Last days in Brooklyn

Park slope restaurant

creepy Steeplechase leering man on Boardwalk near where Steve grew up

The Thunderbolt

Worst hurricane to hit NYC. Not much wind but a super high tide and torrential rains left a good part of Brooklyn under water

They fixed this old skating rink finally. Back in the 80s I was nervous to run down near it on the boardwalk as crime would increase precipitously past the Parachute Jump. Now all is gentrified 

it is a pretty building repurposed as a theater and restaurant

This hasn't been working for 70 years yet it still stands Steve's mom was hauled up on cables then dropped many years ago

this glistened in he sun but I couldn't get the right angle

lots of cheap fruit markets in the various neighborhoods

Outside the Brooklyn Museum: The YO/OY sculpture

In the blue exhibit: all art blue over the centuries from ancient Arabic  blue tiles to this blue lady with the Amazon bag

From a distance, this looked like a huge dinosaur skull. Up close,, it was made of carefully folded boxes from old Korean manuscripts

I liked the light in the courtyard

the hubby

this shivering girl was an allegory for Turkish soldiers sent to fight in Russia during the winter. The weren't dressed much more than this and suffered from exposure more than wounds

This huge installation is one of the museum's bragging points along with all its ancient Egyptian art: Judy Chicago's The Dinner Party made in the 70s

Each place setting celebrates various famous women. Most feature female sex organs such as this for Georgia O"Keefe

My grandmother was named for this Greek poetess but hated the name so she just put an S in front of her middle name

I was thrilled to read there was a glass exhibit. However it consisted of droplets of mirrored glass pasted on the walls which looked tacky. I did like the effect in a sculpture room

They had an open store room of pieces not on display you could walk through. Me before my diet?

I liked this bike

Nice lighting in the lobby along with interesting furniture

Steve and I in front of the YO   OY would have been better

As we were leaving, a high school drum line emerged from a subway tunnel

It's been almost a week since we returned from our New York adventure. I spent the first 4 nights in Harlem with my nieces and then on to Brooklyn with Steve, his brother and wife. Currently I am waiting impatiently for it to be warm enough for me to safely and somewhat comfortably ride my bike. New York is usually 5- 10 degrees warmer than here so I ran a record amount while there. Surprisingly my body held out as usually I get slower and slower with no rest days but on the last day up and down Ocean Parkway I got faster. Maybe because it is so flat and at sea level.

A good time with family and local specialties: Italian bakery and restaurant, huge cheap Chinese pork buns from a nearby Asian area, a deli in downtown Brooklyn where I emerged from a subway tunnel carrying a much too heavy suitcase, fine on sidewalks but tough climbing up and down stairs (better planning Sue!) I did persuade Steve to abandon a 'good' parking spot so we could go for a walk/run on the Boardwalk. Last year he had found a good parking space and then refused to take our car anywhere. Not playing that game again. Besides, in the middle of the day while the workers are gone parking is much easier. He did worry arriving Sunday night that parking would be impossible but managed to score a spot right in front of his brother's house. He walked or took a train until I came to spoil things.

I hadn't been to the Brooklyn Museum before despite coming to NYC every year if not twice a year when the parents were living there for the past 42 years. That is a lot of trips. And it was cold that day even for NYC, a sharp contrast to the 60 degrees it was earlier in the week so inside it was. We did take a long walk outside around the park and Park Slope afterwards. But the museum was very interesting so I am glad we went..

Running along the Hudson

a prettier version of a previous photo

detail in a brownstone window

nearby church

this bizarre statue is called the Peace Fountain  In the summer, peacocks run in the yard. They have a blessing of the animals here with people lining up for blocks with their pets

I take a bridge to the island that has Riverbank State Park  This is looking north

And now looking south

The park has several murals

New Jersey and the George Washington bridge

my path which was surprisingly empty

interesting rock sculptures

little red lighthouse

view from under the bridge which has two decks of traffic

view of the Palisades past the bridge. My path abruptly ended though I think I could have run up a steep hill to continue further north. But I saw that steep hill and lazy Sue balked

lower Manhattan to the right

Rockefeller Center. This being Steve's photo as they got lost in Harlem, a mystery to me as they were 3 New Yorkers and the streets are on a grid. I had walked them to the right station the day before but they didn't take note of where it was. I assumed walking a block short of it the next day would not be a problem but it was. The problem: all the numbered avenues change names. They kept looking for 8th avenue which the A train runs up to no avail. Sigh But they got to see the tree so it was a win.

I do like combining running with sight seeing though I didn't take my camera until the last day I was in Harlem. It had been so pretty the day before with the Palisades all aglow in the golden hour, I vowed to get up even earlier so I wouldn't miss the dawn on the river. It took me about 6 minutes to get down there assuming I didn't have to stop much for lights. A few days later I found a strange large bruise on my inner arm that I didn't remember getting. Not a good sign when bruises spontaneously appear and these days I am especially paranoid about new symptoms but after a while I remembered that the case I take the camera in was slightly askew and I must have banged my arm against it while running.  Dawn arrives a full hour earlier in NY than at our house plus the streets are lit. Not here, total darkness for miles. Bonus, it is usually 5- 10 degrees warmer . It was actually too warm one day (it would have been fine if I had shorts and a short sleeved teeshirt) which brought out dog walkers. Yeah dogs have to walk everyday but their owners wouldn't stop so much to socialize and leave a tangle of moving leashes for me to negotiate. This was on the upper Westside. I could see the campuses of Banard and Columbia so it was scenic but once I found the magic trail down to the river, no more dogs leashes. And anybody excepting this fast moving e-bike threatening to mow me down.

Once my niece had another person to keep her company, I took most of my stuff Thursday on a subway to Downtown Brooklyn (which is considerably north of where my in-laws live). I couldn't take everything so we had to stop in Harlem on the way home. We were meeting up for a late lunch with one of Steve's cousins. I was left on a street corner for a half hour. Usually not a problem but it was cold and my mobility was impaired by all the stuff I had. Should have gone directly to the restaurant...Should, should should.

Harlem mamma

We took off early Sunday morning for our long drive to New York. Lucky on no traffic and good weather

I stayed in an area of very impressive brownstones

lots of churches

And the City University of NewYork was nearby with its very pretty campus

this is a pumping station for the city

at to the school

more of the gate

statue of one of its first deans

my twin nieces who hosted me

Harlem is full of murals. I found out after I returned, there are many Audubon murals of endangered birds. Have to go back I guess

brownstones

church

another church

Near by coffee shop where I caffeinated myself. There's a famous jazz classic

Take the A train

Which mentions Sugar Hill and Harlem. Yes you do take the A train to get there

Latte love

Alexander Hamilton's house  The neighborhood is Hamilton Heights, emphasis on the heights especially as I was coming up from the river

Harlem used to have mainly African American residents, rich ones in those fancy brownstones but now it is much more mixed especially with Hispanic Americans particularly those from the Dominican Republic. We went to a funky Caribbean lunch place. Love any place that uses lots of coconut

gnome on a literary building

I was chugging up a steep hill last Monday morning. A man shouted at me "work it, Harlem Mamma, Work it." I was way overdressed as I did not pack summer running things with me. But it turned cold from then on and I was perfectly comfortable with my early morning runs along the Hudson. Hard to tell sometimes I was in a huge, crowded city. Many more photos to follow.

The week before leaving, I tortured myself thinking I had too much to do and I sort of stalled in a state of inertia. Thinking is not clear these days as more and more things to worry about appear. Right before I left, I went to the Mom's group. To make things a bit easier on myself, I did not prepare a fancy dessert but instead put together a concoction that involves Italian amareno cherries, my new favorite. A nice night with the moms. Up bright and early the next day for the long drive to NYC. We stopped for a nice breakfast in Toledo. A huge snowstorm had come through a week before. We saw the aftermath of twisted semis jack-knifed and down a steep ditch but it was now 60 degrees. We got a bit lost trying to find the cheap Costco gas in NJ. We found the Costco but not the gas which seemed to be a mile away. Sunday is not a good time to get into the city as everyone is coming back from their escapes. We crawled across the George Washington Bridge which was so foggy, we couldn't see the bridge or the city lights. Years ago we ran across it but it was so foggy then too, no view.

My niece lives just a few miles south of this bridge. She now has a medical issue in which she should not be alone. Her twin sister has come down to be with her but I took over when she had pressing issues back at her home. It was good to be with my nieces. We were able to take walks around her very scenic neighborhood which I had not visited before. Steve stayed south in Brooklyn with his brother and sister-in-law though they came up twice to visit us. In the mornings I would run along the river. All very pretty.