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mitchy at 11:24pm on 04/05/2009 under nyc trip may 2009
mitchy at 11:24pm on 04/05/2009 under nyc trip may 2009Monday dawned as wet and cold as Sunday - this was to be a theme until the end of the week. Undaunted, we went to a diner for breakfast, where I happily scoffed eggs and bacon and toast, and then stopped briefly at home to grab our luggage before setting off. As I'd not gotten my International Drivers Licence in time, poor ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jenni411 was lumbered with all the driving. I've promised that next time, I'll give it a whirl.
That said, there's no way I'd volunteer to drive through NYC, even though we bypassed the centre and headed out through the Bronx and across the George Washington Bridge. I was in charge of navigation and I had a fabulous map that I consulted happily for the entire trip. We also had written instructions that Jenni had obtained from the website and we used those on the way up, as it had very precise instructions. I wasn't convinced that it was the best way out of New York and neither was Jenni (the native) but we followed the instructions just fine and were soon out of New Jersey and back into New York, heading north on the Throughway.
Upstate New York is beautiful, it has to be said. I know as a general rule of thumb, you don't see the best bits of a country from the major highways, but it was still pretty stunning. Big hills and lakes and forests that kind of reminded me of parts of Scotland - though that may have been influenced by the low cloud and rain we drove through :D
We made two stops on the way, once for more food, and finally arrived in Cooperstown around 4.30pm. It was getting dark already but we managed to find the hotel before it got too dark to see. Just as well, because although the hotel was easy to find, the entrance being big and well lit, our room was further up the hill and was reached by going back out onto the highway and turning up a dirt road, which had to be bounced down to reach the upper section of the hotel that included our room.
It also turned out we'd inadvertently booked the WRONG Lake View hotel - easy done because every other hotel was called Lake something or other and when we'd discussed it, Jenni had assumed I was referring to the hotel she'd meant, which was near the town centre. Our hotel was about 4 or 5 miles away, as we discovered when we went for a short walk and quickly abandoned the idea of attempting to walk to the town for dinner :)
Here's the view of the lake from the road outside our hotel.
Cooperstown proper is a beautiful place, way smaller than I expected given that the Baseball Hall of Fame attracts millions of visitors a year. We were there in the off season, which in many respects was the best time to go because it was very quiet. The downside was that we discovered that, to use the local parlance, the town rolled up the sidewalks at 5pm. We scouted a few places to eat and then went for a drink at a bar for an hour to wait until we were hungry. When we came out, we found 2 of the 3 places we'd picked out were closed! Bah! Deciding that we were really not that hungry, we found the nearest supermarket and bought food from the deli, which we took back to the hotel room and chomped happily :) Neither of us stayed up very long, Jenni was particularly tired after six hours plus of driving, so we had an early night.
jenni411 was lumbered with all the driving. I've promised that next time, I'll give it a whirl. That said, there's no way I'd volunteer to drive through NYC, even though we bypassed the centre and headed out through the Bronx and across the George Washington Bridge. I was in charge of navigation and I had a fabulous map that I consulted happily for the entire trip. We also had written instructions that Jenni had obtained from the website and we used those on the way up, as it had very precise instructions. I wasn't convinced that it was the best way out of New York and neither was Jenni (the native) but we followed the instructions just fine and were soon out of New Jersey and back into New York, heading north on the Throughway.
Upstate New York is beautiful, it has to be said. I know as a general rule of thumb, you don't see the best bits of a country from the major highways, but it was still pretty stunning. Big hills and lakes and forests that kind of reminded me of parts of Scotland - though that may have been influenced by the low cloud and rain we drove through :D
We made two stops on the way, once for more food, and finally arrived in Cooperstown around 4.30pm. It was getting dark already but we managed to find the hotel before it got too dark to see. Just as well, because although the hotel was easy to find, the entrance being big and well lit, our room was further up the hill and was reached by going back out onto the highway and turning up a dirt road, which had to be bounced down to reach the upper section of the hotel that included our room.
It also turned out we'd inadvertently booked the WRONG Lake View hotel - easy done because every other hotel was called Lake something or other and when we'd discussed it, Jenni had assumed I was referring to the hotel she'd meant, which was near the town centre. Our hotel was about 4 or 5 miles away, as we discovered when we went for a short walk and quickly abandoned the idea of attempting to walk to the town for dinner :)
Here's the view of the lake from the road outside our hotel.
Cooperstown proper is a beautiful place, way smaller than I expected given that the Baseball Hall of Fame attracts millions of visitors a year. We were there in the off season, which in many respects was the best time to go because it was very quiet. The downside was that we discovered that, to use the local parlance, the town rolled up the sidewalks at 5pm. We scouted a few places to eat and then went for a drink at a bar for an hour to wait until we were hungry. When we came out, we found 2 of the 3 places we'd picked out were closed! Bah! Deciding that we were really not that hungry, we found the nearest supermarket and bought food from the deli, which we took back to the hotel room and chomped happily :) Neither of us stayed up very long, Jenni was particularly tired after six hours plus of driving, so we had an early night.
cheerful