30 May 2012

 

Still no bears but we have seen an Indian! Sadly, his name was Gupta Singh and he was wearing a turban whilst serving us propane in a petrol station, so he doesn’t count. According to him, and he should know, there are more Sikhs in America than anywhere else outside India, including Barnsley –phew!

Since I last wrote, we have been to New York. Now I know the few who read this drivel are miles more sophisticated and worldly than us but, if you haven’t been there – go! It’s great. We went to see the brilliant(according to his very wrinkly old folks) godson and his very lovely gentleman friend Adrian, I mean girlfriend Adrienne. We camped in an expensive but handy RV site in Jersey City from which one could catch an underground to Manhattan and from which one could see the backside of the Statue of Liberty. Many people think this is her best side and I am inclined to agree as we didn’t get the chance of a full-frontal. This place, should you ever need anywhere to camp in new York, is called Liberty Harbour Marina and RV Park. It cost us $80 per night which was a bit of a shock but was miles cheaper than a hotel. Having said that, one does have to put up with a fairly average place with less than average people working there (apart from a charming and helpful old Mexican who was the night security guard).

Liberty's rearview

2nd guide and fellow enthralled passenger
(he was the guy in the film Platoon who shot himself)

If you only have 3 days and not much money, then I recommend that you take a city tour on day one, sponge off godsons on day two and then get up and cover the bits you missed or want to see more of on the third day – sounds rather like Easter but actually it was more fun and we had chocolate. We had a bit of luck buying a hop-on hop-off guided bus tour from the appropriately named City Tours. Over three days one could tour all over in the most flexible way including night tours and harbour tours. A guide on one of our hops-on came close to being glowered at when he amusingly insisted on calling me “Essex”. He had the grace to apologise and admit that he had never seen an angry Brit before and then referred to me as Dorset. Another knew bugger-all about anything and we couldn’t hear or understand her so we... yeah, you guessed it, hopped-off.  The third was great and very knowledgeable and didn’t even get flustered when we had to do an unscheduled detour into the definitely off-piste parts of Harlem due to a building that had fallen over (not due to Al Qaeda for a change). We knew that something was up as there were 6 helicopters circling like vultures over the spot.

View fron "Top of the Rock"

Some highlights that we would advise you not to miss (even if it means a bit of a queue): World Trade Centre (very well done, spooky and sad), Top of the Rockefeller Centre (not to be missed for the views but you need a clear day; we had to wait until the morning we were leaving before it wasn’t in the clouds), Grand Central Station (despite being almost train-less these days, it’s an amazing work of art and not a bad place to get a quick lunch), Central Park (unbelievably totally man-made; it used to be a marshy swampy bit with a few rocks until a couple of chaps won a competition in the mag “Practical Park Builder” with their design and - voila - it was done. Now it is a good place for people watching from runners, walkers and staggerers, to bored maids out walking millionaires’ dogs). Like anywhere, going out of season helps with the crowds but beware of clouds; there is no point at all going to a place famed for its skyline if you can’t see it and if you do take a tour, make sure it is an open-topped bus not a coach.

North Tower footprint Ground Zero NY

Central Park

J & A showed us bits which trippers don’t normally go to: we walked the Highline, a cool park created on a reclaimed elevated railway, we ate huge and real NY Italian pizzas and drank in the city’s oldest pub – McSorley’s. The chap outside, dressed like a gangsta leprechaun, was either the owner, a bouncer or the original McSorley. Either way, he was a miserable git who turned away some perfectly respectable Americans, saying that they couldn’t go in as they had had too much to drink already! I believe, in this digital communications age, the correct expression is WTF?

Abe Lincoln drank here too (or so they say)

Freedom Tower World Trade Center NY
Still under construction and has just become tallest in the city

Having felt like we had walked our already short legs down to stubs, we left the city and continued North through bits of NY State, Connecticut and Massachusetts, en-route to Boston. There were of course dramas. A nasty squeak had developed and it wasn’t coming from the Navigator. We off-loaded the camper and discovered that the cargo bed was splitting and sort of coming away from the chassis. Had it continued, it would have only been a matter of miles before complete disaster. As always seems to happen here, a kind and concerned passer-by advised us who to contact and a wonderful small company called Balmville Collision dropped everything from their busy programme and devoted a day to fixing us. At one stage we had most of their workforce – six guys or so, working on the problem. I am pretty fed-up with S Karrosser (the Swedish makers of the camper). I ‘phoned them to try to get advice on correct mounting points for our Navara and they said they would email the drawings – they didn’t and in fact have never helped in any tiny way with any request for information. So, everyone, don’t buy their kit if you want any form of after sales service.

Mended and poorer but happier we wound our way onwards towards Boston. Here we discovered that one of the bods had failed to connect correctly the electrics to the camper’s 12v supply from the truck. Satisfyingly, we identified what was wrong but irritatingly, we failed to fix it. Another trip to another mechanic and we are now absolutely hot-to-trot. (Watch this space.) I don’t hold a grudge against Balmville Collision – they were very sorry and had we not been several hundred miles away, they would have fixed it.

 

Boston didn’t really grip us. The Nav’s diary says (amongst other things) that it was like driving through Clapham in the rain! We did go to a great coffee shop which we had read about in the  Telegraph in England. It is called Polcari and is wonderful in many ways. It’s not so hot if you fancy a cup of coffee – they don’t sell it in liquid form. I think the Telegraph Travel bit should have pointed this out; we drove bloody miles to get there and had to have a cup next door (still quite good though). Then I wanted to walk to the harbour and hoy a PG Tips bag in for old time’s sake. With the draconian waterways-littering fines, (and I had left the teabag in the truck) – I didn’t. Anyhow, it was here that the locals started moaning about tax and about the government changing its mind and, as I’m told they say in the best bodice-ripper stories, one thing led to another. It was jolly lucky for them that the Brits decided to bestow Independence upon them and not come-down hard and teach them a lesson. Bye the way, the seppos are still moaning about tax and the government going back on its word, so they may as well not have bothered and could even now be celebrating the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee with us.

We went to Harvard

It was about now that the Nav and I had a slight misunderstanding. I thought that she wanted to see Viagra Falls and, not wanting to be negative, I was outwardly ever-so enthusiastic. Conversely, she thought I was dead keen and went along with it. As it turns out, we were both happy to give it a miss and not be subjected to mass tourist rubbish and crowds. It was also cold and grey and that was not what we had come for. We then had to decide whether to head for Wyoming (our next fixed point) via the northern route – Chicago, Minnesota, South Dakota, or via the more central route of St Louis, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado. Due to the above mentioned cold and grey and to finding more interesting things in the book, we have decided on the latter. So, I am now writing this sitting in a small clearing 200 feet above the Ohio river looking across to Kentucky on the far bank. It’s reportedly about 90 F with night-time lows of about 25. Bye-bye cold!

Industry on the Ohio

The Ohio is amazing; we have been vaguely following it for the past week or so and have passed through the nightmare of vast, rusting and redundant iron and steel works around Weirton in West Virginia and through unexpectedly beautiful forest and farming land of Ohio and Indiana. The river is huge and is made navigable by a system of dams and locks. Huge rafts of 15 or so barges plough slowly up and down carrying all sorts of stuff from coal to benzene. I have a feeling that some of them may be just wandering up and down trying to find a buyer as I have just seen a raft of coal going north east and another one going the other way a hour or so later. Maybe they could use a bit of my red-hot logistical advice here.

US Army Corps of Engrs barge - REs don't have anything like this

Since we are on the subject, America could cut right back on its oil consumption and thus considerably reduce its carbon emissions etc by kicking the habit of mowing everything. Even the smallest mobile home is surrounded by acres of grass all of which gets cut by, often quite large, people on ride-on mowers (so do all the verges and central reservations). Trade-in your motors for push mowers and help save the planet and lose weight at the same time.

 I suspect that they are even more busy mowing at the moment as it is about to be Memorial weekend and everyone is making a huge effort to make everywhere look nice. It is actually very impressive and I wish the average Brit would take a similar pride in his surroundings. Memorial Day (which falls on the last Monday of May) is taken very seriously with a Bank holiday and parades and services. It is one of the reasons why we are hiding in the woods – to escape the crowds.

 

National Pride

Fozz woz ere?

I should add, for those of you who are interested in our route, we have been staying in some wonderful spots on the way down here: The Green Mountains in Vermont (remote and unspoilt), The Adirondacks in New York (- a bit developed for tourism, so, some tacky resort areas. Despite this we did find an unspoilt lake to ourselves and slept to the call of loons and coyotes), the Allegheny National Forest. I have been intending to add a map to this blog but despite being good with maps, I am bad with technology and have had no luck so far.

Mason Lake - Adirondacks

 What else to report? Ah yes, I’m worried the Nav’s gone native – she bought a packet of “Hungry Joe’s Instant Pancake mix and some real locally made maple syrup (delish.) We have had varied results so far; probably due to a small non-stick saucepan being inappropriate.

We have missed being in Kentucky for the Derby earlier this month. The woman in the liquor store tells us that the winner was a horse which everyone is hoping will go on to win the third of the US big races and so become the first Triple Crown winner for decades. She thought its name was something to do with booze –“I’ll-Have-Another” or “Minzapint” or “Creme-de-Menthe-Frappe”, I’m not sure - look it up and pile your money on.

I expect that some of you are aware of my strange fascination with names. America is full of wonderful village and town names, many of them easily on a par with Piddletrenthide in Dorset or Pratts Bottom in Kent. Here is just a small taste of those in southern West Virginia: Switzer (!!), Tug Fork, Job, Cucumber, War, Crum, Gary, Bald Knob (no photo – boo), Fort Gay (great posting), Bozoo, Hico, Rupert(!!), Odd, Bog, Mud, Petroleum, Left Hand, Sample(!! - in Kentucky), Policeman’s Helmet, that’s enough names – ed. Actually, I made the last one up but all the others are pukka.

Worried looking Indiannan tortoise on our picnic table(for Imi)

We've upgraded our truck