USA Adventure: Return To The Empire State

In October and November 2006 I was lucky enough to go to the USA for work, so I took the opportunity to travel around while I was there. My travel emails were well received back home, so I’m posting them here for all to enjoy.

Original Date: 11 November 2006

Hey all,

I just arrived in San Francisco, and wouldn't you know it - it's raining, and it's forecast rain for the next few days. Oh, and I also got in at around midnight, again. Found the hostel fine, although the guy driving the shuttle bus wasn't exactly enjoying himself!

But back to New York... Kaneen and I had an awesome time, doing a bit more "touristy" stuff this time around. We went to Times Square, took the free Staten Island Ferry to get a view of the Statue of Liberty, and checked out the view of Manhattan from the top of the Rockefeller Center. We also caught an "off-broadway" show (which is apparently cooler), which was "Evil Dead: The Musical". I know some of you B-movie fans back home will be jealous :)

The highlight was probably having drinks at "The View", the revolving restaurant on top of the Marriott Marquis hotel in Times Square. Expensive (US$10 chardonnay / US$10 gin & tonic), but totally worth it. Fantastic view and a great time all round.

The flight to SF was looooong, about 6.5 hours, and it doesn't help that I think I'm still on New York time - so midnight here is 3 am in NY. So very tired, but I think I might go and say Hi to some random people in the "ballroom", which is what they call the common area here at the Green Tortoise.

Here's hoping for clear skies over the next few days!

Take care, Craig

For a lot more photos from the trip, have a look at my Flickr set. I've geotagged them, so the map is pretty interesting too!