Notebook and Pen

Though Sunday's rain had taken us to the New York Public Library in search of shelter, it had also been one of the main things on the list of places to visit, so went back today to see it for more than just a weather shelter.

Most of the libraries we've visited in this country have been impressive, in and out, and most remind me of how badly Hull's compare, but this one is in a league of its own. It would have been easy to spend most of the day in there with so many different sections to see, and was surprised to find out one of the founders is the same person connected with Leeds Met (it's just lucky the library didn't choose to use his name to refer to it by too).

After spending some time in as many parts of the building as we could access (some is unfortunately closed for building work, just as the front of the building is covered up, but that's just another excuse to make another visit in the future), we found out how the original design for the floor layouts were seen as very unusual and purposely went against the traditional norms of library designs.

Making today a 'building visit day', our next stop was Grand Central Station, the name being emphasized throughout the station, right down to the food court where no McDonald's or Subway could be seen, but restaurants serving fresh salmon on toast for morning commuters instead.

Several attempts to recreate the poster I have at home of the sunlight coming in through the top windows later (it didn't seem the same with several hundred more people there) we carried on to find Madison Square Garden, though only saw the outside as we were saving the stadium tour for next week.

By this time on other days we might have been ready for bed, but having altered our body clocks from the night before and accidental extreme lie-in, going back to the hostel didn't seem so appealing and went for a late night showing of Harry Potter on Broadway instead (I don't remember the book ending with such a cheesy line) and added a re-read of the last book to my holiday reading list., if I get the chance to pick up another book while we're here.

Due to the rain yesterday, Dave's trainers had taken a fair bit of battering and had eventually given up on being worn anymore, so wearing flip flops and armed with the umbrella just in case yesterday's storm returned for a repeat performance, we headed back to 5th Ave for an afternoon of shopping.

Shoes in hand (or foot) after several hours of not really knowing where to look, we were rewarded for our hard work by a man dressed as a 6ft tall pizza slice, promoting a new pizza shop's opening by selling entire pizzas for $5 in the street (that may seem a normal price at home, here though, it's a bargain too good to pass up).

Unfortunately he'd just ran out but promised another delivery within 10 minutes, which we waited for before looking as trampy as possible by eating it sat beside a subway entrance. Classy, I know.

The reason we didn't have time to take it anywhere nicer was that we were making a trip to Queens tonight, where the couple we'd met in Miami were staying and had invited us over for cake and drinks as it was Matt's birthday.

Drinks turned out to be a large bottle of vodka and a bottle of orange juice the same size, both of which were polished off maybe a little too quickly before we Ali and I attempted to light the candles for the cake while the hostel owner nervously watched in the corner, hoping we weren't about to burn her house down.

It went down well however, and the cake disappeared almost as quickly as the drinks before we went out to see what the Queens nightlife was like.

Minus a party bus we'd seen on the walk to the hostel, the only place we could find to go for a drink was a pizza shop that sold cans of beer. Intent on finding somewhere though we carried on walking for a while (one of the best things about traveling is going out in flat shoes every night) until Matt ripped his helium balloon on the subway staircase ("this would not happen in England!") and gave up on finding a bar, going back to the hostel instead.

When even the reserve beers were polished off and we were ready for bed we remembered we still had an hour's journey to make until we could do so and reluctantly headed off back to Manhattan.

Before we came on the trip we'd heard mixed things about New York at night, one opinion being that you shouldn't go out after dark, and another saying it was perfectly safe to do so. We (luckily) found the second to be true. The only downside to post 3am travel is the slightly longer wait for a train, but the insane busyness of the city means that the chances of finding yourself in a quiet area are very small, and we got back to the hostel feeling safer than we have done in most other cities at this time, with most of the other subway passengers being asleep anyway.

Still though, an hour-long journey at 3am is still unpleasant despite however safe it may be, and we happily collapsed into bed without bothering with an alarm clock for the next day for once.

Despite having a full day planned today, we spent most of the afternoon seeking shelter due to a downpour that almost rivaled the one we experienced as we left New Orleans.

Having changed hostels in the search for a mattress that didn't feel like it was made of two sheets of paper, we were stuck without the comfort of a room which didn't make you buy coffee or ice cream in order to be there and therefore found the next best thing: a semi-tramp on a street corner selling umbrellas for $5.

We then found the umbrella to be completely pointless on streets lined with thousands of people, who also all had umbrellas making them all take up twice as much space as usual and left fighting for walking space without poking too many eyes out and/or tipping the water from their umbrellas over someone else's head.

We'd heard a rumour that the NY Public Library was opening at 1pm (today was Sunday) and for a while joined the crowd of hopeful people at the top of the stairs while watching what had now turned into a lightening storm over the skyscrapers.

Unfortunately the rumour became a myth and we had to eventually give up and find somewhere else to go, which ended up being a frozen yogurt cafe near the hostel while we waited to check in. A strongly over-air conditioned room with metal furniture is just what you want when you're soaked in rain water, hoping that if there is a dry spot on you, it's in your laptop bag, but 8 wasted dollars later and finally a change of clothes meant we had some time to plan the evening.

The rain eventually stopped just as we were near to giving in and dashing out to McDonald's, and we were able to go on the hunt for one of the restaurants we'd made a list of, at which you can supposedly eat for under $10. Most of these were in Soho, but seeing as we hadn't done much today, decided to walk from Times Square, and although we didn't find what we went looking for, did find a Vegetarian Chinese restaurant, where we managed to both eat for the aimed price and feed our stomachs some vegetables for a change. I didn't realise until now it was possible to miss broccoli.

The night wouldn't have been the same if we hadn't celebrated finding cheap food by buying drinks which cost just as much. At least now I've drank so many beers I'd forgotten how strong vodka is in comparison (especially Soho measures) and only need a couple to look the same as I would after a full night at home. I'm sure Dave's wallet doesn't mind though.

As planned, today started off with a New York breakfast of bagels and orange juice before taking the subway back down to 42nd Street to find what we thought was Times Square was actually only the very edge of it and had yet to see it all at once.

Although being surrounded by 8 blocks worth of lights and TV screens hundreds of feet tall was an impressive sight, we amazingly but unfortunately found out that the man who had thought the Eiffel Tower was in London had been right about the pedestrianization of the famous taxi-filled square.

Ok, so I have to admit being able to stand in the middle of all the lanes of traffic to take photos without being run over by a thousand cars was a slight advantage, but at the same time wish I could have seen it as everyone knows it to look like. Instead, an architect had donated around 100 plastic chairs to take the space of traffic, allowing people to leisurely sit in the square and take in the sights around them.

One block further on and we were on 5th Ave, home to some of New York's shops, which were all due a visit (though I'm told no plastic is allowed to come out of my purse until the last week to save having to suddenly carry double luggage around.

Following the shops up 5th led us to the south east corner of Central Park, where we spent most of the rest of the day. Trying to find the Saturday boat race (featured in Stuart Little), being amused by the elderly man who'd strapped a stereo and speakers to his bicycle, spending a lot of time waiting for a gap in people climbing over the Alice in Wonderland statue for a photo and watching people who were walking dog after dog, each one seeming to get smaller than the last and less appropriate to its owner (either there are a lot of grown, muscley men with lazy girlfriends who own handbag puppies and have been talked into walking them for them, or they're using the hamster-sized dogs as a tactic to meet girlfriends of the same description, while trying not to stand on the little things).

Back to Times Square again for a night-time visit and we found ourselves successfully worn out and ready for bed before another sight-seeing day tomorrow.

60 days on, 5000 miles traveled and countless hours on buses later and we've finally arrived in the Big Apple (called that because there's so much to bite into, according to one New Yorker).

Although our first day here was cut short due to Manhattan traffic only letting the bus move one block every ten minutes, adding on two and a half hours to the journey, it gave us chance to see some of the city by road, probably for the first and last time though.

Eventually arriving at the Port Authority on 34th, we had a short walk to revisit the edge of Times Square before our first subway ride from 42nd Street up to the hostel on Broadway in the Upper West side.

Going for a walk around the area left us impressed with the location when we found out we were only a couple of blocks from an entrance to Central Park, which of course couldn't wait until tomorrow to have a little look in.

Finding the reservoir gave us our first view of part of the famous skyline, but deciding to save the rest for tomorrow meant we left the park to the dog walkers (which I've decided we have to somehow do whilst we're here) and finally have a real milkshake in the first diner we've found to actually look like the stereotypical one in my head.

Happy that the milkshake had passed its authenticity test of almost needing a spoon to finish it, we went back for the night ready for an early start tomorrow, which would have to be started with bagels and orange juice of course.

Although I knew today's bus to Boston would be stopping in New York first, I didn't anticipate it being quite so difficult to peel myself away from the window as we drove parallel to the Manhattan skyline, and even more difficult to stay inside the bus station during the two hour layover and eventually gave in to temptation and accidentally found Times Square, which was lurking just around the corner. I genuinely asked Dave if he'd mind if we didn't bother getting back on the bus and stayed in New York instead.

It turned out he did mind though so off we went to Boston, where we arrived at our host's apartment close to 11pm to find he'd gone out. A brief residence with his neighbour and a bit of a telling off to him on her part we eventually got in and had a much needed beer before bed (how I've come to regularly drink it now, I don't know).

Our new host, Jad, told us he was going to be working from 8am until 9pm the next day, so we'd have to find things to do in the mean time, and although we couldn't work out why you'd host someone without giving them a key whilst working those hours, we went out and tried to stretch Boston's attractions out over the length of time we had.

The Freedom Trail took up most of our day, especially as we directed ourselves around it until the last few stops when we realised the red painted line running through the town was actually for you to follow without the need for a map. Anything that took up a bit more time was welcoming though, as was stumbling across Durty Nelly's, an Irish pub which shares the name of one in Hull and therefore was absolutely necessary to go in for a drink, cider this time, thankfully, before eventually being permitted back to the apartment for the night.

The next day was possibly the least eventful of the trip, mostly because we'd seen most of the city yesterday and also because it was raining all day, which wouldn't have been as bad if we could have returned to the apartment at the initially offered time of 3pm to at least put something warmer on, but 3pm turned into 9pm and after almost 4 hours in the same coffee shop and 3 hours in the Boston Library (which was nice but not as comfy as the coffee shop sofa) it was safe to say we didn't quite agree with our host on what was an acceptable hosting schedule.

Never mind, back to New York for a better look at Times Square tomorrow!

As most of Washington is museums and monuments, we saw as many as we could take in today, they're all free too which was both an advantage and extra incentive to see as many as we could. Being free has its downfalls too, there are several hundreds of more people to fight with for space once inside any of the buildings.

The museums are all conveniently located in one area, known as The Mall (we'd wondered why everyone kept insisting we went shopping here) and hosts the Museum of Natural History, Museum of American History and the Smithsonian to name a few.

The Museum of American History was the only one we fully got to see, and even this was a struggle with queues to gain entry to every floor and section, but thankfully someone had some sense when designing memorials as outdoor pieces and therefore considerably more breathing space.

The next morning was Dave's birthday, and also the last day of our short stop in Washington. Having heard about tours of the White House, we thought this was worth investigating but gave up after 1 and 1/2 walks around the perimeter of the White House without finding any hint of an information office, other than the small, radical protest going on at the front which were giving out information whether people wanted it or not.

A treat to lunch at a new cafe nearby ended abruptly when either the owner's attention span ended or a cover up for something else went wrong and we were left sitting in darkness to finish our meals. Another attempt that evening went slightly better though as we explored the Columbia Heights area properly and found unlimited choices of restaurants and bars which didn't look like they'd close on you.

A diner, dressed as a restaurant from the outside tricked us in but surprisingly served anything but the standard greasy diner menu, and for the first time since arriving we managed more than one course, though only just.

After drifting off last night to the sound of a broken snow globe which refused to stop playing its repetitive tune until the early hours, we woke up to our last great view of Chicago during sunrise (staying in people's living rooms has its benefits when their window is the entire wall and you're 50 floors up).

We left Bryan to start our longest Greyhound bus journey yet, around 20 hours and said goodbye to Friday as we knew it not long after the day had started.

Being a bus journey of this length the day was mostly uneventful, so much that Dave was bored enough to challenge me to a game of holding a skittle in your mouth for as long as possible without chewing it (I'm sure this is the wrong sweet to play with). Unfortunately though mine was red and upon opening my mouth to prove I still had it in one piece, dropped it onto my wrist, wiping the colour off as it went leaving me looking like I'd had a half-hearted suicide attempt until the next service stop.

After almost an entire day we arrived in DC to some warmer weather than we'd left in Chicago and made our way to the student area of Columbia Heights, where Eli and Lakshmi lived, housemates of Mary who's hostel we stayed at in Phoenix and who's room we were staying in while away for the summer.

Some brief introductions later, including a friend's dog who was at the house at the time and we thought it was time to pay a visit to the most famous of DC residents, or the perimeter of his house anyway.

Not long after we arrived at the White House a group of police arrived to block off the road leading up to Mr Obama's driveway, and rumours that he was going to be making an appearance soon started spreading amongst people stood around.

Although something definitely was going on (we decided security with large guns on the roof was proof enough), the police gradually put the barriers further and further back until we were about the length of a football pitch away and it was pointless trying to see anything, even watching through the zoom of my camera became difficult and people slowly started drifting off deciding we wouldn't see anything after all. Very disappointed.

A very blue ice lolly and a lesson well learned about eating blue ice lollies in public later, it was back to the house for a nap, and when even the dog failed to wake me up by licking my elbow repeatedly (apparently) I took it as a sign to stay put until the morning.

We hadn't originally planned to stay in Chicago as long as we have done so when we extended our stay we looked for another Couch Surfing host as we'd stayed at Rick's the maximum number of nights most people state on their profile.

It turned out Rick was enjoying our company but when we showed him the address of our new host he told us we had to go purely to see the building. (If you google Mission Tower, Chicago you should see where we stayed.)

When we arrived we were greeted by our new host, Bryan, a well-built, bottle tanned man with shaved legs and bright pink shorts, so we were a little surprised when he told us about his girlfriend, maybe that should teach us something about stereotyping.

Bryan's profile stated that his interests were people, and this became evident as he took us on a walk through the busy streets that surrounded his building and stopped to talk to several people we bumped into on the way, including a cafe bar owner who showed us his breakfast menu which put a pause on the walk for a while.

Leaving Bryan, and all of his friends behind, we decided to use our last day here to explore Chicago's boroughs a bit further and jumped onto the blue line which had brought us through some interesting-looking areas on our way in from the airport.

Almost at the end of the line we got off and turned around after seeing nothing but residential areas and freeways for half an hour, and also deciding against my previous theory that the train line colours may run in accordance to the representations of Monopoly colours for each area.

Later this evening, Bryan took us to meet even more of his friends at the Sax bar at the hotel across the road from his building, where a $3 champagne offer was on that night. At home I probably would have loved a bar like this one, lowly lit and expensively decorated, but seeing as I was in shorts and flip flops, I didn't quite feel I was fitting in next to the girls in designer heels and LBDs.

Leaving Sax, we left Bryan and went for a last walk around Chicago (for this visit, anyway), revisited The Bean for some photos with less people in and caught the end of another concert at Millennium park, ending the walk back through the town by overhearing someone summing up the city while looking out over the river: "This is what New York needs, just something without dead bodies in it". Lovely.

Couch Surfing is turning out to be a great way to both meet new people and locals, we feel we're getting to know our host fairly well now and are enjoying staying with him, though we can't say we share the same preferences on breakfast choices as we found out this morning after accepting a bowl of hot polenta grains with maple syrup, still, a free breakfast has to be at least tried.

Knowing we only had a couple of days left in Chicago we went straight to the library to find out what was happening in the city today, which oddly well-timed for us included a White Sox baseball game, and although we already had two other options of things to do tonight, we felt ticking a baseball game off the list came pretty high up in levels of importance. (The other options included going with Rick to sell torches at a concert with a possibility of earning $100+, no work permit questions asked, or watching a Chinese film with subtitles as part of the summer film festival. As interesting as the film sounded, I can't stand subtitles so it wasn't a hard choice.)

Being the stingy travelers we have become though we decided against paying the $4 booking fee for a ticket and went down to the stadium instead, which of course was purchased for the nosebleed stand. This done, we didn't have a huge amount of time left before the game so we got ready, paid the Corner Bakery Cafe another visit for tea and headed back up to 35th.

We're still not sure how many home runs are normal for a game, but at least we got to experience one tonight, fireworks and all, and we even think we figured out the scoreboard by the end of it.

Amongst a few accidental cheers for the wrong team (nobody seemed to mind, thankfully) and a careful decision not to buy a foam hand for $20, I think I can actually admit to enjoying a popular sport. Saying this, it isn't difficult when there aren't people who've been drinking for 12 hours straight hitting other people with bar stools around you.

I wonder what English football teams would think to permanently only having the home team's fans attend matches...