The days are full here. Work and visits take place all our days. As little time as we have left, we spend it with our friends on the spot with whom we really share good moments. We're enjoying it. Of course, we keep an eye on French news, which is not enjoyable. Even here the pill has a hard time.
To keep us safe « crust » in our comfortable cottage and then because we should not miss this, we made a detour through New York. More than just a detour, we spent a week there. It was aboard a bus we took the road, heading for the big apple.
The trip between Boston and New York allowed us to discover new landscapes. The route took us through Providence, an important city south of Massachusetts, then along the coastal marshes of Connecticut before returning to New York. We left these beautiful natural landscapes to gradually enter the concrete and macadam of the New York suburbs. By far already the city seemed impressive, the skyline was emerging and let all these great buildings appear.
New York is a megacity and knows of course its lot of bottling, it took us a long time to reach the heart of Manhattan. And now, first shock! We got off the bus, in the middle of the car, among a crowd of passers-by and surrounded by these large buildings as far as we can see, it was rather dizzying. With no budget to stay in Manhattan for a week, we took public transportation to get to our New Jersey accommodation, about an hour away from downtown Manhattan.
We had a room in Jersey City, across the Hudson River, that is, southwest of New York City.
We landed in this neighborhood called Communipaw, which we crossed for a week to join New York. The atmosphere was quite pleasant and very lively.
To reach Manhattan, we were walking for ten minutes to reach a train/tramway stop that set us off at a PATH station, another train/metro. This PATH (for Port Authority Trans Hudson) allows you to cross the Hudson River through a tunnel and reach the New York Metro. There are two different lines from Jersey City that we borrowed according to our visit programs. The line we used most was at the World Trade Center, south of Manhattan.
It was special to go through this place, because we all remember this famous September 11, 2001, and being on the site of the disaster touched us. To be very small in the middle of these great buildings and to imagine the shock of those planes that came to hit the towers, it is not even conceivable.
Today there remains the memorial which consists of two immense basins placed at the exact location of the towers. The names of the victims are inscribed on the banks of these basins and the Americans come to collect them. One can see a tree recaptured from the cataclysm, a pear tree that was removed from the rubble, moved to a nursery for a fitness cure and replanted on the site for memory. Today a new tower of the World Trade Center was built, as well as a new station for the PATH, the old one having been destroyed by the collapse of the towers.
The reconstruction of the building was entrusted to the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, who also wrote the St Exupéry station in Lyon and the Liège-Guillemins station. This station is called the Oculus. The work is very futuristic, very design, very bright and clean interior. We were able to admire this achievement twice a day at different times of the day.
We wanted to go through New York for various reasons. Of course, there was a link with the project around resilience and adaptation in green spaces and also as more personal, touching and seeing this urban landscape and pop culture that accompanied us during our childhood through American series and movies.
The result, rather strange, is that the city seemed quite familiar to us and this feeling did not leave us during our stay. Except maybe in Times Square. Seeing on an image a street full of giant screens does not allow you to realize the commercial orgasm that this represents. We went there out of curiosity, and we quickly looked for a way out, the feeling of choking and visual aggression was too strong.
When we left, we came across a very acrobatic and funny street entertainment troupe. We came out of this temple of consumption by Broadway Avenue, the mythical avenue of theatres. A beautiful sunset accompanied us along our way to Central Park, where we had decided to take refuge for our evening picnic.
A week in New York cannot be summed up in a few lines.
You'll have to take care of it in a few days.
A little more greenery, a museum and a large bridge.
See you soon!
