Hello from New York City (3) - Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge,
Exploring Downtown Manhattan
What a full day we had yesterday. We had a delightful breakfast
in our bed and breakfast at about 8:30 am and shared some nice
conversations with a young couple from Sweden and an older
couple from Holland, the hostess was participating as well. This
is one of my favourite things about bed and breakfasts, usually
they offer really tasty filling meals and a great conversation
to go with it.
We got going at around noon and hopped off the subway just
before the Brooklyn Bridge and ended up exploring the historic
Brooklyn Heights neighbourhood a bit, a place with many
well-preserved brownstones and expensive apartment buildings
with a perfect view of downtown Manhattan. Then we started our
walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, and started to soak in the
vistas of the famous skyscrapers.
The Manhattan Bridge is very close to the Brooklyn Bridge and
the Empire State Building is visible on the horizon. Tons of
walkers and bikers were making the trekk across the bridge and
the weather was pretty decent, sunny with about 16 degrees
Celsius.
After the bridge we arrived at NYC City Hall which was blocked
off to pedestrian traffic and there was a big congregation of
media people on the front steps. Tons of people were sitting
around the beautiful fountain just outside of city hall and with
the blue sky, the blooming trees and the surrounding
architectural arrangements this was just the perfect place to
snap away with the camera. I particularly fell in love with the
ornate spires of the Woolworth Building.
Then we headed further west, explored the yard of St. Paul's
Cathedral which is right across from the World Trade Center
location. As a first place of refuge after the tragedy, the
churchyard has many plaques commemorating the events of 911 and
it took more than 2 years to clear all the debris from the yard
that had fallen down with the collapse of the buildings.
We then proceeded to Ground Zero. The area is fenced off with
various posters showing the history of the buildings, the events
of 911, and the names of the more than 2700 victims. The tragedy
of 911 is very hard to grasp and when you are right there where
it happened, you remember all the horrible pictures and the even
more horrible events of that fateful day, now more than 31/2
years ago. It is so hard to imagine these 2 enormous buildings
collapsing, surrounded on all sides by other highrise towers,
and what it must have been like that day, with people running
through the streets, debris raining down, rescue workers risking
their lives to help the victims. The police presence, by the
way, was very strong and we weren't sure if there was a special
reason for that or if that was the case every day.
After reflecting for a while and absorbing the incomprehensible
nature of that tragedy we walked south on Liberty Street into
Battery Park. Lots of African entrepreneurs were around with
suitcases and bags full of merchandise and it seems they were
very careful not to be seen by the police. We had a beautiful
view across the bay towards the statue of liberty and proceeded
to our next destination - the Staten Island Ferry terminal,
where our next adventure began...