Addendum Part 1

Photos..........
Some blogfollowers have approached me with regards to purchasing some of the photos. As explained early on they are all my copyright. When I return to Menorca I will be following up the offer of an exhibition in one of the leading galleries where some of the best photos will be on sale, printed and framed professionally. As yet this price is not settled...... It depends on how much cut the gallery wants.

The photos as published on Flicker were reduced in quality to ensure fast upload speeds, yet retaining a viewable image. These averaged out at about 150 KB. The originals taken on the 18Mega Pixel 7D Canon Camera are between 6000 and 8000KB. This means that a Flickr quality photo will only print decently to about postcard size, whereas a full resolution print could fill a wall in your room if you wanted it to. 

If you are interested in having one or two photos sent to you, full resolution, to have printed yourself and framed yourself, then send us an email to yarrowsinmenorca@yahoo.co.uk with "RTW Photos" as the subject line and we will come to some agreement.

If you are a holiday company looking to update your brochures, then I would be really pleased to hear from you !!!

Kind regards,
Richard A Yarrow.

New York Day 4 to Manchester -- March 23rd and 24th

We had more or less packed to leave the hotel the night before, but when we looked out of the window this morning we had rain, sleet and snow on the agenda for the day. We had to check out by 11:30 and had to be at the airport by about 4:30, so had a few hours to use up. We set off downtown to see if we could find the Levi shop we had noticed a few days earlier and with a pair of genuine 501s in my bag we still had a few hours left to spare. Catching the subway at Canal Street we headed up town aiming for the top end of Central Park … 110^th street subway Lexington…. From where we walked through Harlem to Frawley Circle where there is a statue of Duke Ellington and his piano. It was raining fairly heavy, but we still walked on down through the park passing the three nymphs dancing (in the rain) statue. I did not hang around long enough for further details, but had to try to get a shot of the rain dripping off their noses (and other parts). We had planned to see the Museum of the City of New York , on 5^th Avenue, which in part concentrated on the musical history of this end of town… Harlem etc. The other part of the museum focussed on the development of the city from the early days down on the harbour to today and of course the effects of 911 on current developments. A good place to use up time productively and it was not raining inside. Back to the hotel (to collect suitcases) we passed a sign on the end of Manhattan bridge telling drivers that it was wet…. As if they did not know already! We got to the airport in plenty of time to ask for a starboard window seat so that we could complete our POSH (Port out, starboard home) RTW trip. The only delay on the whole trip we had here at Newark where it had snowed and the pilot had asked for the de-icing to be done. Not satisfied with their first efforts, we had it done again, which made us an hour and a half late taking off. We missed our connection at Heathrow T5 by one minute, 8:55am, and had to wait to 11:15 for the next flight to Manchester. We are now about to attack our grandson’s bedroom in Corin and Jen’s new home. New skirting, sockets, sanding floorboards and painting architraves, before we return to the sunny isle on Tuesday. Job done…. 'RTW in 80 days.
A few photos here. It was rainng so hard I only took the little camera.

New York Day 3 – March 22nd

Today was a much brighter day, so we were determined to go on one of the tour buses to get an overview of the city and to find out about some of the buildings we couldn’t recognise. We took a subway ride to near the start of the tour and were promptly pounced on by ticket sellers, got on our bus and away we went. We keep being told spring has arrived in New York, but we are not convinced. Today there was a freezing cold wind blowing on the open top of the bus, but it was dry at least. Tomorrow 2-8 inches of snow is predicted….some spring!

It was great to have the history of the city explained and the background to some of the architecture. The details you got depended on your guide, very music based on the way back, very film star based for the ride to the ferry terminal, and women and African history based for the rest of the first ride.

We had found out that very few boat tours run before April and were warned that the few that do are very oversubscribed. Rather than wait in long queues we decided to take the Staten Island Ferry  which gives you good views around the harbour, and we could see a different part of New York too. (and its free)

There is a really nice small museum on Staten Island, that we enjoyed a lot. It gives lots of details about the ferry service history but is also full of interesting Natural History about the area. There was a little Art gallery on the top floor, full of collages by the same artist, a bit odd after the Guggenheim and MoMA but interesting.

Tonight we will be packing and sorting our stuff before leaving tomorrow. Photos here.

New York Day 2 -- March 21st

Last night at about 11pm, as we were finishing the blog, we were surprised by lots of sirens outside our hotel and lots of fire engines surrounding it, when we looked out. Knowing how disaster has been creeping closer and closer, Rich dashed out to investigate, but it seems it was a false alarm since they were all packing up and getting ready to leave when he arrived. Phew!!

Our mission today was to go to The Museum for Modern Art  and hopefully a tour round the harbour to see the Statue of Liberty. However it has been a really wet foggy day, with even a flurry of snow, and we decided to postpone the boat cruise till we’ll able to see the sights. There was a huge long queue outside MoMA when we arrived, just after opening time, so we visited their design store across the road. We could have done all our Christmas shopping there except for the problem of flying it home! We got Harper a little something for his new bedroom.

The MoMA was a very different experience to the Guggenheim. It is a much bigger place and has a wide variety of exhibitions, and there were thousands of people there. It felt cramped and crowded and it was often difficult to really see what you wanted to. We went to the photography section, the architecture and design section and a special kitchen design exhibition. Then we looked at some of the modern art sections from their collection, until we got completely exhausted.

We had decided to get off the tube and explore some of the city at street level, and saw some surprising things. We were walking towards Washington Square, in Greenwich Village, when we came upon a load of filming going on. Rich had spotted some old cars in a line, and then we saw some extras being put through their paces in front of an old shop front. We had seen Richard E Grant earlier in MoMA, so will be on the lookout for his next film, as no doubt he was there for the filming.

Then we came upon a man covered in pigeons…literally! He obviously feeds the birds in Washington square regularly. Photos here.

New York Day 1 – March 20th

NY Videos here and here. 

We’ve had a really exciting but exhausting day today. We firstly moved hotels then set out for the Guggenheim . The metro proved difficult to master as there were lots of repairs going on, it being Sunday, and lots of stations closed and diversions! We got to the museum eventually after an hour underground, and were surprised by how small it seems outside, especially compared with the high rises around it. Once inside we were completely bowled over by it as a space, or series of spaces and as an exhibition experience. Once again, the architect, Frank Lloyd Wright didn’t live to see it completed.

‘The Great Upheaval’ exhibition brought together many of the modern paintings from the collection, leading up to WW1 and showing the development of several of the movements towards abstract art. I was pleased to see some early Mondrian paintings showing how he developed towards the coloured lines and squares that were all know him for. You could also see just how closely artists worked, developing ideas together alongside one another at a particular moment in time.

We went from there into Central park for a walk in the bright sunshine and it is strange here to see daffodils and winter jasmine just coming out and snowdrops almost over, whereas in San Francisco, the daffs were all but over. It really shows the change in season. It is very cold here at night and in the morning too, but people were lying basking in the winter sun in the park in the afternoon. There was also a photo shoot going on of a group, so I took a shot of the photographer.

Losing 4 hours caught up with us at about 4 and we had to come back to the hotel for a rest, but we picked up again later, and, as we are on the edge of Chinatown, we went out for a truly authentic Chinese meal, complete with fortune cookies.  Photos here. 

An aside (New York 19th March)

It has been very strange in America, especially from Santa Barbara on, how much Spanish we've encountered, from the obvious place names, like Los Angeles etc to streets called Los Gatos boulevard. In Fiji and in Oxnard too our cleaners were all Spanish speakers and we had conversations with them in Spanish. It  seems to be South Americans and Mexicans who are doing a lot of the menial jobs. We have asked directions in several places and found it easier to speak Spanish, to be understood, than English. On the airplane all written instructions were bi-lingual and in supermarkets and restaurants too. Perhaps it is just our ignorance that led it to being a surprise. Here in Queens, New York, we went out to eat and there were several South American/ Cuban places as well as Pizza and Fried Chicken. We chose one where there were chairs and tables, the menu was all in Spanish and nearly everything they didn't have, but we did end up with Calamare and Rice and Chicken, and Rice and Pork! Tomorrow we go to Manhattan to start NY proper and Best Western should be better than Queens. No Photos today as we lost a few hours and spent the rest on a 'plane.

Monterey to San Fransisco - March 17th and 18th

SF Video

Again the main impression from the Scenic Coast road has been of the amazing power and size of the sea in these parts. We have also passed through some lovely little towns and seen some really elegant deco architecture. We finished our road homage actually in San Francisco where the road goes right alongside all the wharves and through the city. We then followed another scenic route driving around some of the highlights of the city. This will explain why lots of photos are taken from the car, because it was often impossible to park. We were able to explore a few on foot, notably the Palace of the Arts and the Fisherman’s wharf area.

The next day we awoke to torrential rain, as forecast, so again you will see photos taken from the tour bus, and lots of rainy shots! Still we enjoyed ourselves, and drove over all three bridges, because the visibility was so bad, we got lost driving in to the city. We went on a ferry around the bay and also a cable/tram car, and by then the rain had stopped briefly so we could explore a bit on foot. We had the traditional clam chowder in a Boudin sourdough loaf, which was great and went on their factory/historical tour. It’s a great city, with some huge parks and some very steep hills, lots of bridges and all the fun of the fair along the wharves.  Photos here.