Tucson

Although this is technically no longer “LFL at Sea,” I will continue blogging this trip until it reaches its end in Tucson next Saturday, 1 June.

Saturday, 25 May 2013 
Boston to New York City

After a final room service breakfast in our suite, just before 8am we drag our luggage down to the gangway on Deck 5, thinking there would be only a few folks foolish enough to want to carry their own stuff.  In reality, there is a large crowd straining toward the exit with even more luggage than we have.  Some of these people are, like us, taking Amtrak to points south, while others must have early flights from Logan Airport.

Fortunately it is a short walk through the Boston Cruise Terminal and a five-minute taxi ride to Amtrak’s South Station—so we needn’t have worried about missing our train—where a redcap comes out to the street to pick up our luggage and hold it while we have some coffee.  He then escorts us to our Business Class car ahead of other passengers, suggests which seats will give us the best views of the coastline as we head down through Connecticut, and calls ahead to Penn Station to arrange for a redcap to meet us on the platform when our train arrives.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You are probably aware that during the previous week there was a crash on the Metro-North Commuter Lines in Connecticut that shut down all service from New Haven to Penn Station (Amtrak uses the same tracks).  For a short time we thought about reserving a rental car at Logan Airport in case the trains were still not running on the 25^th.  But the national news reported on Tuesday the 21^st that all trains would be running by the next day.  The train service is good, but we arrive in New York about 45 minutes late because of lower speeds on the last leg of the journey.  This is the first time I rode the train from Boston to New York and am very surprised (I should have been more prepared by reading the schedule) when, instead of heading through the South Bronx into the tunnels under Manhattan, we cross from the Bronx to Queens over the Hell’s Gate railroad bridge and then use the LIRR tracks into Penn Station.

From Penn Station it is a short taxi ride to the Grand Hyatt Hotel (adjacent to Grand Central Station), at 42^nd Street and Lexington Avenue.  The hotel has recently been remodeled and the huge lobby is a model of post-modern minimalism, with shiny black and white surfaces, and two strange Easter-Island-like sculptural heads that tower over the tiny guests.  We don’t have much time to unpack or relax, since we are due at my cousin Helen’s apartment on 15^th Street and 5^th Avenue at 5pm for wine and cheese.  We always enjoy spending time at Helen’s with its 20^th-floor wonderful wall of windows looking out over all of lower Manhattan and the new skyscrapers of New Jersey.  There is even a small slice of the Hudson River visible and we catch a glimpse of a cruise liner leaving New York for distant ports.  And the new, not-yet-finished Liberty Tower at the World Trade Center rises up over the city as the centerpiece of the view.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helen’s friend Cathi joins us for the last glass of wine and then dinner at Sagaponack, a fish and seafood restaurant off 5^th Avenue just a short walk away (although it’s a blustery and cool evening as we walk).  If you like lobster, the Sagaponack is for you, offering lobster of some kind for every course (except dessert).  The four of us manage to consume lobster sliders, lobster salad, lobster mac-n-cheese, and lobster pot pie—as well as really delicious fries (not that we didn’t enjoy the lobster on the ship and in Canada).