Ooh wah, ooh wah cool, cool kitty, tell us about the boy from New York City

Peter Allen once wrote that he’s “…been to cities that never close down…” and included New York in that list.

MBW and I have just arrived home (11.25pm) from a concert at Carnegie Hall, it’s -4°C but feels like -11°C, and it’s been snowing.

Despite all of that, we caught the subway with hundreds – no, thousands – of other people. In fact, it was standing room only on the train for parts of the trip home.

But that’s stuff that has happened at the end of the day. Let me start at the beginning.

It was cold this morning too.

We got up and planned our day. The High Line, followed by a foot tour of places to eat and things to see, then see what the rest of the day brings. Then a concert – Keith and Krysten Getty – at Carnegie Hall.

Our last full day in NYC and we were going to make the most of it.

The forecast for today was sunny … and cold, of course, but I’m not going to beat that drum any longer.

We played subway ninja again and hopped on the train – well, trains – into the city. No one train ever takes us to where we want to go.

I mentioned yesterday about how the subway trains start (and stop, for that matter) with unexpected and unnecessary violence.

We were watching this young Asian guy on the train heading into The High Line this morning. He planted his feet about the width of his shoulders apart, closed his eyes, did not hold onto anything, and stood rock solid for the whole journey.

He either has greater ninja powers than I have, or he has a core of steel.

There must have been a great deal of clenching going on, I think.

His display of balance tells me that he certainly wouldn’t fall off a Segway.

We got out at West 34th Street and experienced a small miracle of our own … a miracle on 34th Street, in case you missed that one.

The sky was blue. The sun was shining.

We were on The High Line.

The High Line is an old, disused railway track that was due to be demolished, but was saved and turned into an elevated walkway. It’s one of the “must do” things in NYC.

At the start of The High Line, we also found the stabling yard for the subway trains where they are allegedly cleaned and allegedly serviced … but that is all of probably very little interest to most readers.

Here is a photo anyway.

After we had walked The High Line – about 3km – we wanted to do a foot tour around the Lower East Side. It was a guide that MBW had found on line.

First stop was the Yonah Schimmel Knishery where we had a potato knish. It’s like mashed potato wrapped and baked in pastry.

Mr Yonah has been making knishes since 1890.

Not long after we left the Knishery, we saw a truck parked in the street.

Closer inspection of his truck revealed that the company name is “Call-A-Head” …

… with the motto that “We’re #1 an picking up #2”.

Nice.

Next stop was Russ & Daughters – a deli that we wanted to visit last year when we were in NYC, but we arrived about 30 seconds after they closed.

We were there in plenty of time today, and we had a hamantashen – like a jam drop. It was good.

We then skipped a few items on the foot tour – after all they were only stops of cultural and historical significance – and not places to eat.

Next stop was the Sugar Sweet Sunshine Bakery where we had an Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cupcake, followed by Java Jive Pudding.

In the last day or so, I made a comment that could have caused you to believe that New Yorkers are all rude, obnoxious and unhelpful.

I need to retract that statement because in our foodie walking tour today, we had 2 or 3 people come up to us as we were consulting our list and Google Maps, asking if we needed help or directions.

After the SSSB, we needed lunch … no, I don’t really understand that either 🙁

We found the Essex Markets and we had empanadas (like a savoury pastry) and rugelach (like a cross between a biscuit and a puff pastry).

Probably not the wisest of dietary choices, but after 4 weeks of poor choices, why start now?

We then needed to walk off some of those calories, so we walked half-way across the Williamsburg Bridge.

You may have noticed that my whole body including my face is covered. This is in response to the increasing cold.

My phone is set up for facial recognition – let’s just say that it was having difficulties finding or recognising my face, so I had to keep using my fingerprint instead.

We caught the subway back to Times Square to have a final look around, and kill off some time until dinner and the concert tonight at Carnegie Hall.