Hello from New York City (7) - The final day: Brooklyn's
Prospect Park and Manhattan's Washington Sq
Yesterday was our last day in New York City and our flight left
at 7:57 pm, so we figured we'd store our luggage at the B&B for
a few hours and head out one more time for one more round of
urban exploration.
Well, one area we hadn't seen much yet was Brooklyn (other than
Coney Island which we explored on Friday). We really liked
Brooklyn, formerly a sleepy suburban area, which has has nicely
matured into one of the most desirable neighbourhoods in New
York City, no wonder, thanks to its stately architecture,
multicultural shopping areas and green mature trees in many
areas.
Our beloved Q train got us to Prospect Park, another masterpiece
by landscape designer Frederick Law Olmstead, although this
exhibit is a lot wilder and more natural than its Central Park
counterpart. Although the day was a bit on the cool side, there
were tons of people jogging, biking, walking and Prospect Park,
just like its big cousin in Manhattan, has big fields with
multiple baseball diamonds and soccer fields. The action was in
full swing and we caught a live performance by a Mexican
mariachi band, fronted by a young girl who was literally singing
her heart out.
At the north end of Prospect Park is Grand Army Plaza, which is
dominated by a massive Civil War memorial arch. Across from the
arch is the Brooklyn Public Library, opened in 1941 in a late
Art Deco style, and now blocked off for some renovations. Just
around the corner is the Brooklyn Botanical Garden and the
monumental Brooklyn Museum of Art.
But we had no time to explore these areas further, we only had a
less than a couple of hours left before we had to pick up our
luggage to head to the airport. Off we went and hopped onto
another subway to head towards Washington Square Park, one area
that I had definitely wanted to see.
It was a little quiet there on this cloudy and cool day and the
Washington Arch, compared to other monuments, seemed a little
diminuitive. We had a quick pizza in one of the cheap student
eateries around New York University and got back to the subway.
However, we realized we were on the wrong platform (for
northbound trains), so we headed back out the subway to reenter
on the correct side.
Guess what - our metro transit card didn't let us back in! The
display said "Just used" and there was no way we could get back
in at a different entrance at the same subway station. I guess
that's a built-in mechanism to safeguard against 2 people using
the same transit card. So we had to trekk about 20 minutes south
to Prince Street and use our metro card there. Our $24 transit
pass got major use over the last 4.5 days and when we go to NYC
again, we'll definitely pick up another transit pass. Well, at
least we won't make the same mistake again to swipe the card and
then exit the subway station...
Just after 2:30 pm we picked up our luggage at the B&B and spent
the next 2 hours discovering a new subway line (the N line)
which we caught all the way to Astoria Boulevard, where we
picked up the M60 bus to get to LaGuardia airport. It took us a
couple of hours, but it was great to get one last ride through
the New York City neighbourhoods.
After being thoroughly searched, patted down, having my shoes
x-rayed and otherwise being inspected, we finally got on our
American Airlines ride back home to Toronto and saw one last
vista at dusk of the City that never sleeps.
We will return.......