Before coming to New York, I tried not to get too much information about the city or about things to do here just so that I would not get hyped up and eventually get disappointed when I would actually visit them. I had high expectations for my visit to New York and I feel that if I were to gather a lot of information about things to do and see there I would either never manage to do it all in 10 days, or the reality would be different that I imagined and I would end up feeling a bit disappointed. I did not want that. But you cannot avoid getting tips from people either, friends and locals started to talk to us about must-see locations. The High Line was one of them.
Day #5
Starting point is as always Brooklyn between Williamsburg and Greenpoint where I finally had my first real cup of cold coffee thanks to the Upstate Stock Coffee shop. Greenpoint is the first location in Brooklyn where I saw some cool street art as well. After that great coffee -with a free refill- and after visiting some biker shops in the area, we jumped on the train on our way to walk the walk the high line. In a bizarre way, when we reached the entry point of the High line, I got flashbacks of Cinque Terre. Admittedly the view form these routes in Italy is very different than in NYC and you need some real strength, endurance and courage to walk these routes in Italy, here it is just a straight line. Yet again the route between the Manarola and Riomaggiore villages in cinque terre came to my mind. Now, can I be the one to say it? The high line was just OK not something very extraordinary. The cool thing about it is that you can walk “on top of” the city and have a view from above, have a curious peek in some New York apartments, see the streets from above. But other than that it is simply OK. When the weather is nice it is indeed a nice thing you can do in New York but I would not call it a must see. You can do without it too. Moving on….
Although I would love to stay in Greenwich village after the high line because the other end led us there, Tanguy insisted to jump on the train yet again to get to the Brooklyn Bridge area so that he could take some photos – Ah, the perks of being married to a photographer- Was I annoyed? Yes, yes I was. Was it worth it though? It was absolutely worth it. Watching the sunset under (on the side of) the Brooklyn bridge is just breathtaking….. being next to the river looking at the high and impressive buildings with the sun reflected on them seeing them turning grey and cold only for a moment soon to be filled with lights once again artificial lights this time, when the sun is down. Just an amazing transition of this scenery and there are no words for me to describe it because I am not a skilled writer, so I will just show you:
It was hard to leave this place and this view behind, I could stay there until the sun rises again if I could but the cold and fatigue got to me so we returned to our nest in Brooklyn to end day #5. The next day we would be on the top of the world!
Currently listening to Alicia Keys: Empire State of mind
