Next morning Wednesday, we had booked a tour to Niagara Falls. We decided that we had a pretty good idea were the bus stop was so looking like ‘terry the tourists’ with my back pack on we headed off in the supposed direction off the bus stop. Walking, walking, walking we had left at 10.30am to get there by 11am for the 11.30am bus. We thought that we would have enough time to grab a coffee when we got to the bus station, but instead we had no idea where we were going!! I had my cranky pants on and Leigh was busy asking everyone which direction the bus stop was in, luckily every pointed us in the right direction but their ideas on just how far it would take us to get there varied widely, everything from 5 mins to 10 mins to just up the road – arrgghh we are going to miss the bus!
Eventually we found it and had just enough time to grab a sanga and jump in line. The bus was pretty packed and when we got to the next stop 3 older women got on (they were aged from late 50’s to 70). After the got on the walked up the aisle and back down to the bus driver and informed him that the bus was full. “ladies and gents in this situation when we have overbooked the bus, if 2 skinny people are sitting next to each other they can squash together and 3 people can fit on 2 seats” what the hell???
So these old ladies walked to the back of the bus where we were sitting and stood up hanging onto the back of the seats, no one else looked like they were moving so Leigh and I stood up so they could have our seats. Lets just say sitting on the bus feeling a bit green from the night before is one thing but standing and trying to hang on and then seeing if its more comfy sitting on the floor in the aisle is a whole other thing! So this continued for 2 hours and no one else even battered an eyelid or bothered to get up. We talked to the old ducks and they were really nice and very thankful that we gave up our seats.
We finally arrived at the town called ‘Niagara’ (mind you with no apologies from the bus driver) we hoped off the bus in this little town that looked so run down we thought it was a joke ‘is this where the famous falls are’?? No, no it wasn’t we then had to catch a smaller shuttle bus to the falls, it wasn’t far only 10 mins. Got off and wandered down the road and there they were. When you first arrive you are looking at the falls from the top of a ridge, from our point of view the falls where across from us and on our right. I didn’t realise that there are actually 3 different waterfalls. They are all very pretty and so spectacular!
Bought out ticket on the ‘Maid of the mist’ and decided it was time for some lunch. The town where the falls are is huge, its got lots hotels, big casino’s lots of touristy shops and museums and timezone type shops, bright lights and neon signs all a bit tack-a-ramma! We found the ‘Rainforest’ café and had some lunch and walked back down to the falls. Lined up for a boat ride which we had to catch a lift down the cliff and onto the dock, the boat is absolutely huge holds 400 people at a time and on both the American and Canadian side there are at least 2 boats on each side running every ½ hour. Got our very attractive blue poncho’s which every one had on, and boarded. From the water the falls seemed humongous so massive and spectacular – 1/5th of the worlds fresh water flows through the falls, its incredible. The boat takes you past the ‘American falls’ first then there is a gap and a smaller waterfall called the ‘bridal veil’ then onto the nicest one and the biggest the ‘horse shoe falls’ you get absolutely soaked from the spray of the crashing water. Took lots of pics and even gimpy got herself out there and had a few pictures!
Off the boat and a little bit more looking around, caught the shuttle bus back to the town of Niagara, for some reason we thought that there would be more to do at the falls so we had booked the last bus back to Toronto at 10.15pm that got us back at midnight – why?? At the bus stop we only had to wait for 5 mins when the bus pulled up, trying to sweet talk the driver into letting us onto the earlier bus didn’t exactly work – especially as she was a chick. Great so we had another hour before we could try our luck again with the next bus and it was only 5pm!
The town was so dead, we could see a train station and boarded up hotel with weeds growing everywhere and a Chinese shop. Bloody fantastic! So………
There has to be more to this town – surely?
About 5 minutes up the road we found the main street which was even more bizarre, it was really quirky with shops like ‘pretty and twisted’ with all emo/punk type clothes, there was an organic health food shop, an army and gun shop, a massive laser tag shop, a pub that had about 4 bikie men that looked they could kill us if they stared at us long enough! And a really cute chocolate & ice cream shop. The town was deserted apart from the people working in the shops that were actually open we were the only 2 in the street very bizarre. We walked up and then back down the street and had an icecream and bought some chocolate covered bacon(voted in the top 10 foods on Toronto??) the chick that sold it to us said she hadn’t met anyone who didn’t like it, well………. She hadn’t met us yet! – it was gross, if you get the chance don’t try it.
Time for the next bus, walked back and tried our luck again, it was now 7pm and this time it was a boy bus driver – yes! Worked our magic and got our toosh’s on the bus 3 hours earlier than our original ticket, GREAT. Cabbed it back to the hostel and relaxed and watched some telly in the lounge room.
The next morning Thursday 26th August was our last day in Canada, we slept in and decided we would try and find Toronto’s biggest and best souvenir shop we ended up walking around for about an hour having walked past the shop 3 times before we realised it haha and it was as big as a newspaper stand at a train station! Needless to say we saw the shop looked around in 3 minutes and we were done. Did some more shopping had some lunch and tried to drag the day out as we were catching a bus from Toronto back to NY at 7.30pm. Tried hanging round the hostel as much as we could without looking sus, when the owner asked us if we wanted a lift so for 5 bucks he dropped us and all our luggage at the bus station at 5.45pm – nothing like being early we wanted a good seat!
While waiting for the bus we needed food, so one last ultimate Canadian hotdog. While I was getting the dogs Leigh was in line for the bus and it came a bit early so the line had started moving before I had arrived back so when I got there I had to juggle 2 hotdogs drag my luggage through all the people as Leigh was at the front of the line and had so much stuff that she couldn’t move all of our stuff. In the time that I had gone to get dinner Leigh had been interviewed by a local tv station CBC who were doing a story on megabus and over crowding! Haha so she got her gob on telly and told them the story of yesterdays escapades and the overbooked bus, we eventually got on and we both got 2 seats to ourselves and I got the seat behind the stairs so it had a bit more room as there was no one in front of me to recline their chair back.
Travelled on the bus for 3 hours and we arrived at the US border crossing – the moment of truth, will they are wont they let us in? We had to take all of our stuff of and line up, we were in the first lot of people to be processed and we were almost the last people to get back on the bus, it took us ages at the desk as all most everyone else was American and it was really quick for them. So we did get let in and we are allowed to stay for 6 months! Back onto the bus and some buggers stole our bloody seat despite the fact that everyone else was back in their original seats – they broke the unspoken bus riders rule ‘no swapping seats’!!!!
Urrghh so now we had to sit together as the bus was now over full as we had picked up more passengers. It was getting late about 12am and we still had no luck in getting to sleep so we took a sleeping tablet with no success, another one down and still nothing- just a drowsiness feeling but no actually sleep. Tossing and turning in a bus seat for 6 hours is not comfy! Finally we were back in the big apple. Off to the Marriott it is, so we rocked up and snuck (if that’s what you can call it) in with our 50 bags and up to the room level 34!!! Kel, Hol, Nicky and Michal (Nicky’s friend from Melbourne) were already there and they had made up a makeshift bed on the floor with blankets and pillows – they were still in bed and then we got there so they got up and onto floor bed and we got into bed and slept until 12pm. Verena had caught the bus up from Philly and was staying for the weekend.
Off to see more of NY on a beautiful sunny day – bliss. We headed up town and stopped off at ‘Whole foods’ which is a huge chain over here that combines a fresh food super market and a café with the nicest healthiest food in America mmmm delicious and it was within walking from the hotel. After lunch we walked through the neighbourhood streets of Tribeca and the West village and had a look at all the shops, some of the girls saw the famous midget guy from ‘Death at a funeral’. Being in the West Village we had to go to ‘Magnolia Bakery’ the famous cupcake shop from ‘Sex & the City’. Eating our cupcake we headed for the meat packing district.
Nathan the Aussie guy that Nicky has been talking to has friends living in NY so we were planning on meeting up with them later that night but they happen to be at a pub in the meat packing district so we headed to the Bier ‘Garten’ a German beer garden under the ‘Standard hotel’. We stayed only for 1 drink as it was a bit pricey $11 for a vodka and sprite. Headed back to the hotel for a kip and to get ready for a big Saturday night, we firstly headed back to the ‘Bier Garten’ for a while then we headed to a club called ‘Carnival’ we got there and it was 8 flights of stairs up to the club – that’s quite a task after a few bevy’s let me tell you!
When we reached the top and into the club it was a real spin out, it was decorated like a circus, the roof was a massive tent/big top and was red and yellow, there was funny mirrors, arcade/carnival games, a fashion show on a runway, people walking around on stilts it was amazing! We met up with Nathan’s footy mates there and burnt up the dance floor. We some how managed to get this old black guy in a brown tweed suit in our little dancing circle??? All of a sudden Verena (who by the way was tanked) popped up with a chicken wing “where did that come from” we all asked “just over there” as she pointed to a table full of food “those people over there told me to help myself”. As it turned out there was an older couple (40’s) who were having their wedding reception at the club (only in America!). They invited us to the food as they said that they were all done and that it was only going to go to waste! They were really nice and we wished them well, got pics with them and crashed their wedding! The old dancing man now made sense – he was from the wedding!
More dancing and chicken wings later we thought we needed to head to another bar, ohh the stairs – thank goodness they had a life down. Along the way I somehow managed to get hold of a red glitter top hat which I thought was pretty Sicko! Wearing my lovely new hat we hailed a cab to take us to ‘Bar 519’ during the taxi ride I got over my sparkly hat so I graciously donated it to the cab driver – he thought it was great! This bar was fun it had good music was smaller and had cheap drinks. Having a good boogie here it was almost time to leave as the bar was closing. Verena and I ran next door to another club to have a quick dance there and then back out the front with the rest of the gang when it was closing time. ‘What’s the plan now?” off to one of the footy boy’s house, stopping of at macca’s first half of us managed to waste an hour there before catching a cab to Izzy’s house. Geez this is the longest cab ride ever, it felt like we were driving back to Canada!! It was up half way up central park and cost about $24, which in New York is a long way.
At the house some of the guys started playing drinking games…..
Verena and I decided that we had done our dash for the night and we cabbed it home. Got in at 5.30am – not a bad effort! 2 by 2 the rest of the girls came home and we were all back by 7ish. We slept for a bit more and headed back to whole foods yum. It was now Saturday and Nicky and Michal had to leave to start their 2 week camping tour. We said good bye and it was down to 5, we stayed at the hotel for a bit and then headed to ‘Steve’s pizza’ for a burrito! Back to the hotel and into bed.
Sunday 29th – Today we got up and decided that we would do some more sight seeing, but first we needed to book some more accommodation as this was going to be our last night in NYC so we decided that seeing as though we are here why not pop over to queens and flushing meadows to see the US Open? Booked ‘The pan American Hotel’ ($60/night) and then booked tennis tickets $96 for a pass into the ‘Louis Armstrong’ stadium which was where Stosuor and Hewitt where playing – sweet. We then headed off to find some lunch, went back to Europa café and got take away and walked to central park to have a picnic. It was so hot and the park was busy, busy, busy. It was so strange to see people at the park with their bikinis on and their towels stretched out sunbaking, people just stripping off to their undies and sun baking, people walking their dogs, people pushing prams, people jogging, cycling, horse drawn carts, people with easels painting just about every type of person you could imagine was in the park.
After lunch we went for a walk through the park, it is so huge you would need a whole week just to see everything, took lots of pics and it was nice in the shade. We went to ‘strawberry fields’ a place in the park that is famous because of John Lennon and there is a mosaic mural on the floor with ‘Imagine’ written on it and people put fresh strawberries around it? It was then time for Verena to catch her bus back to Philly, so another goodbye and we set off for Times Square. Being so hot 95, we caught a cab back and then wandered around the shops and down the strip. Time for dinner and the ‘Hard Rock café’ it was.
Coming out from dinner we spotted the famous ‘Naked Cowboy’ in his y-fronts, cowboy boots, cowboy hat and a guitar there was a huge crowd around him and he was raking in the dough, people lining up to have their photo taken with him. Walking a little further down we headed for ‘Union Square’ it took quite a while we walked for almost 40 mins and it was still really hot. On the way we were walking past a movie theatre and I hear a familiar voice. “who is that, I know that voice” I thought to myself as I looked around to see who it was there was ‘Chris Rock’ the actor leaning against a pole talking to his friend!! Wow we spotted a celebrity in NY so cool!!
Finally got to Union Square and went to the chocolate shop ‘Max Brenner’ and had a choc shake it was nice but very filling. It was def time to head back so right outside was the subway so down we went and on we hopped to the train which we thought was going back down town in our stop ‘Wall Street’. Got on and looking up at the places where the train stopped none of them looked familiar and none of them said ‘Wall street’? Umm guys I think we are on the wrong train ….crap! ‘Excuse me maam where are you try to go’ said a policeman who happened to be on the train with us ‘Wall Street’ “Well you girls are quite a bit of track, your going to the Bronx” What the……..
We told us where we had to go and which colour we needed to take ‘the green one’ thank goodness for him, so we jumped off at the next stop and followed his directions and caught the next train back to where we had just been. Right off to find the green line, on our way there was a sign that said yellow line and listed the stops one of which was Wall Street “yeah guys but the police guys said green line and look its just down there” ‘Yeah but yellow goes there too and its on this level’ ‘ok ok then lets just go yellow’!! That was just the beginning of our problems.
Onto the yellow line and we go past 3 stops and an announcement comes over the speaker we couldn’t hear most of it but the parts we did catch said something about track work and change here for some stop. We of course didn’t get off and the next thing you know we pop out into the night (each time we have caught the subway it was been in the under ground tunnels, no tracks outside) and we are racing away from NYC and across the Brooklyn Bridge!! Oh crap again wrong train, so at the first stop we jump off and ask a station worker where we were and how do we get back. Turns out that over the weekend not all the train lines work as its not peak and most of thee trains are diverted and especially a Sunday night when there are track works!
Our plan was now to catch the next training heading in the same direction as the one we just got off and head to one more stop further down get off and change platforms and find the number 4 line. At this point it was 9.45pm there weren’t that many people on the platform and I was getting cranky (and scared for our lives I didn’t want to die in ‘Queens/Brooklyn’. Ok so we get to the next stop and find line number 4 which has big closed gates and a sign saying “line 4 is currently not running please use line 2 or 3” ohhhh the pain……… So found line 2 & 3 but they were on different platforms so we chose number 2 and went up, waiting, waiting, waiting no train as of yet so we ask a lady and she tells us “no, no your on the wrong one, you need to be on the other side over there on line 3” @#$%* By the way did I mention that it was still at least 35 degrees outside so it was about 40 degrees underground!
Onto line number 3 and if it was possible I was feeling even more scared now, I had may bag gripped so tight my fingers were hurting, I wasn’t making eye contact with anyone and all I kept thinking was that everyone looked like a gangster and at any given moment someone could, as they say ‘Bust a cap in our ass’, and we are all sweating like there is no tomorrow. Finally we caught train number 3 and we headd back over the bridge and off at Wall Street and walked back to the hotel. So what was meant to be a 10 min train ride and walk back to the hotel it took us 2 hot, sweaty fearful hours to get back. I then had to contend with packing up my ‘Big bertha’ bag ready for the 6am start the next morning.
Monday 30th – up at the crack of dawn to see the sun rise for another beautiful day. Checked out and had our prearranged cab waiting for us, at this stage Nicky and Michal had left us with a massive 30kg box that they were going to post home but didn’t get a chance too. We told them that we would do it for them but it was so big and took up so much room. The cab ended up being a new black Mercedes Benz 4wd with the blackest windows I’ve ever seen. We felt pretty spesh driving in that thing. Our driver was really nice and told us lots of things about NY and how he had dropped a man off at the world trade centre 10 mins before the plane crashed into it and the man died, he also told us about the main road in Queens ‘Queens Boulevard’ and that so many pedestrians had been killed because they don’t wait for the signals and told us to take extra care when crossing the road. He was more of a corporate driver and hadn’t been out to queens so was a bit unsure of where we were meant to be going, it took him a while but we finally found the place and when we arrived he looked a bit apprehensive about the hotel and said “here’s my number make sure if anything isn’t right call me and ill come and get you” Lets just say it was quite a down grade from the Marriott.
None the less we checked in and had some breakfast at the small restaurant/café thing they had going on there. The room was ready so we went up and dumped our bags and got ready for the tennis. It was so hot outside at least 38 degrees, the hotel had shuttles to the tennis so we got one of those and arrived at 10.45am ready for the first game at 11am. Walking around it was so cool to actually be at the US Open, we went into the Louis Armstrong stadium and it wasn’t even that busy so we sat anywhere we wanted and watched the Daveydenko vs. some American guy, didn’t stay for the whole match we went and had a look at some other matches on the outside courts, we saw a young Aussie girl called Sophie – she lost. Then we saw the French man Monfielis – his muscles were great! Then we thought we would have a go at trying to get into the main arena Arthur Ashe stadium, even though our ticket was for that particular stadium. Leigh just walked in like she knew what she was doing they checked her ticket and let her in , so we did the same and we all got in it – sweet! We got to see Kim Clijisters play and win, then it was time to see A-Rod, Andy Roddick play.
Today was also the day that Hollie was flying home at 11pm, Hol left at 3ish and was planning on catching a cab back to the hotel getting her bags then catching the subway back into NYC and then catching a bus back to Boston and flying out from there back to England.
Went back over to the Armstrong stadium and watched Sam Stosuor play – it was awesome we sat behind these 8 Aussie guys in yellow Australian singlets, we gave them all koala’s and we all had little Aussie flags, we where yelling out and cheering and then all of a sudden a security flag Nazi came running up the stairs and told us that we had to put the flags away as there was strictly no flags due to the fighting at the Australian open between the Serbs and the Croatians – talk about fun police!
It was so hot everyone was sweating and there was absolutely no air flow in the stadium. After Sam, Leyton Hewitt came out and started playing, he was going well but we were all very tired after getting up early and had been out in the sun for 9 hours. So we were getting ready to leave when we heard from Hol, as it turned out she wasn’t able to get a cab back to the hotel in time, was late in getting the subway back to the bus station in NY and missed her bus. So she was all by herself with all her luggage having missed the bus and not having any way to get back to Boston. She ended up having to get the train and the whole time thinking she wasn’t going to make her flight. At Boston she had then to catch a cab to the airport and was 10 mins from the close of check in!!! ohh thank goodness she made it!
Back to the hotel and into bed. The next morning Tuesday 1st we slept in and walked down the road to the big mall but we had to cross the big road first, there were big sign every where saying ‘a pedestrian was killed here’ so as soon as the light was green for us to cross we practically bolted across the road and made it safely to the other side of the road. We took the laptop and planned the start of our road trip, after a few hours of searching we booked an avis car for 60 days and then booked our first night in Philadelphia. Verena had told us about this website called www.hotwire.com where you book mystery hotel for cheap prices so we gave it a go and snagged the Holiday inn right in the historic district of Philly for $92 night. We went back to the hotel and watched a movie with Beyonce in it called ‘Obsession’ it was pretty good! Then went to bed.
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