It Was a Two Carousel Day

23 August 2014

 
I started the day with a quick walk around our neighbourhood to check out all the flowers.  I don't know if it's a continuation of an old New York tradition, or if it's for convenience, or what, but somehow businesses are sort of clustered in neighbourhoods.  There's the garment district, the diamond district (which includes other gems and jewelry in general), several other districts.  We're in the flower district.  So while there are little restaurants and convenience stores, most of the businesses are related to flowers.  Plants, ornamental peppers, flowers, vases, baskets, ribbons, florists, all that.  Which of course makes for a gorgeously colourful, or colourfully gorgeous, part of the city.

Then we headed north to the park.  THE park.  Central Park, New Yorkers' back yard.  What a wonderful day in Central Park!

I'm not sure how old Central Park is, other than that it's more than 100 years old.  The stone bridges are lovely, and each one is different.  There are rolling hills and flat meadows, rocks to climb and lakes to sail boats, and the story is that one of every tree in North America is planted here.  There are lanes with statues of famous authors, complete with quotations.  And Tavern on the Green, a lovely restaurant that has changed hands numerous times but is always elegantly charming with delicious food.  So that's where we met a friend for brunch, and had a wonderful time catching up on the past two years, sharing stories and experiences and updates.
 
We walked around the park for a bit, and headed over to the carousel, which is at least 100 years old as well.  This is part of my personal ritual in New York, to ride this incredible carousel.  I realize it's silly and maybe frivolous, and that's probably why I like to do this.  Plus it has some of the most beautiful horses and carriages in a carousel, and they just don't make them like this anymore.

So we rode our horses galloping up and down in circles, laughing and chatting round and round.

Then on for more walking, this time down Fifth Avenue, with a little window shopping and of course people watching.  And for me, building watching too.

New York is known for its beautiful examples of Art Deco architecture, such as the Empire State Building.  But the Chrysler Building (which has a new name, but no one knows it by that name) shines as one of the most iconic buildings of this city.  It probably is my favourite of all the buildings here - and today, it was shining silver and platinum against the grey clouds blowing in from the west.  So of course I stood in the road (okay, on the edge of the road) taking photos of this building, and as always marvelling at the intricacy of design rendered in steel and glass.

Onward to the New York Public Library and Bryant Park in back, full of flowers and people, for another carousel ride.  This is a much smaller carousel, and the animals are smaller as well.  But it's a lovely little carousel, and yes, I'm riding a white bunny.  Very silly.  But the horses that go up and down were taken, so I was left with a bunny or kitty - and a little girl wanted the kitty so I took the bunny.  She and I chatted, the tiny two-year-old next to me waved hello, her dad said hello, and we had a great time in our little corner of the carousel.

We eventually made our way back to our hotel, and when it grew dark I found out that there really isn't a penthouse here, it's an open roof - so great for night photos of the Empire State Building.  A little fuzzy since this is a night shot, but it captures the look of this other emblem of the city.

So we've done many of the things we love to do in New York.  Never made it to a show, didn't ride a ferry, but we did most of the other things and had a fabulous time.

And tomorrow we head to Philadelphia for more family time.


NOTE:  I kept the photos small, but you can click on them to make them bigger.  I love the carousel photos, as well as the buildings, and would love to have huge photos.  But then there's always that long area of only photos, and some of you (you know who you are) want more to read and fewer photos.  So, here we are with little photos and lots of words.