As promised, this is the follow-up post on my trip to New York.
Ken and I arrived in Manhattan on Monday, July 28th at about 9:30pm. Flight delays, a confusing air-train map and switch problems on the E subway train along with Joel having problems getting in from Minneapolis through our plans for dinner at Lombardi’s off a little bit. We checked in, and walked: Times Square, Carnegie Hall, The Russian Tea Room, The Plaza, Broadway, etc., etc., etc.
Once again I sing the praises of my iPhone. With the new Google maps app and subway system app, we found everything easily. We were like a walking Apple commercial, mapping, linking to websites, finding hours of operation, etc. When we wanted historical info, there it was. How late is the Carnegie Deli open, we were on it. BTW, the Carnegie deli is open until 4am in case you find yourself needing cheesecake or a sandwich as big as your head at 2:45am in Manhattan.
We did finally connect with Joel on Monday night at about 11:45pm at the Carnegie Deli. You know the Carnegie Deli, the place where $20 buys you a sandwich big enough to feed an entire country in Africa. No joke here, my brisket sandwich was absolutely the biggest I have ever seen. Don’t ask the waiters the difference between matzo and kreplach, they don’t know and we still don’t know. It’s a fun challenge though watching them try to explain. What better to wash it all down with than a trip into Gray’s Papaya at 2am?
Tuesday found us on the town. Breakfast was pizza at Lombardi’s. Excellent! Lombardi’s is in Little Italy and is recognized as the first pizzeria in America. Their over was first lit in 1905 and has made great pizza ever since. The folks there were great, even inviting us to the kitchen for great photos with the cooking staff and a peek into the oven. We walked to Washington Square, through the village, down Mulberry Street, into Chinatown, to Central Park to the Dakota and Strawberry Fields to see the Imagine memorial. We shot up to the Cathedral of St. John the Devine, started in 1822 and still nowhere nearing completion. One interesting note is that there was more reverence at the John Lennon Imagine site that in the cathedral. Then we jumped on the 4 train and headed to the Bronx.
I could sense the excitement building as we rode closer to the stadium. I remember being in NY a few years before and stepping out onto the subway platform only to be turned away by the driving rain. Not this trip. It was sunny, low 80’s, very humid and hundreds of fans all in Navy or pinstripes exited the train with us. We were steps away from the ballpark. From under the subway platform, you could look to the right and see the future, the glistening new stadium, to the left, the cathedral of baseball, the old Yankee Stadium. All along the exterior of the stadium are businesses that cater to the Yankee faithful. Restaurants, bars, souvenir shops, stretch all in a row for a city block. It is a block long tailgate party without the cars as everyone comes to the stadium on the subway; the Yankee faithful united. I bought peanuts and Cracker Jack. I wanted the whole experience as it was intended when the game was invented. We geared up at a local shop and headed into the stadium.
Walking into the stadium I paused and said to Ken, “we are really here.” It was very surreal. We headed to Monument Park only to be denied by a security guard. We were 10 minutes too late. A major disappointment, but we were still inside Yankee Stadium. We were at the home of all of baseball’s greats and arguably one of the greatest sporting venues ever in the United States. It’s not just about the baseball, since 1923 Yankee Stadium has been the representative arena for all sports in America. Gene Tunney & Joe Louis won heavyweight title boxing matches here. Graziano fought here as well as Sugar Ray Robinson. Muhammad Ali fought Ken Norton to defend the title here. This is also where Knute Rockne gave his “win one for the Gipper speech” in 1929. Three Popes held mass here. The baseball stands out however. It is hard to not think that by being here only for a few moments that you were in the words of one of the great players Lou Gehrig “the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
The Yankees lost to the Orioles 7-6 that night. They came from behind with 5 runs in the bottom of the 8th. We all thought they had them. I say “we all” because at Yankee Stadium, all 57,545 people in attendance are rooting for the Yankees. The new greats were all there: Alex Rodriguez, Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jason Giambi, Johnny Damon perhaps on their way to World Series title number 27 and immortality in the new monument park. When it was all over, I didn’t want to leave. I took some last shots of the scoreboard to freeze it in time. There were some last photos to capture the memory of my first and last trip ever to Yankee Stadium. It was a memory to last a lifetime. We crowded back on the 4 train to Manhattan. We grabbed a slice at Ray’s to end the night after a long walk around to say goodbye to the New York icons; St. Patrick’s, Prometheus, Central Park, Times Square.
On Wednesday, we got a little bit of a late start. We grabbed a bagel at H & H Bagel Company. New Yorkers call it the best bagels in all of New York City. There is some documentation of that on the walls. We shopped a bit and got on the E to JFK. We missed our flight. Oh well. We grabbed another slice, sat, waited and shared our thoughts about the great trip.
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