Bearhugs Blog

Didn’t get a lot done on Thursday. We were just settling down to work when John phoned to say the maid was on her way. We weren’t expecting her until Friday so Maria was in a panic. I cannot understand why you should need to tidy up before the maid comes, I thought that was her job. Maria says, yes it is but the maid is sooo.. tidy if we leave it up to her we’ll be searching for our things for the next week, and we’re only here for 10 more days. So we tidied, loaded the washing machine and then went out for a bit of shopping.
When we came back the apartment was cleaned but the smell of cleaning products was so strong (the Americans favourite product is Clorox bleach, they use it for everything) we decided to open a window and go up on the roof. I wish we’d taken some sun block with us. Still I think we realised in time and we’re only a little red.
Claire arrived on Friday. The start of her journey went really well. This end looked a bit iffy, on Thursday there was a fire in a tunnel and all the trains to Penn were diverted to Hoboken + ferry. When she set off from the UK the situation was still unresolved, but John and Maria kept track with the internet ( it’s amazing how you can follow flight etc online, so we knew as soon as she landed etc) and although the tunnel was open by the time she landed we decided it was better for her to go to Hoboken and then take the ferry since it lands at the World Financial Center and we can just stroll back from there. Apart from the fact that she dropped John’s whisky and broke it at imigration (that’ll smell good for a while) it all went well. Claire seems rather please with the fact that she traveled by taxi, train, monorail, plane and boat to get here.

Because of the time difference we were all up early yesterday and had breakfasted etc. and were out of the apartment by 8.30. As usual (it being a weekend) most of the downtown subways were shut but we got up to Union Sq for the Farmers market. Maria is thrilled because they were selling lily-of-the-valley, her favourite flowers. We then went up to Grand Central for their market (we got there before it opened!!!) and did our food shopping. They do some gorgeous food.
We then made our way back via Century 21 (we needed cutlery, the stuff in the apartment is rubbish and has been breaking on us) and Ground Zero. We were shattered by the time we got back and Claire was trying to go to sleep. Still, some lunch soon revived us and we strolled out to the Carnival @ WFC (sort of a glorified school fete). This seems to be the season for school fundraisers, the nursery downstairs was holding a hayride on Thursday afternoon.

We were rather impressed with a trimoran tied up in the North Dock. We were even more impressed when we found out it was in fact the one that set the record for sailing around the world that Ellen McArthur broke recently. Apparently it’s been here since early April, on ‘the starting blocks’ (as it were) for a transatlantic effort, but it’s been too calm.

However the clam weather has enabled some rowers to set off accross the atlantic. Some people do the strangest things for fun.
We had an early night since we’ve got a lot planned for tomorrow. Rather spoilt by the fact that we were woken at 11.45pm by some fireworks.

On Monday Maria and I went uptown to 110th St. The furthest uptown I’ve been so far. We went because Maria found the only Hungarian Pastry Shop in NY in the yellow pages. It was opposite the church of ST. John the Divine, the biggest church I’ve ever seen. They’ve been building it for about 100 years and it’s still not finished. They’re working on the tower at the moment.

The pastry shop was interesting, Maria says it reminds her of Hungary, even the way it looks is reminiscent of Hungary. All I know is the cakes were lovely.

We have been spending some time up on the roof, the weather is lovely and Maria is working on her tan and her bears at the same time, I just admire the view, it’s lovely. She’s managed to finish 2 more bears. I don’t know if we’ll manage to beat the total from last time, she’s running very low on stuffing.


John has been watching boats again, he was thrilled on Monday, three big boats left that evening, he managed to catch 2 of them.

Today was Maria’s art day and we spent most of it outdoors, drawing, painting and working on our tan. So no work on bears.
Claire arrives on Friday so I don’t think Maria will get much work done after that.

It’s Mother’s Day in the US and NO flowers from the kids!! Mind you they did send a lovely bunch when it was Mother’s Day in the UK.
Last night there were some fantastic fireworks again on the Hudson, between us and Liberty, That’s the second time. Perhaps they do it every Saturday?

Today Maria’s not feeling too good, earache, sore throat, dizzy.. I reckon it’s because we nearly froze down at South St. Seaport on Friday. Anyway we stayed in, watched the Grand Prix and finished the bear.

Maria’s now happy ‘cos they’ve got a Mama’s day Elvis Marathon on telly.

Well I’ve not written for a couple of days again ‘cos first there wasn’t much to write about, and then when there was something to write about, there was no time to do so.
On Thursday we had a very quiet day. John had a bit of excitement when we saw the Carnival Legend. Him and big boats! Honestly it’s almost as bad as Maria and anything colourful.

He went off to work and Maria and I stayed at home and worked. Another bear joins the fold.

Then yesterday, we decided we wanted to go to see a Broadway show. So Maria and I went to South St. Seaport where there is a TKTS office which sells tickets for shows that evening for about half price. There is another one at Times Square. It involves a fair bit of queuing and it’s a matter of luck what you can get but it is excellent value. When we joined the queue we couldn’t decide if we wanted Fiddler on the Roof or Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. By the time we got to the front the decision was made for us, they’d sold out of Fiddler. Still we didn’t mind. Mind you it would have been nice if the weather was a bit nicer, we were frozen, what with standing around and the wind blowing in off the water.
The show was at the Hilton Theatre on 42nd St. I was all prepared for a not too well appointed theatre. The couple of times Maria and John have been to Broadway, they say the theatres had no lobbies or foyers to speak of, you were almost straight into the auditorium from the street. However this was different, it was a lovely old theatre with grand staircases and bars and restrooms on each level.
The show itself was great!!! As for Chitty flying.. WOW!!!! Thoroughly enjoyed it, together with everyone else in the audience.

I rather like my Chitty badge.We’re going to see if we can get tickets for something else when Claire comes out to join us at the end of next week.
A rather amusing sight was the rickshaws (?!?!) waiting outside the theatre entrances at the end.

It was very late by the time we got back home and I was shattered.
Today has been a quieter day. Despite half the subways downtown being closed (again! every weekend!!) we managed to get up to Grand Central. We really like the food market there.

Then Maria finished another bear. Rather an eccentric and funny chap.

Well, I haven’t posted for a couple of days ‘cos there wasn’t a lot to say. Maria’s been working hard and has produced a couple of bears.

She’s pretty happy at the moment because on Monday on his way home John saw a shop selling lilacs and bought her a bunch. So she’s been going around smelling them and going all sentimental.
Today we made some new friends. The Battery Park City Parks Conservancy puts on all sorts of activities during the warmer weather in the parks. Everything from story reading, drumming, singing, Tai-che, childrens activities and adult art classes. Guess what Maria decided to take part in.
We spent the morning doing ‘elements of nature drawing’ and then this afternoon ‘figure al fresco’.


It was great, a bit cold in the afternoon but it should warm up by next week. It’s only $5 a session, with all materials included. Real good value. Apparently it goes on through to October, so if we come back in August we should be able to rejoin.
We are constantly amazed by how many things/activities are available free or at a minimal cost. We must check what the concert at Trinity is tomorrow.

Well the forecast was for rain in the morning, cloud and strong winds developing later. They usually get it right, but not today. It’s been a lovely day, sunny, a light breeze and getting warmer all the time.
We had to be in after 3 because we had a grocery delivery but we thought the morning too nice to waste. So we had a stroll down along the Hudson. We had to keep dodging the bike riders since today was the Five Boro Bike Event and they were everywhere. The trouble is there are no bike lanes, and while I don’t blame the bikers for not using the road, it does mean the sidewalks get pretty dangerous.

We had a walk around Battery Park, as usual it was full of people selling handbags, watches, T-shirts etc. (there is a park ordinance saying ‘no hawkers’ but it seems to be more of a ’suggestion’ and largely ignored), also the usual street performers.

We then made our way up Broadway towards Wall Street, I wanted to have my picture taken with famous Wall Street Bull. Iit is enormous!! I had to really hang on.

A lot of the roads around that area are dug up, there are major road works going on for the next year or so. I hope the results will be worth, at the moment it’s a case of clambering past whatever obstacles they happen to put in your way. Considering America is considered to be very litigious, we are constantly amazed at the apparent lack of safety precautions.

We were accompanied on our return journey for a fair bit of the way by a squirrel. They are very tame. (There is a park ordinance against feeding them, but see above!!)

When we got back to our road a stretch limo had just drawn up with a bridal party, Sunday seems very popular for weddings.

Well, she’s moaning again. Mind you we have walked a lot today, mostly verticaly.
The weather wasn’t great, drizzly, but we decided to go to the Sakura Matsuri (cherry blossom festival) at Brooklyn Botanical Gardens anyway.
Getting there was pretty easy, a quick walk, a trip on the subway (to a very atractive subway station) and then a very short walk.

The gardens are lovely, very well laid out and full of lovely plantings. We were particularly taken with the sweeps of grape hyacinths. Reminded us of bluebells in a way. I think we may have to go back at the end of May to see the actual bluebells.

Maria got a bit sentimental around the lilac trees, going on about how she was going to miss the lilacs back at home. Mind you they did smell lovely. So did the cherry blossom, I had to get pretty close to get a really good smell.

There were avenues of them. It looked beautiful, shame the weather wasn’t better.

We had a look around the exhibitions and demos, Maria was particularly interested in the Mataro Ningyo Dolls and the Ikebana Flower arranging.

She bought what looks like an origami crane but is in fact made from sugar.
We also saw them rehearsing for the Taiko Drumming and quite fancied seeing the actual performance.

The problem was it was still raining and there wasn’t really anywhere to settle down for a while to wait, so we decided to call it a day and go up to Grand Central for their Spring Fair. Seemed like a simple enough trip, up the 2/3 to Fulton Street then swop over to the 4/5. The trouble is Fulton is an enormous station and after we had walked up several flights of stairs we found a man shouting that the no. 4 and 5 were not stopping at Fulton Street. We worked out an alternative route but the signposting on the NY subway is not the best, at one point there were signs for the same track pointing in 2 completely different directions (even on to 2 different levels).
We reckon we walked up and down at least 6 flights of stairs before we found the right place. By the time we got to Grand Central we were shattered, still a quick sit down and some refreshment soon sorted us out.
The Spring Fair was very interesting, Maria got a really nice leather bound sketch book, it took her ages to choose. And then John bought her a lovely handmade chenille jacket, in shades of red and russet. So she was a happy bunny.
We also had a look around the market and their food looks fantastic, we bought some steak, veal, pancetta, parma ham, strawberries and chocolate cake.
We thought it was time to get back. Of course this wasn’t easy, first the shuttle to Times Square (we had to walk so far we thought we might end up at Times Square without the benefit of a train) then the 1/9 to Rector Street.
Except that at Chambers Street we were told the train was diverting and if we wanted to go to Rector Street we had to take the shuttle bus provided. After all that we were grateful to get back to the appartment. Maria has been trying to work out how many flights of stairs she has walked up today, she reckons she’s done at least the equivalent of walking up to the appartment.

We were due some rain in the afternoon, so Maria and I thought we’d go for a walk down to the Amish market while the weather was nice in the morning.
We walked along the Hudson, our usual route. Where a month or so ago there were snowdrops now there are pansies.

The parks are starting to look really nice. Maria moaned a bit but I just couldn’t resist doing a bit of climbing, (well I’d been cooped up for a few days).

After we got back, Maria got on with the bear she was working on (she seems to be working pretty hard at the moment) and another friend was born. That makes 5 now.

I don’t think she’ll be making any over the weekend. There’s the Cherry blossom Festival, and then if that’s a wash out or we have time left over there is a Spring Craft Fair at Grand Central. A busy weekend ahead.

Last night after John went to bed, Maria was watching The Merry Widow ( she has a thing about operettas) when we heard some very, VERY loud bangs outside. There was a fantastic firework display on the Hudson, it seemed to be coming from a boat partway between us and Liberty. We still don’t know what it was for, but it was superb. Maria even woke John up, he seemed to be pleased to see it.
Today has been a strange day weather wise, lovely sunshine and then sudden storms. John says they even had a thunderstorm and hail at work. That’s only about 3 blocks away, and he says the hail was only around one side of the building?!?!
We spent the morning doing basic house keeping, tidying up, washing up and doing the laundry. Plus finishing off the head of a bear, and then went off to Trinity church for one of their free concerts.

It was the Harvard Krokodiloes, a group of 12 Harvard undergrads who did akapela singing. Their repertoir was very varied ranging from Jerusalem to Run-around Sue, their presentation was excellent they seemed to enjoy themselves thoroughly. As usual it will be available on the web in a couple of days.
Krokodiloes video
The web is a wonderful thing, we can listen to the breakfast show and all the comedy shows etc from radio 7 while Maria works on her bears. She finished another one today, he’s rather sweet.

I don’t know how we’re all going to fit in her suitcases.

It’s been raining most of the day. We had a brief bit of sunshine mid afternoon, but then just as John got back a storm started up. It’s quite spectacular watching a thunderstorm way up here. Things have calmed down again now but the foercast for tomorrow and more importantly the weekend is not too good.
Still at least it has meant Maria has worked hard and finished 1 and 1/2 bears. She seems to be going for the wacky look. She ordered some fur from Intercal and it arrived late yesterday so she’s very keen.

John came back with some cookies from work today. Apparently there were Girl Scouts selling them at work. We’ve heard of the concept but didn’t realise it really happened.


Of course he had to buy some, back home Maria was Akela of a cub pack for about 10 years and John was Group Scout Leader. I wish I’d seen them camping, I’m having a bit of a problem trying to imagine it. They still know some strange songs, I just wish they didn’t insist on trying to teach me.