New York

Last weekend I finally got the chance to visit New York properly, having already been there 3 times but only seeing the interior of JFK airport, the subway and the coach terminal each time. Again, I got to New York by coach, at this rate I'll be able to drive the route from Ithaca to New York without a map before I leave!

I left around midday on Friday and the journey was very uneventful, we hit some traffic on the way into NY and finally arrived at about 6:30pm. The hostel was thankfully easy to find and close to a subway station. We were staying just off Broadway in uptown Manhattan in West End Studios Hostel. The place was nice enough (our room was anyway) but the woman on reception didn't seem to speak much English, initially she put me in the wrong room but finally it was sorted. Another group from the course had travelled down to NY the day before and we were all staying in the same hostel, so after meeting up with them we went out to a club for the night. Entry was free before midnight so it was a cheap but fun night out. On the way back we started to realise that the subway system in NY is actually rubbish, very confusing, badly organised and too infrequent. Having travelled on the London Underground quite a lot in the last year I've been used to walking onto the platform and never usually having to wait more than a minute or two for a train to turn up (obviously there are times when this is not the case but on the whole you don't usually have to wait at all). In NY we generally had to wait 10 minutes or so for a train to even turn up. Very frustrating when you only have a weekend in the city, every minute counts!

On Saturday I decided to buy a 2 day sight-seeing ticket which included open-top bus tours, a ferry to Liberty Island, a ticket to the Empire State Building observation deck and a cruise around the harbour, all for the grand total of $77. There were two companies offering similar itineraries. We chose the blue bus, this turned out to be a mistake, the blue buses only came about once every 10 minutes and tended to be full, whereas the red buses came about once every 2 minutes. So, if you ever go to NY and want an open-top bus tour go with the red company! Anyway, once on the bus the tour guides were very good and we could get on and off where we wanted. I was joined by Ciara, who is on the course here at Cornell and is studying in Dublin. Our first stop was at the Empire State Building, we had to go throus airport-style security checks (as you do for pretty much everything over here) before we could join the queue for the lift. As with a lot of touristy things over here you don't just wait in one long queue, we had to queue to get through security, there was then another queue to buy tickets (which we bypassed as we already had ours), a queue to get the lift to the 80th floor and then another queue to get a second lift to the 86th floor where the observation deck actually is. Then we had to queue twice to get the lifts back down again. Overall the whole thing took us about 2 hours but fortunately it was a beautiful clear day and the views from the top were amazing.

Next we got back on the bus to Chinatown, where we got off for lunch and to take photos of the amusing shop names (such as 'Nice One Bakery Inc.' 'Happy Time Cafe' and 'New Big Wang Restaurant'). We then wondered down to 'Ground zero' although it is now looks more like a building site than a disaster area, there is really nothing apart from the big empty space and a few nearby buildings still surrounded by scaffolding to suggest that anything major happened there. I think my only disappointment after visiting NY was that I didn't get to see it when the twin towers were still standing, the skyline must have been spectacular.

We then planned to get on the ferry to Liberty Island but the queue was very very long (so long that we didn't even bother finding the end of it before we decided not to bother), so instead we spent a couple more hours on the bus tours and then walked back to the hostel through Central Park, which is massive and a very pleasant place to find in the middle of the city. That night we went to a Japanese restaurant for dinner. We had to take our shoes off before we went in and the tables were sunk into the floor so that you actually sat down on the floor to eat rather than on chairs. We ordered plates of raw meats and cooked everything on a little barbecue in the centre of the table, it was all very exciting and the food was very good. After that a group of us went into Times Square (absolutely breathtaking at night, like Picadilly Circus but 100 times bigger and brighter) and ended up at 'Ripley's Believe it or Not', which is basically a museum of weird things (man with no legs, two headed cow etc.)

On Sunday we left the hostel early to get our ferry to Liberty Island before the queues got too long. We only had to wait about half an hour. We didn't actually get off the ferry onto the island but had brilliant views of the statue and also of Ellis Island nearby, where the immigrants used to arrive in NY. Once we were back on land we wandered up to Wall Street, and while Ciara and Emily took the bus tour around Brooklyn I managed to get a ring at Trinity Church on Wall Street and then had a stroll out onto the Brooklyn Bridge. Not only is the bridge amazing, but you also get really good views back onto the Manhattan skyline, so the walk is well worth it if you are ever there!

Unfortunately it was then time to head back to the coach station and then back to Ithaca. As you can tell by the length of this post I had a really busy weekend but I feel like there is so much that I didn't get to do, of all the cities I have visited so far I thought that NY was the most vibrant and exciting, I really would encourage everyone to visit at some point if you haven't already! We were also really lucky that the weather was so amazing, it was sunny with clear blue skies all weekend, which made it all the more enjoyable.

Hope everyone is fine and dandy. The next few weekends I'll be hanging around Ithaca so may not have too much to report but after the program finishes in 2 weeks time, Fiona and I (plus another girl from the course) have planned a mini-holiday to Philadelphia and Chicago followed by a short road trip up to the Great Lakes. Then after that I'll be heading down to Georgia for a week and a half to see my friend Miriam. So, plenty of excitement on the horizon! I'll finish off with a few photos as usual.

Stephen xx

The Empire State Building, currently the tallest building in NY

Central Park, right in the middle of the city

Two headed cow at Ripley's Believe it or Not

The Statue of Liberty

The downtown Manhattan skyline, the WTC towers would have been pretty much in the centre of the photo, just to the left of the black skyscraper and would have been soooo much taller than all those other buildings.

Boston!

It's the moment you've all been waiting for... The latest update!

So, last weekend a group of us took a trip to Boston. This time I wasn't driving so it was a nice relaxing 7 hour trip down, there was no traffic and we had some good fun in the car. We arrived in Boston at about 12:30am and after a bit of confusion after being given the wrong keys and waking up the other 5 in the group (who had left earlier) we made it into our rooms and got some sleep. Next day we were up and ready for some sightseeing, we walked into the Downtown area from the hostel and had a look around the big park in the middle of the city. After that we walked a bit of the Boston Heritage Trail before getting lunch at a seafood restauraunt (which was very nice!).

After lunch we made the short trip up to Harvard University, quite similar to Cornell, lots of nice buildings, plenty of trees and a very studious atmosphere. I tried my best not to get annoyed by the fact that I was essentially looking around a college exclusively for kids with rich parents (Cornell is essentially the same, but none of the rich kids are here at the moment).
We had decided in the morning that we would try and get tickets to watch the baseball that night, the Boston Red Sox were playing the Toronto Bluejays. Gameday tickets went on sale at 5pm, 2 hours before the start but by the time we got there at around 4:30 the queue for tickets was already very long. Anyway, we decided to wait and try our luck. The line moved very slowly but by about 6:30 we had made it nearly to the front. They were obviously running low on tickets because officials kept coming and counting along the line. Finally we were at the front (I mean right at the front, no one else before us) and they sold out. At this point, after queueing for 2 and a half hours, I was not best pleased, but the ticket man assured us that if we waited until 7:30 they would release unclaimed reservations and we would be able to get in.

Sure enough, at 7:30 we managed to get 10 tickets, all together in the same row for $23, so the half hour wait turned out to be a blessing in disguise as we all got to sit together and our seats were centre field, a long way from the actual action but good to get an overall view of the field.
I was at the end of our 10 seats and so was next to an American woman and her husband, this turned out to be a very good thing as I had no idea what the rules were and she was happy to explain. So, baseball is kind of like rounders but more complicated. It was so much fun, the vendors really do come around the seats selling popcorn, hot-dogs, drinks etc (and even throw a few of the less-messy items to you in your seat) and there are plenty of little bits of music and chants to keep you entertained. One of the Bluejays' players came in for some heckling, he was catching in the deep in centre field, so was just infront of us, and the crowd kept chanting his name. Veeeernon... Veeeernon... Veeeernon... YOU SUCK!! He seemed to take it pretty well though!

In the end the Red Sox won 9 runs to 4 and I thoroughly enjoyed the game. Afterwards half of the group went out clubbing. I had suspiscions that they would be out late so decided to stay in as I was pretty tired and sure enough, Fi came back into our room at 4am. It turned out they had found a Disco bus and partied the night away driving around the streets of Boston!

On Sunday we decided to go to the Boston Aquarium, which turned out to be well worth the money, all the usual things you'd expect from an aquarium plus a special exhibit on jellyfish and the two coolest fish in the ocean, the weedy seadragon and the leafy seadragon! We also went to the iMax theatre at the aquarium and saw a 3D film about sharks. Then it was time to head home and back to another boring week in the lab. But don't worry, the next exciting trip is only a couple of days away. This weekend we are heading to the Big Apple, so watch this space for another update soon!

Stephen xx

The big park in the middle of Boston

Fiona and I hanging out with John Harvard

Fenway Park, home of the Red Sox (in white, batting in this photo)

Vernon Wells, he got a lot of stick!

A leafy seadragon!

Niagra Falls/Toronto Report

Hello everyone,

Here is an update on how the trip went. We set off on Saturday morning in our shiny hire car (A Ford Taurus). we actually got a free upgrade because the economy car I had booked was not back in time. So, I had an automatic with cruise control, all I had to do was point it at Toronto and the car did the rest. Fortunately the journey to Niagra was pretty uneventful, I managed to stay on the right side of the road at all times and was cruising nicely, disregarding the stupidly low freeway speed limit of 65mph (in Canada it is 100kph, or 60mph, I wonder how anyone gets anywhere at that speed...). Surprisingly, most people seem to stick to 65mph and I was overtaking far more than I was being overtaken by, a far cry from the UK where if you are doing 75 you get overtaken by pretty much everyone else!

Anyway, on the way to Niagra we discovered a small problem, 2 of this girls had forgotten their I-20 forms. The I-20 is a piece of paper that you need to get a student visa. Despite the fact that you cannot get a visa without one it is still necessary to carry the loose piece of paper around with your passport everywhere you go (a stupid system if you ask me). Since we were already over an hour away from Ithaca I made an executive decision to not turn around and we carried on with the assumption that the missing piece of paper could be got around.

Unfortunately it couldn't, we got turned back at the border and had to wait an hour for the girls to see the immigration control to explain what had happened (interestingly there never seemed to be anyone wanting to get into Canada but loads wanting to get back to the US, there were no queues at the Canadian checkpoint but the one back into the US was always tailed back over the bridge.

Anne-Marie and Elva were both very good about having to stay in the US for the weekend. Fortunately we had decided to cross in Niagra Falls itself so they just stayed there on the US side and had a good weekend anyway. The other 3 of us went back over into Canada and saw the falls from that side, which arguably has better views.

The falls themselves are amazing. I often find that famous tourist sites can be a bit of an anticlimax but Niagra is not, the sheer size of the falls is breathtaking and the scenery is just amazing (see photos). Also, everything seemed to be reasonably priced, a bottle of water only cost $1.90 (about £1) and the Maid of the Mist boat tour was only $14 (£7) In England I'm sure everything would have cost at least twice as much. So, we did do the boat tour and although the trip was pretty simple (just go right up to the falls, get very wet and then turn back) I thought it was well worth it, seeing the falls from down below was awesome and it's hard to imagine how people have the guts to go over in barrels!

So, after finishing up at Niagra we made the hour and a half journey along the shore of Lake Ontario to Toronto. Toronto is the biggest city in Canada and is probably best known for the CN Tower, the tallest free-standing structure in the world (over 500m). So, obviously we went up it. We decided to go up on the Saturday night (which turned out to be a good idea as it was stormy on Sunday) and we made it just before the last lift went up at 11pm. The main observation deck is at 346m so you get a pretty good view. There is also a glass floor that you can stand on and look straight down at the ground. Overall, the novelty factor of being in the world's tallest tower was nice but it gets old pretty quick (and there are other buildings which are not as tall but have habitable floors at higher levels), looking at a city from high up is the same regardless of whether you are 250m up or 350m.

The hostel we stayed in was nice but the air conditioning didn't seem to be working so I had real trouble sleeping. The next day I went ringing at Toronto cathedral and, as usual, was warmly welcomed. After that we (myself, Sarah and Sonja) wondered around the city, shopping a bit, eating lunch etc. until it was time to head back.

The journey back was pretty uneventful, we had to queue for about an hour and a half to get back into the US but apart from that there were no hold ups. This week it's been back to the lab and I also managed to injure myself whilst swimming in the gorge yesterday evening, I managed to slice a couple of my toes open on submerged rock and am consequently walking with a bit of a limp but hopefully it won't slow me down too much for this weekends exciting plans.... Which are... A visit to Boston! So, I'm sure you'll all be waiting with baited breath to hear about that! In the meantime here are a couple of pictures from the weekend just gone.

Hope you are all keeping well.

Stephen xx

The Horseshoe (Canadian) falls

The American falls, the separate cascade on the right is the Bridal Veil falls

A closer view of the Horseshoe falls with the Maid of the Mist boat and the rainbow that accompanies the mist whenever the sun is out

The CN Tower in Toronto. It is so tall that is almost seems unreal!

Slow week, not much news

So, I had a pretty lazy weekend and therefore there is not much news to give. On Sunday a few of us went to the ornithology lab, borrowed some binoculars and wandered around the woods trying to see birds. We didn't see too many but the ones we saw were quite colourful. The most colourful one was probably the red cardinal (see photo)

That was the most adventurous thing that happened this weekend. Next weekend we've organised a trip to Toronto/Niagra falls, which will hopefully be amazing. I am driving the hire car, which could be quite interesting!

Tonight we went to watch the 4th July fireworks, we watched from a hill on Cornell campus, the display was actually a couple of miles away so I couldn't get any decent photos but the display was brilliant and must have been even more amazing close up!

So, it's a national holiday here on Wednesday and I think we are having a BBQ, which should be good fun. I'll update again soon, probably after the weekend. Hope you are all well!

Stephen xx