of where to experience the Atlantic Coast for the first time. It was a great choice--I loved this little ocean town. It has an amazing collection of "Painted Ladies" (below), or restored Victorian era homes--the town's full of them much the way San Francisco is.



I stopped for breakfast at a place called Patty K's (below) on Main Ave in Ocean Grove. I had asked locals to point me to a good spot nearby and this was the concensus. I sat under the shade trees at a sidewalk table and listened to Patty K's offering of a John Lennon soundtrack as I ate. After poached eggs, bacon, pancakes and grapefruit juice I went along and visited some of the art galleries along Main Ave, then stopped to send out some postcards, then I went for a very satisfying walk around surrounding neighborhoods to see the Painted Ladies up close.

One of the prominent town sites in Ocean Grove that I came across was the Great Auditorium (below)--a place that the town seems very proud of indeed (if their selection of local postcards is any indication). The Auditorium was built in 1894--Theodore Roosevelt was the first of several U.S. presidents to speak to crowds in this place. While I walked around the structure and its' adjacent parks I could plainly hear a gospel choir and church organ loudly rehearsing from within. I tried to find an open doorway to enter in and watch the rehearsal, but the old place is kept very locked up it would seem.

I was pretty excited to get off to Manhattan, but I was not anxious to put an end to my morning walk through the neighborhoods of Ocean Grove, New Jersey. I finally started my drive northward by 11am. I went along the main coastal roads Hwys 71, 57 & 36 passing through towns such as Asbury Park, Long Beach and Highlands, New Jersey. Asbury Park, NJ is a place of note to Bruce Springsteen fans. It was once a very prominent resort town, but it started falling apart during the turbulent race riots of the 1960s. While I was stopped at one traffic light in Asbury Park there were several pairs of (approx) 12-year old black boys standing along the road's median. All of them wore football jerseys and were holding out football helmets for donations. I had my window down already since it was such a perfect day. I handed them a dollar and told them not to stop until they collected at least $100. They were trying to get funds for their Pee Wee fotball league. A few adult coaches stood watching nearby occasionally yelling out orders to the kids.

My immediate goal at this point was to catch the Seastreak automobile ferry into Manhattan from the marina in Highlands, NJ. It was a perfect weather day to sail into New York Harbor, pass by the Statue of Liberty, and pretend to be arriving in America for the very first time having sailed from some far off Old World location like Parker, Colorado or something. I arrived at the Highlands, NJ marina at 12 noon sharp, parked my car and walked to the ticket office by the pier just in time to watch the 12 noon ferry leaving for Manhattan! I was crest-fallen when I discovered that the next ferry to Manhattan didn't leave until 3pm. I made the decision to just drive myself into Manhattan in my trusty Accord. If I had only been 10 minutes earlier---jeeeez! I could have saved at least a few minutes if I hadn't stopped in Sea Bright, NJ to use a roadside port-a-potty (which to my unequivocated approval bore the monicker: "Johnny On The Spot"--why didn't I think of that?).

I was pretty upset to miss the ferry into Manhattan, but I was even more upset at the amount of times I got lost in this coastal region of New Jersey. Whoever is in charge of road signage in this area is a complete and collossal jackass! Never will you experience so many blatant examples of misleading directional information in the Free World as you will in coastal New Jersey. Wow. I was floored. That was also part of the reason that I was late to the marina. The marina signs actually led me into another town altogether and I had to double-back only to find the streets to the Highlands marina completely blocked-off by the police and fire departments. The annual Highlands Town Picnic, which occured right in the middle of the road, took unmistakable precedence over my plans to play "Immigrant" on the ferry boat to the Big Apple. But, no matter I suppose. I was still having a stellar day of it and so I kept up the drive toward Manhattan. It did make me a little crabby though--what a spoiled brat, eh?

So, after falling victim to several more misleading New Jersey road signs and losing maybe an hour's time doubling-back to my intended path, I finally passed through the Lincoln Tunnel(below) into Manhattan by around 2:30pm. By 3pm I had parked my little green Accord at the QuikPark at 310 West 38th Street--just a few blocks away from the Empire State Building. The valets made me leave my car keys with them and I also was instructed to leave my car doors unlocked. I wasn't too thrilled about this, especially since I had a TON of stuff with me on this road trip including my 1983 Gibson Heritage Flying V. So I put as much of it as I could in the locked trunk and then relinquished my valet key to the valets.

My first order of business once I was on foot in Lower Manhattan was to stop at a deli and get a big slice of pepperoni pizza and a cold Coke straight from the can--tasted soooo good! Nothin' sez "Manhattan" like sitting inside some old looking deli and eating pizza--eSPECially when they're loudly playing the Bee Gee's "Staying Alive" on their stereo system. I felt like some sort of movie cliché sitting there with a big grin on my face. I DO love New York.

A block away from the deli I came across Madison Square Garden (below). I immediately noticed that the Garden's marquee prominently displayed the message: "Tonight 8pm ERIC CLAPTON". I stood under the increasingly overcast skies and did battle with my desire to see Clapton in concert there in NYC. But I've seen Clapton in concert twice in the past, and I figured that I would rather not be stuck for hours inside a concert arena after all the effort I had just put forth in to getting TO Manhattan. I just wanted to walk around and explore the city until it got late.

Arriving at that monumental decision, I then made a beeline straight away to the Empire State Building (photos below). The elevator to the Empire State Building's observation deck is not quite as accessible as Meg Ryan made it seem in "Sleepless In Seattle". No sir. After fully 70 minutes of cattle-gate line-ups and winding hallways I finally made it to the 102nd Floor observation deck. It was 4:50pm and the sunlight was fading fast.

I had paid an extra $14 to travel 16 more floors upward from the main 86th Floor observation deck to the 102nd Floor deck. I guess I HAD to do this on my first trip to the ESB, but it was clearly a waste of coin. The 102nd Floor deck is fully enclosed by tinted, smudged, and graffiti-ed windows. Yuck. I was hoping for an open-air deck where for the additional $14 gratuity I would be permitted to climb on the precipice of the building's parapet and balance precariously with eyes closed and arms spread wide like Jeff Bridges in "Fearless" (1993). Instead I found myself locked inside the tiny circular observation deck listening to German, French, British, Japanese, Indian and Mandarin dialect from the other curious big-spenders I traveled up 102 floors with. The photo above shows the view looking south toward the Statue of Libery and the photo below shows the view looking north toward Central Park.

I was sooooo excited to be on top of this building...finally! Another boyhood dream realized. And speaking of Jeff Bridges references, I couldn't help not think about "King Kong" while I went around spying on the city below. I only wish I had made it to the top of the World Trade Center towers before it was too late. It was interesting to see the "King Kong" reference on one of the info placards on the 86th Floor observation deck (see photo below)--until I spotted that I thought I was just being silly thinking about Kong. But no.

I stayed on the 86th Floor deck longer than I did on the 102nd Floor deck because it was, in fact, an open-air deck. It was terribly crowded (below), and the skies were quite overcast, but I was not disappointed by my visit to the top of New York City--rather, I was quite thrilled!

After leaving the observation decks I took the elevators down to street level again where I watched a really dumb, 20-minute motion-simulated feature about NYC in the Empire State Building's "Sky Ride Theatre". This cost me an extra $18 and plainly exposed me as a first-time tourist of the lowest calibre. Jeeez, the film was even narrated by Kevin Bacon--why not DeNiro or somebody like that, eh? In total I had spent somewhere around $50 to experience the ESB for the first time. What was I supposed to do--the place is impossibly compelling. I HAD to do all that stuff! I was back on the street by 6:30pm. It was nearly dark. I got one good night shot (below) of the Empire State Building from a few blocks north.
Riding to the top of the ESB was my #1 goal in NYC. Mission accomplished. Afterwards I spent from 6:30pm to 11pm wandering the tourist-filled streets of Manhattan in search of visions familiar to me from many years of television and film exposure. First stop: Times Square (below) where I watched a little Andean acoustic quartet perform.

Next, I made brief stops at Radio City Music Hall (below) where they were hosting Celebrity Jeopardy...

...and Rockefeller Plaza (below) where David Letterman USED to hang out...
....now it's just Conan and his dog and pony show...

The last stop of my NYC night walkabout was Grand Central Station--the quintessential tourist must-see. My favorite reference to this place is from my friend Andy's first visit there a few years back where he mused to his fellow tourists: "this place is like Grand Central Station or something!". I felt this same sentiment when I first walked through the main entryway, paused at the elegant grand stairs and considered the towering concourse before me (below).

As I wandered through the Station I realized that I had not eaten since that deli pizza and it was now getting near 9pm. I browsed the restaurants in the concourse, but nothing seemed to be a fit. I settled for a chocolate gelato to get the ball rolling, but I was after something more substantial.

I went over to the Station Master's Office counter to ask advice on nearby restaurants. The two girls working the Station Master's Office wound up being my best "find" in Manhattan yet. Both were cute black girls of about 25 years of age. The one named LaShawn was very engaging indeed. We ended up hanging out for the next hour or so at her counter after she pulled out some NYC maps and let me share scallion pancakes from her take-out order. I was famished so I dug right in to the savory Chinese fare. LaShawn noted my enthusiasm and suggested that rather than my walking to some restaurant somewhere outside, why not just order more take-out from the place that brought over the scallion pancakes. Brilliant!

LaShawn picked up the phone and called up Ming's Delight (594-3rd Ave, NYC 10016--between 38th & 39th St 212-922-2888) which is only 4 blocks east of Grand Central Station. They clearly knew who she was since she simply said: "this is LaShawn at the Station. I have another order for ya'..." She even told them to speed it up because the order was for "a friend" that had a train to catch. I wasn't actually trying to catch a train, so I thought that this was a nice persuasive touch on her part. LaShawn said I had about 20 minutes until the food arrived. I went over to one of the station stores to buy a cold bottle of Coke and then slowly I wandered back through the main concourse where after only 15 minutes I heard LaShawn announcing my name over the main Public Address system: "Mark, please report to the Station Manager's Office...Mark, please report to the Station Manager's Office immediately!"

So, with a huge grin on my face off I went to pick up my take-out order. I feasted on the best chicken & broccoli and scallion pancakes I've ever had. This just may be the best Chinese take-out shop I've ever discovered--anywhere--period! Notice that I've included the address and phone number above--I'll be in NYC again and when I am, I will gladly order from Ming's Delight yet again!...yippee kai....yippee yeeaaaahh!! My fortune cookie from Ming's instructed me that: "One should count each day a separate life".

I went and sat down to eat my take-out at one of the tables around the station's restaurant court. Two very cute girls of about 21-years of age sat down right next to me even though there were empty tables as far as the eye could see in the now closed-for-business food court. They each had the most enormous collection of shopping treasures all bundled up in the stylish, heavy-paper bags of every prominent clothier in Manhattan. They started taking photos of each other with their new gear, so I offered to take a few shots with them posing together. I wondered just how safe it was for two pretty little white girl tourists laden with $1000 worth of fashion schwag to be flaunting about the NYC subway as it approached 10pm. That wasn't my problem, but I do hope they survived the subway with all their bags intact.

After my Grand Central Station/Ming's Delight foray (see photo above--Grand central Station with Chrysler Bldg in rear) I had to make haste back to my poor little green vulnerable Accord and its' unlocked doors--the garage locks up for the night at 11pm. I walked fast enough that I had just enough time to write up a few postcards at a Times Square deli and mail them off before getting back to the garage. It only cost $14 to park there for about 8 hours--pretty reasonable, and nothing had been damaged or stolen. I think NYC looks scarier to the outsider" than it really is.

I was back on the road by 10:55pm. I took the Lincoln Tunnel back over to New Jersey and followed I-95, then I-280, and finally Hwy 15 north-westward into the New Jersey boonies near the Delaware River. After some jostling around on the backroads I settled in at the low-grade Rolling Hills Motel in Sussex, NJ at 1:15am. I was KNACKered! Lights out came at 2am. Judas what a day.