Wednesday, September 2, 2009

NYC - Part 9

Katie had recommended the NYFD museum as well worth a visit so after a quick breakfast, Lars and I decided to head down there to check that out.

And I have to agree with . Definitely worth a visit. I'm not terribly interested in fire fighters myself, but Lars is, and he enjoyed reading about the history and seeing the different fire trucks (I didn't care much about those, so I have no pictures of them).


For me, personally, the highlight was seeing the 9/11 memorial... although I don't know if "highlight" is the right word. It sounds too positive for something as utterly devastating. Lars and I spent a very long time in there, and we were both in tears by the time we were through. Not that it was a big memorial, but it's so incredibly poignant that it just drew us in. We were rendered speechless.


After the museum Lars and I jumped on the A train to take it all the way through Brooklyn and out to Queens on the other side. This took us past JFK and through Jamaica Wildlife Refuge. I'd wanted to go partly to be able to say I'd been in all 5 boroughs and partly to see this, but in fact there was a lot less TO see than I'd expected - just marshland really. I did regret not bringing our togs though, because it was HOT and Rockaway Beach would have been a great place to visit!

On the way back, Lars decided he wanted to take a trip to New Jersey, and I wanted to walk across Brooklyn Bridge (we'd seen it from Manhattan one of the previous days, but as Lars didn't really know how it would be for his vertigo, he didn't want to join me there), so he dropped me off at High Street and we went our separate ways again. On High Street station I saw the narrowest escalator EVER! Unfortunately there weren't any people standing ahead of me, so it's hard to gauge the scale, but there would NOT be room for two people standing next to each other! Still haven't seen any escalators as long as the one at Namesty Mero station in Prague though ;)


The walk across Brooklyn Bridge was a LOT longer than I had expected. The guidebook I had said that the river was 500m wide, but either it was completely off, or the bridge itself was a LOT longer than that (or both) - I think Lars read 2km somewhere, and that I'll believe :) Originally I'd thought to take the train to Brooklyn Bridge station and then walk back and forth, but I'm glad Lars talked me out of that, because I was absolutely exhausted and far too warm for comfort after just going one way. I'm glad I went though. The view was absolutely magnificent.



My legs were hurting quite bad at this time (I know I've been writing this at the end of practically every day, and it definitely was the case, but I just want to state - for the record ;) - that it was nowhere near as bad as it would have been without the crutch, and the pain disappeared overnight, so I was "good as gold" the next morning. That has NEVER been the case before. I cannot stress this enough. THE CRUTCH WORKED MIRACLES!!!! I am SO thankful! :) ) so after a quick detour through Times Square (I think that's possibly my favourite part of NYC :) ) I went back to the hotel for a shower and a nap before Lars came home.

Unfortunately Lars came home with a raging headache not too long after - complete with full-blown migraine symptoms (he's never had a migraine before, so I don't think that's what it was, but his symptoms definitely resembled mine). I didn't feel right about leaving him, and he definitely wasn't in any condition to go anywhere, so I ended up going up to Times Square and getting take away McDs for both of us. Not my first choice of food, and I did consider getting something less boring for me (or just something that I wouldn't have been able to get in Denmark), but didn't want to leave Lars for longer than necessary, so McDs it was. The things you do for your loved ones ;) Lars went to bed not long after, in the hopes that he could 'sleep off' the headache.

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