On the road to the big apple!

Day 3:

Another rainy day lay ahead of us. We packed up our things, half of which were soaking wet. We had a traditional American breakfast of rasberry flavoured peanut butter with jam smothered between a toasted seeded bagel.

In the 20 metres of so from the door of the apartment to the car we managed to get drenched. Brilliant first big drive day, rain. Our highest level wiper speed could barely keep the rain off the windscreen, everybody on the highway was driving at half the speed limit. We were making our way along the 95 Turnpike. It would take us all the way to New York City (and eventually it will take us through Phili, D.C. and Carolina) This journey would see us travelling through more English places than I've actually been to back home in England!

We decided our half way stop would be in New London, which is situated on the river Thames of all places! We settled on a pier and ate some incredible sandwiches that auntie Zia had made for us.

After leaving (New) London we headed out down the 95 but spotted a Mall in Hartford, we stopped here to get our first real taste of American Mall life, it was in the middle of nowhere really but it had all the big name brands and was really rather busy considering it was midday on a wednesday. Paolo got himself a new pair of jeans from American Eagle, only $40, his other jeans were still soaking wet. I activated my US number which is 347-573-3964.
The rest of the drive was pretty uneventful but it passed quickly, we saw numerous ridiculous sized vehicles and listened to some tunes on the way down.
We had travelled through 4 states, Massachussetes, Rhode island, Connecticut and New York. We drove into New York via the Bronx making our way through Queens and over the Queens borough bridge.
See here for pics and video's of our entrance!

We easily found parking on 5th avenue, which was 4 blocks from out hotel. Our hotel is called Hotel 309 and is right in the centre of Chelsea, right by the meatpacking district, a brilliant location!
The hotel is simple but comfortable.

We decided to go out for dinner around 7:30pm, we headed over to a Man vs Food location, a deli diner called Katz Delicatessan. Once again there is not much I can put into words to truly describe how good it was, we tipped the server before ordering and he brought us a plate of tasters of all their different meats. We decided to go for the Corned Beef and Brisket of Beef, all made on location and cooked for upto 24 hours! It was juicy and just unbelievable! The Coleslaw was sweet and better than any coleslaw I’ve ever had. Look at the sheer size of them!


After dinner we made our way 2 blocks east and met my friend Esther, who looked after me when I got stuck in New York previously in the Volcano this year. She’s is one of my closest friends and it was so good to see her again, we went for drinks in our regular haunt around St. Johns, Hirai Mong. It was a quiet night and Paolo and Esther were just getting to know each other, a couple of drinks later and we departed and headed home getting ready for a big day tomorrow!

Quote of the Day: (In the car, while listening to radio)
Paolo: ‘All these country music stars sound like Taylor Swift.’
Me: ‘Erm, well this IS Taylor Swift’
Cue mass hysteria!

Day 2:

An early morning for me and

Paolo, the 5 hour time difference meant that we were up at 8:30. Paolo's cousin

Giovanni works night shifts so was up in the morning having just returned from work at the Hilton. We hadn't met him yet because we arrived so late the night before, we had a expresso and cookies for breakfast and talked with Giovanni for about half an hour after listening to some advice on where to visit and directions to the subway, funnily enough in the backround James Bond: You only live twice was playing on the TV and we had a conversation about which bond was the best, me and Paolo concluded it was Pierce Brosnan in Goldeneye, Giovanni went for the classical Shaun Connery.

The weather was light and breezy, with a very slight drizzle, to little to justify donning the kag or bringing an umbrella (which we would later regret). It was just over a mile walk to the Maverick subway station, we took in the sights, the wood panelled buildings and wide suburban roads. Today was a day for walking, we had left our car outside Auntie Zia's. We were only going north one stop to Aquarium station, there we exited and took a early morning walk around the piers, it was very quite in Boston, it being around 9:30pm by now and having missed the rush hour, not many people were around. Too early for stores to by open we merely walked around the piers, the misty rain was starting to build up very slightly, but still nothing to be worried around, we were still walking around in T-shirts.

Just across the road from the Piers was Quincy Market, a famous food market in Boston. Here we found taster of what was in-store for us throughout our America trip, Mexican to Greek food, Italian Sausages, Pizza, Cookies and Cupcakes, Bagels to Barbeque and much more! We bought ourselves a classic beef hot dog which we split and shared (we were saving ourselves for lunch).

We headed out of Quincy Market around 11 (we walked up and down Quincy Market around 4 or 5 times in awe!) we headed into North End where the old little Italy was located. There we took photo's with the Paul Revere statue, he was the dasterly fool who alerted the American Patriots to the arrival of the British Liberation Army (back in 1700's). I hate to be so British and talk about the weather, but now it really started to rain, we unpacked our kag-in-a-bag's and made our way towards Old North Church, one of the oldest churches in Boston, it was an established anglican protestant church, in here we took shelter from the rain and had the full tour and history. We couldn't spend all our time in the church so we decided to brave the rain and begin our search for the legendary Barking Crab restaurant, as featured on Man vs Food!

The rain was really picking up so we stopped in a 7/11 to ask for directions (which was a fail) but check out the Rice Krispie square we found!

Lobster!

We found the famous Barking Crab seafood restaurant! The menu was immense and extensive! A seafood lovers dream! We ordered a Junior Lobster selection which came with 1.25lbs of Lobster and 2lbs of Crab (the options went Junior, Neptune, Venus and King which was 10lbs of Lobster!) with the Junior Lobster selection we also ordered a Clam bake which was a side which came with clam chowder, corn, coleslaw and a bag of mussels. I will let the video and pictures show you just how much we enjoyed this meal!

After lunch the time was about 3:00pm and we were looking for something to do for next, the waiter at the Barking Crab recommended the Harpoon Brewery for their free tasters, it was 2 miles from the restaurant and we figured we could use the exercise. However hard to believe, the rain decided to increase in intensity, our bags were begining to really soak through. We arrived at the brewery, it was quiet, they had a bar inside which was frequented by the staff, after all when we arrived, they were the only ones there, all of them had a pint of one of the 12 pints on offer. They began to run us through all the different beers and told us we could have whatever we wanted, so we proceeded to try all of them! Paolo's settled on their own version of cider while I decided my favourite was the 12% Leviathon. We had to leave by 4pm because a big tourist group was arriving for a tasting.

We then headed over to Harvard, which was in Cambridge (confusing I know), the method of getting there, we thought, was a subway TRAIN, but what we ended up getting on was actually an underground subway system that was all run by busses! Underground! They have a network of busses underneath Boston! Weird.

Harvard was quite a disapointment, not really any fault of its own, but because the rain was such that we just couldn't be outside for much longer without being completely drenched. We couldn't really be risking our valuables in the rain. We did however find refuge in the Harvard book shop, here is Paolo reading about Game Theory (which I had to tell him had nothing to do with Monopoly).

Harvard was a wash-out, literally, we headed home and the walk home from the subway station was even more rain! The only real worthwhile event to mention was a hobo man attacking the bins, which was freaky when you combine it with his shouting the weather.

When we got back home, we got changed and noticed just how wet everything was! My bag was soaked through, I’m lucky my laptop isn’t water damaged.

Dinner was an Italian masterpiece! Auntie Zia had cooked us up some of the best pasta sauce I’ve ever had, with Italian sausage and bread, it was a brilliant meal. We spent the rest of the evening catching up with Paolo’s Zia and Antoinette, we watched Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy, we are really immersing in American culture! Still being subject to the Jet lag we ended up sleeping at 10pm. A good full day in Boston!

Quote of the day: (While at the Barking Crab)

Paolo: “We make eating lobster a spectator sport!”

Food Glorious Food!

Quincy Market; Boston, MA

Just a quick post of Quincy Market in Boston! A glorious introduction to the gems of USA Cuisine!

This is mainly a picture post! Check them out! A taste of whats to come!

Day 1: London to Boston

Day 1:

USA beckoning we made our way towards the airport. I had stayed the night at Paolo's and his parents were taking us to Terminal 5, Heathrow. It was wet and cold, it was London after all! Once we arrived Paolo's dad tried to sweet talk the check in guy into getting us free upgrades to business class, which kinda worked, he put us on the SFU list (Suitable For Upgrade), this merely increased the anticipation! We had final drinks with Paolo's mum and dad before embarking on our truely epic journey.

Check in went smoothly, security was as standard,Terminal 5 is a big and beautiful place, but a bit cold and characterless. After checking in on Foursquare (the really important check-in in my opinion) we went for a little bit of shopping. I picked up the standard 1L of Jameson's Irish Whiskey in duty free and we found ourselves drawn towards the cigar room! Browsing with wonder (and totally pretending we were more sophisticated and classier than we clearly were) and pretending to know what we were doing, we thought it'd be a good idea to get some celebratory stogeys! Unfortunately you can't take cuban products into america, and seeing as they were all cuban cigars, we had to bail on this plan, perhaps Vegas will present more opportunity.

Knowingly eager we had turned up about 2 hours early for our flight, so we had to sit around for a bit, but being the brand new Terminal 5 and it being built by the British, we got stuck in the internal train between the gates! for about 20 minutes we were stuck, and the whole holiday was up in the air! (perhaps an over dramatisation, but you get the picture)

Boarding our plane and not getting our upgrade we were pleased to have the honour of sitting behind a young baby, who clearly for the entire 7 hour flight, was not happy to be heading towards the USA (well not as much as us) the only thing missing from our flight experience so far with British Airways was getting stuck on the runway for an hour and a half... oh wait sorry, we WERE stuck on the runway for an hour and a half! Well done BA!

There isn't much to say about the flight, apart from the aforementioned crying baby, we were perhaps cracking too many america jokes and trying our silly accents, but nobody said anything. At least we had a couple of drinks to get us through :)

Arriving at the National car rental location it was dark at 8pm, we arrived and was greeted with a choice of 3 cars, a KIA Sorento, Dodge Nitro or a JEEP SUV, they said we could simply choose! We were like 2 kids in candy shop, except with huge ass SUV's! Decisions decisions! We went for the Dodge Nitro, for a couple of reasons, it was a Dodge, it had a cool name, and it was comfortable. Check out the Dodge

However a spanner in the works was about to turn up as the lady disappeared to let us explore the cars, she turned up with a Ford Explorer, which was HUGE! 7 seater, more than we had bargained for, but she had a word with her manager and managed to get us swing us this beauty! (SEE PICS!) Now that we had this larger than expected car, our whole plan to buy tents to camp when we our without accommodation was out the window, the seats in our car fold flat, so we are able to sleep in it!

Upon leaving the rental place we followed the directions that they gave us to Border street, however due to a misunderstanding (on their part!) they sent us towards Porter street! So we were lost, after wondering around in the car for a bit we decided to bite the bullet and do what no man does, ask for directions... after a couple of failed attempts, we parking in front of a mexican cafe and the delivery guy decided to escort us to our location! Damn americans are so nice!

The place we are spending our first two nights is Paolo's great aunt's, Zia Maria, who is a sweet old lady who was trying to over feeding us from the moment we arrived! Prosciutto, Mozzerella, Turkey, Provolone and all the condiments and trimmings! And for Dessert? what else! Cookies and Doughnuts!

Now we are off to bed, and we will be watching our little TV that Zia provided :)

Day one not off to a bad start!

So mileage so far: 00010

Quote of the day:

(while Paolo is looking at the map of America)

Paolo: "Hey look, there's a place called charlotte, reckon we'll be going past there?"

Me: "I don't know about you, but im planning on going IN Charlotte!"

Cue lots of childish giggling!

Car is sorted, flights are booked and lift to the airport arranged....

ITS TIME FOR A ROAD TRIP!

Roughly 4600 Miles of driving, at least 23 major stops, this is the trip of a lifetime!Im currently supposed to be packing, but I've taken a break while I wait for my clothes to dry and before I begin to do some ironing (gotta look ship shape for our American cousins).
This is a starter note to launch this trip, check out this page for updates etc.

This trip was first dreamt up over a year ago over ribs at our regular Kingston haunt, Tony Roma's, we had all arranged to meet up for lunch, but only me and Paolo turned up! So we got to talking about how much we liked BBQ ribs, and how we should go travelling after university, and being the genius's we are, we put two and two together and decided we needed to go and discover America! Now the British have a long history on US soil, and we most definately wish to add to that!

After just a few days of planning and a few months of anticipation the time is soon upon us to embark (and yes ofcourse we are flying British Airways, who else!). The journey so far has involved me selling alot of my stuff (or 'Junk', gotta get used to the US lingo) and working my arse off to earn a bit of extra mulag. But we have ourselves a Car and we have ourselves a general route.

This is what we are expecting on the car front:

We are expecting highs, lows and food! Lots of it! hopefully we won't have ballooned by the time we reach the west coast. But for the mean time I have other things to think about, I have to pick up my camera from a friend and sort my house out before I leave my room is a tip and its going to stay that way until I get back and have to do the UN-packing.

The general route is not set in stone, but we do wish to proceed with some direction, so here is a map of where we will be going!
I expect to meet many friends and make many friends!

See you in America, or if you stuck in England, I guess we will see you when we are back!

View USA Roadtrip in a larger map

Road Trip Agenda!

Okay, so some of you must have heard me babbling on by now about my road trip across america, well i thought it best for my american friends to see when and where i will be at different places, this is a very rough guide, but do keep checking my blog here for more details (because facebook wont always let me post so much detail. I will put an update on facebook to alert you of an update.
So here is the Agenda in terms of timings, and some details of the plans at each location, please message me if you can contribute anything to my trip!
I will be travelling with my mate Paolo!

Iron Man graffiti!

Iron Man graffiti!
Originally uploaded by Terocs

Check out this sick graffiti of Iron Man underneath Waterloo station!
check out my other graffiti photo's

Climate Action, where is it?

In 1988, James Hansen, a climate scientist for the Goddard institue at NASA, warned a Washington meeting that the world was getting warmer due to the build up of greenhouse gases, and an increased tendency for floods and droughts was to be expected. He made his speech on the hottest day of the year, when the midwest was suffering one of its worst droughts.

Hansen's speech spurred the setting up of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

It's interesting that a change of just a few degree's during an American summer turned climate change into a 'global issue' that was able to mobilize the entire scientific committee into action, when only 3-years previously thousands of famine victims in Ethiopia and Sudan werent enough to move governments towards acting on global environmental emergencies. These deaths took place in Africa after all, and they were still considered 'out there'

Just as Terrorism was never a real issue in America until it landed on their doorsteps, the Environment is still not a big issue there. One would think that it would take a dramatic hazard event to shake the political system, such as 9.11 did with Terrorism. Perhaps Katrina, which had a death toll of 4081, would have been the catalyst for action in the political power house of the U.S., after all it surpassed the 2995 death toll of the 9/11 attacks which spurred a whirlwind reaction. However the lack of action shows how the geography of politics comes into play. Ethiopia and Sudan clearly doesn't have the social, economic or political capital with U.S. political interests and apparently neither does New Orleans.

Sadly this is because even within the borders of America, if it doesn't effect those with the money and power, than it is still an issue which is 'out there'.
It is unfortunately that the U.S. is so blase on the issue, it is the case of the Ostrich Arena of politics, where politicians stick their heads in the sand to avoid doing anything that would appear drastic. The environment still doesn't hold the capacity to be worth any politicians to use any of their political capital on. This means that what little action is taken is often short sighted and avoids any real political breakthrough.

After arriving back form New York, a city I now Love, it would be a shame if it took a disaster such as 9/11 (which clearly still impeeds the memories and emotions of New Yorkers still) in order for a change to happen.
U.S. politicians should see the foresight as a blessing, it would be a shame to see a blessing of knowledge go unheeded.

Cold Turkey

Facebook is now off! Its serving as a much too desirable distraction for me during this revision season, and boy do i need to avoid distractions! Since being stuck in NYC ive missed some valuable study time! I'm way behind and i need to take drastic measures to give myself even the slightest chance of doing alright, getting good grades are kinda off the books at this point and doing OKAY is what im looking to do. I'm becoming more and more disenchanted with my course and Im looking forward to getting university out of my life!

It could be interesting for me as well, to see how long I can go without it, Facebook has been such a big part of my daily life and routine, it will be interesting to see if the urge becomes unbearable and I log back in! I started to feel that I was becoming far to dependant on my Facebook as a means connecting to friends that my phone was being under used, and I was missing opportunities to actually meet up and catch up with people. So thats my plan! already I find myself lacking contact details of a bunch of friends whom I would normally turn to Facebook to connect me. I'm a Facebook addict and this is my cold Turkey time

If being in NYC serves as the reason I do poorly in my exams than it would have been totally worth it. The people I met and the experiences I had have definately served to let me grow as a person and Im definately better for it. I'm looking forward to life and the adventures and people it will bring!

This is me bounding towards life!






Also watch this space for another NYC update! (if I can be bothered)
I may also use this blog as a place to write up anything interesting that I've just learned about while studying.

There's nothing you can't do now that your in New York

Monday 12th April 2010,
4th full day in New York City.
Ive had a hectic few days with little sleep, many friends and much partying.
My first impression of New York is of a city who’s people have so much personality which is totally reflected in their lifestyle.
First night straight off from the airport I met up with Esther and came across this little gem that reminded me of one of my greatest loves –
David Purdie!



And then proceeded to get to know the local bars and luckily my friend Emma was able to join me! Catching up with good friends is my favourite past time.

On the Friday I met up with Jessica, and we met up with a bunch of alumni from Berkley, who are a crazy bunch! We ran up a bill of $1200 just in our first location which they were able to put on their expense accounts, that was the beginning of a crazy night that took me all over Manhattan. Starting off at a bar just off Times square, to getting dinner at a Pho place downtown near NYU, then onto a bar called ‘the W’ underneath a hotel on Union Square, which eventually got flooded so we had to moved on at about 3am. At this point people in our crew of now about 4 (which started at around 10 people) started to be craving a famous late night delicacy, chicken and rice! On 53rd street, the que at 4m was a mile long, so you knew it was good, taxi’s constantly pulling up to drop people off just for this one late night food stand which is apparently a local must have meal. We tried to get into the lobby of the Hilton to eat our food but they wouldn’t let us, so one of the guys got a room in the Sheraton on 53rd and 7th (just down the road from Time Square and we proceeded to much in our room and watch movies. Here is a few pics of the room and then a view from our room.





In the morning a couple of people had to catch planes and I decided to walk back to NYU, which is around 8th street and I was currently on 53rd street, but the walk was good, ive included some pics of the places I passed and the weather was incredible!






When I got back I decided that catching up on sleep was for the weak! So I walked back up to Central park to see what all the fuss was about, it was only a 3 mile walk and I got to go past the empire state building and times square again. Central Park is way to overcrowded, unlike London where we have loads of big parks, Central Park seems to be one of the only ones, and it shows, most of the grass has been trodden away and there are people absolutely everywhere doing all manner of past times in the park. I was then supposed to meet Esther in Soho, which is back downtown around 4 miles, this took me past the famous Square Apple store which had a que around the ‘block’ for the new iPad still, and also past the Rockafella centre. All these places ive seen in hundreds of movies are all very close to each other, its brilliant.

The weather is great and the company is brilliant, which brings me onto my Saturday night when I got to reunite with Steve, Emma, Esther and a couple of other people from Yonsei. Soju and Kareoke ensued!