Katz’s Deli is famous from the film When Harry Met Sally and I headed down to the Lower East Side to give one of their iconic sandwiches a try. I ordered the Beef Brisket on Rye and the beef was delicious…at first…. The picture doesn’t really do it justice as it was massive!! I ate less than half of the sandwich and I was stuffed! I didn’t eat again for nearly 24 hours. Dearna and Shannon – you nearly had a convert 🙂

Another train trip – this time north to Boston. This was supposed to be a 4hour trip but for some reason it ended up taking over 5 hours. Still a much better experience than I suspect a bus may have been. As a result I arrived too late to be able to do anything but the good news was that the Liberty Hotel in Boston provides guests with champagne on arrival. The perfect beverage after a day of travelling – I’m hoping this practice takes off!

I started my first full day with a wander through Beacon Hill – a beautiful historic part of Boston full of brownstones – and down to the Cheers bar. Given the expected heat of the day I started out pretty early and it wasn’t open yet which was a little disappointing (the reviews are pretty bad so perhaps not such a loss). From there I walked through the Public Garden and Boston Common to the start of the Freedom Trail at the Massachusetts State House. The Freedom Trail is primarily a historic walk through Boston sites related to the American Revolution which was only mildly interesting but it is an easy to follow path and you get to see a lot of the city. In the afternoon to escape the heat I spent a few hours at the Museum of Fine Arts.

For the 2nd day I headed across to Cambridge to have look at Harvard. I was hoping to be able to wander the grounds and just have a look – which you can do (they even have a self guided tour app for the iPhone). Unfortunately – it was the day before their graduation ceremony and the campus was set up to accommodate the 32 000 or so people that attend. Also the pre-graduation events had started so there were people everywhere. Still an interesting place to see.

A travel tip for Boston – the Yankees cap I bought to fit in at the Yankee game in NY did not go down so well in Red Sox territory and a couple of people let me know it (more disappointed than nasty). I wasn’t going to wear it but another 30C day made it a necessity.

After the Central Park debacle I thought I’d give the Chelsea Highline a chance to redeem the idea of an urban park. Built on an elevated disused railway line from just below 14th St in the downtown Meatpacking District to 34th St in Midtown, the Chelsea Highline is my sort of park – clear (and well signposted) entry and exit points, a clear path from start to end, interesting views and (for the traditionalists) great greenery. It certainly didn’t feel like I walked 20 blocks (a little over 2km). A much better day!

Central Park is the number one NY attraction on TripAdvisor and I was looking forward to seeing it. I have to say that I wasn’t that impressed. If I was being entirely honest I would say that I found the whole experience incredibly frustrating and I’m in no hurry to go back. On the positive side it has nice trees and lovely grassy areas but every self respecting park has that so if that’s all it takes then I can give people a hundred other parks just as nice. What I wanted to see were the parts that make it different from every other park but what I saw was the Alice in Wonderland statue 3 times because for some unknown reason there is an aversion to signposting key attractions and a series of pathways that loop back on themselves with such a gradual curve that you don’t notice until Alice pops up again! I decided I’d rather sit on a New York bus and watch the traffic than spend another minute with “nature” so I found the nearest exit (an achievement in itself) and headed back to the hotel to watch Eurovision on YouTube.

My first real cold and rainy day since I arrived and it was a doozy – there didn’t seem to be much rain but it was icy cold. After the period of hot weather I’d experienced it was a bit of a shock to the system. On my way to the International Spy Museum ( yes – this is an actual place and super interesting as well!) I wandered past Ford’s theatre where Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. You can buy tickets to go inside but the line was massive, outside in the rain, and 98% of the people waiting looked like they were under 15 (ie the dreaded school groups had struck again!) so I kept on walking. After learning how to be a spy I headed to the Newseum to find out how and why news is made. I spent a very interesting couple of hours here before battling through the rain back to the hotel. No presidential encounters today 😦

I really liked DC and would have loved to spend another day or so but unfortunately I had organised to go back to New York. I guess this just gives me an excuse to come back!