Total distance travelled - 11225 km
We travelled through the busiest airport in the world: Atlanta.
Number of our flights that were cancelled: 0
Number of times our luggage didn't make the connection or was misdirected: 0
Number of minutes of television we watched during our trip: 11
Location where we watched this TV: The back of a New York City Taxi.
Most cabs are equipped with TVs in the back. There are TVs and also bullet proof glass protecting the driver. The TVs broadcast news and entertainment clips done by the local New York television station recorded especially for Taxis. It looks like a regular news broadcast except if you listen closely the news anchors sign off by saying "Enjoy the rest of your cab ride". You could also select "Map" by touching the screen and watch via GPS exactly where you are travelling - all in the back of a New York taxi. Very cool.
There are so many TV shows and movies being filmed in New York that the NYPD have a special unit exclusively for movies and TV.
The average number of times we went through security to board our airplane: 1
The number of times we went through airport style security to get to the Statue of Liberty: 2
We were screened before we went on the ferry over to the Statue of Liberty: full airport style. Your belt, shoes, jacket, everything went through like the airport. Selena's purse was hand searched and went through the scanner three times. We figure that she had two compact umbrellas in there that must have looked suspicious. When we got over to the Statue of Liberty, in order to go onto the pedastal, we had to pass through even more stringent security yet again. This time you went through a special machine that scans for explosive residue. Selena and I went through this machine before when we had to go through secondary screening on our flight from San Francisco to Atlanta.
Percentage of Washington, DC tourist attractions that are free of charge to enter: 99%
We had to stand in line for a long time in many attractions but they were all free. The only ones we paid for was the wax museum and the International Spy Museum.
Percentage of New York tourist attractions that were free of charge to enter: 1%
The only tourist attraction in NYC that is free that we encountered is the Staten Island Ferry. We didn't get a chance to go on it, however.
Taxis in Washington DC do not have meters. They charge you by how many zones you cross.
Average temperature we experienced in San Francisco/New Orleans - +20C
Average temperature we experienced in Washington/New York - +5C
Average number of photos we took per city - 1200
Number of photos per day averaged over entire trip - 320
San Francisco and New York are opposites in terms of car ownership. In New York, everyone either walks, takes the subway or a cab. In San Francisco, according to one of our cab drivers, everyone in SF who can drive usually does. It has a high ratio of car ownership especially in comparison to NYC.
Manhattan is derived from a native american word meaning "Land of many hills." The city planners in New York ended up flattening it. The city planners in San Francisco did not and built on the hills.
Overheard on a tour in New Orleans: "Now remember, you are in the City of New Orleans. This means that most of the drivers you will experience tonight are intoxicated. So, while on this walking tour, please watch yourself when crossing the street."
Overheard on another tour in New Orleans: "You can do anything you want in New Orleans. As long as we can watch."
Amount of time in advance you need to book a tour of the White House: 6 months
The cost of a guided White House tour: 0
Monday, March 31, 2008
At the Air Canada Gate at Laguardia...
Up at 4:15 am this morning for the big trip back to Canada. Our car service arrived precisely on time and we were off. We took a car service rather than a taxi because all this week, we had to walk to Park Avenue (less than a block) to hail a cab. We were worried that at that time in the morning, there wouldn't be cabs around and we didn't want to shuffle around Park Avenue with all our luggage. Well, we neednt have worried. As soon as we squeezed out of Hotel 31s elevator, we saw the familiar yellow flashes darting past the Hotel at ridiculous speeds even at this hour. By the time our car service had arrived, about 10 of New Yorks 11000 cabs had already driven by our Hotel. There was no traffic on the 20 minute ride to Laguardia - it is so close. But we still experienced some ever present car honking that is everywhere in New York. Former Mayor Guiliani tried to deal with the honking problem by putting some "No honking - $350 fine" at some intersections. Our night tour guide said the signs are meaningless as the cops can't and won't enforce them. We passed through security and were the lucky winners of "secondary screening". We have won that lottery many times it seems. We got secondary screening in New Orleans flying to Washington also. Anyway, the TSA dude was nice and thanked me for my patience. Soon after we sat down at the gate, we were treated to an ear piercing fire alarm for about 3 minutes. At least we didn't have to evacuate. So we have been here for about an hour now waiting for our 840 flight which departs in about 90 minutes. I notice that they are playing Alanis Morrisette over the sound system. Is this an Air Canada thing? Is it supposed to calm me? Note to Air Canada, playing Alanis Morrisette doesn't make Canadians feel more at home, it just makes us mad. And wishing for more of that ear piercing fire alarm..
Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry
Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry
Sunday, March 30, 2008
This Just In: Kevin Bacon Update
Selena is a papparazi and quite the journalist also. She figured that since Mr. Bacon had only a dufflebag with him he had to live here in NYC. Well, she was right. She also found out why he may have been travelling to New York with us that day and got off at Newark on to that other very public train:
http://www.baconbros.com/site.php?em1=141_-1__0_~0_-1_3_2008_0_0&content=news
He was playing a show that night. Cool!
Well done Selena!
http://www.baconbros.com/site.php?em1=141_-1__0_~0_-1_3_2008_0_0&content=news
He was playing a show that night. Cool!
Well done Selena!
Special cat picture for Russy!!
Oops, got my animals mixed up.. hehe it's not a cat
picture, it's a FOX picture, Fox network news that is :-)
Your welcome Russy :-)
picture, it's a FOX picture, Fox network news that is :-)
Your welcome Russy :-)
pix of the day....
Taxi anyone?
Sorry you have to enlarge these I had the wrong
setting, just click on the pic
Ramsay's at the London Bar
our Ramsay lunch
Ramsay beer
Ramsay menu
The London
No Soup for us.....
The White Castle tower...
told ya they were little!
8PM Sunday night at the post office. Open 24/7
When we arrived in New York by train, this is where we
came in. Under Madison Square Garden is Penn station
and without planning it, this is where our journey tonight
ended, supper across the street from Penn st, back from
wence we came.
From where Dean sat he saw the Empire State bldg.
The Secret to A Really Great Trip!
We do the blog because we very much enjoy sharing our experiences with you when something we think is interesting happens. For the past 16 days, things have been interesting. But we also write to blog to give you something back - something that you can take into the real world to improve your life. What are we talking about? Diet tips? Nope. A real, fast way to make money straight from Wall Street? Nope. This post is how to improve your (travelling) life with just the right bag. One Bag To Rule Them All. This post is a tribute to the unsung hero of this trip: our camera bag.
My new wife is organized-holy crap she is organized. If she sees me hesitating for a moment in the kitchen looking for something, she asks me what I am looking for and ALWAYS knows where it is. Wow. She also transferred this knack of being organized when she travels. Me? I just throw everything in the first available pocket and hope I can find it later. It is a rather frustrating way of doing things especially when I am trying to find something which is all the time.
There are two basic ingredients of a really great trip especially when it spans four different cities over two weeks. The first ingredient is a really great travel agent. Co-op Travel's Alicia did an amazing job of booking the perfect hotels, booking our tours and our flight and rail tickets. Perfect! But Alicia's brilliance only gets us so far. We have to do the rest.
The second secret ingredient to a really great trip was my wife's use of a simple camera bag. Every pocket had a specific purpose. In five minutes, she trained me, "Pockets to Nowhere" Dean how to be super organized and efficient. Yes, Mom, it is true! I am serious, Cam. Let me explain. At the front of the bag, there is a compartment. In there: the wallet. It had a zipper on the front of it with a pocket for the hotel keys. The top compartment: the camera. The right side pocket: extra battery for camcorder and extra camera card. The right pocket: Emergency back up camera and the camera we hand to strangers to take our picture. The back zippered pocket: (the third busiest pocket behind Camera and wallet) Passports and all tickets (Broadway show tickets, Tour tickets, Empire State observatory tickets, etc). We were NEVER looking for anything the entire trip because of my very smart wife's system. In Washington, ol' Pockets to Nowhere showed his face again and put the wallet in his jacket pocket. Within three minutes, alarm bells were going off as to where the wallet was. As was demonstrated from "The Washington Incident" (as it is now known) or "Walletgate", strict adherence to this system also detects important missing things in seconds. It was really amazing.
In New Orleans, Selena and I were on our first tour and she had two failures with the camcorder at once: the battery and the tape. This was a walking tour so we couldn't really stop or we would miss a cool story or something. Like a surgeon, Selena called out for "Battery!" - I was able to hand one to her in seconds because I knew where to look. "Tape!" she ordered next - again I was able to comply easily because of the five minutes of training I had received on "The Bag" Crisis averted - camcorder up and running and we hadn't fallen behind a single step in the walking tour. Nice!
We used this bag system for the whole trip and it made the trip run like a well oiled machine. Awesome.
So there you go, the secret to a really great trip: a camera bag.
My new wife is organized-holy crap she is organized. If she sees me hesitating for a moment in the kitchen looking for something, she asks me what I am looking for and ALWAYS knows where it is. Wow. She also transferred this knack of being organized when she travels. Me? I just throw everything in the first available pocket and hope I can find it later. It is a rather frustrating way of doing things especially when I am trying to find something which is all the time.
There are two basic ingredients of a really great trip especially when it spans four different cities over two weeks. The first ingredient is a really great travel agent. Co-op Travel's Alicia did an amazing job of booking the perfect hotels, booking our tours and our flight and rail tickets. Perfect! But Alicia's brilliance only gets us so far. We have to do the rest.
The second secret ingredient to a really great trip was my wife's use of a simple camera bag. Every pocket had a specific purpose. In five minutes, she trained me, "Pockets to Nowhere" Dean how to be super organized and efficient. Yes, Mom, it is true! I am serious, Cam. Let me explain. At the front of the bag, there is a compartment. In there: the wallet. It had a zipper on the front of it with a pocket for the hotel keys. The top compartment: the camera. The right side pocket: extra battery for camcorder and extra camera card. The right pocket: Emergency back up camera and the camera we hand to strangers to take our picture. The back zippered pocket: (the third busiest pocket behind Camera and wallet) Passports and all tickets (Broadway show tickets, Tour tickets, Empire State observatory tickets, etc). We were NEVER looking for anything the entire trip because of my very smart wife's system. In Washington, ol' Pockets to Nowhere showed his face again and put the wallet in his jacket pocket. Within three minutes, alarm bells were going off as to where the wallet was. As was demonstrated from "The Washington Incident" (as it is now known) or "Walletgate", strict adherence to this system also detects important missing things in seconds. It was really amazing.
In New Orleans, Selena and I were on our first tour and she had two failures with the camcorder at once: the battery and the tape. This was a walking tour so we couldn't really stop or we would miss a cool story or something. Like a surgeon, Selena called out for "Battery!" - I was able to hand one to her in seconds because I knew where to look. "Tape!" she ordered next - again I was able to comply easily because of the five minutes of training I had received on "The Bag" Crisis averted - camcorder up and running and we hadn't fallen behind a single step in the walking tour. Nice!
We used this bag system for the whole trip and it made the trip run like a well oiled machine. Awesome.
So there you go, the secret to a really great trip: a camera bag.
Live From New York, It's Sunday Night!
Well we tried once again to get to the Soup Natzi, we found one that was open to 9:OO but when we got there it was closed. So we went to the post office to mail home a box to lighten the load for the trip home. Anyone notice + said post office? Yes, it's open 24 hours and it was super busy at 8:OO at night!! Now we are having supper, it's 9:.PM and we're at a Deli. We got the window seat and I get to face Madison Square Garden, Dean is facing the Empire State Building! Our food just arrived and it looks awesome, Dean's steak takes up his whole plate!! Well we should be posting pix from the hotel when we get back and the post after that should be from the casa.(Home,unless we see someone famous at the airport!) It's been an absolute perfect, fun, unique 2 weeks.
(Over to Dean)
It is kind of neat ending the trip in a diner much like the one that Seinfeld was set in. It is even more fitting that we are sitting directly across from Penn Station where we first arrived in NYC. In this brief period in NYC, we have seen so much but could spend another week here and still not see it all. I am enjoying a NY steak right now, I thought it fitting to order one...Bryan Adam's Summer of 69 just came on the diner's sound system as if to remind us of our trip tomorrow back to Canada. I bet the Summer of 69 was great but so was the Spring of '08...
Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry
(Over to Dean)
It is kind of neat ending the trip in a diner much like the one that Seinfeld was set in. It is even more fitting that we are sitting directly across from Penn Station where we first arrived in NYC. In this brief period in NYC, we have seen so much but could spend another week here and still not see it all. I am enjoying a NY steak right now, I thought it fitting to order one...Bryan Adam's Summer of 69 just came on the diner's sound system as if to remind us of our trip tomorrow back to Canada. I bet the Summer of 69 was great but so was the Spring of '08...
Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry
Dean and Selena....
Go to Whitecastle.
Really. We have pics to prove it. It was really good! Greasy little yummy burgers. They have a 100 pack available for 52.99!
For those of you who haven't seen the movie starring Harold and Kumar, Whitecastle has been around since the 1920s and is famous for serving little palm size burgers. They are very addictive....
Sent on the TELUS Mobility network with BlackBerry
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