New York City weekend (part 1)

We had an excellent long weekend in NYC - so long and excellent that I had to split it into 2 posts (3 if you include the Xplore race report).  Not sure if we will make it back there before we depart from the northeast, so just in case we figured we should pack in most everything that we definitely wanted to see.

Thursday evening was off to a good start at our old favorite, The Hummus Place:

We had come down a day early to see a special screening in Brooklyn (more about that in my next post) but it was rain-delayed until Sunday.  So I poked around and found a show at the City Winery - Loudon Wainwright III was performing and we figured that would be fun.

I managed to pick seats at the next table over from the performer himself... I didn't think it was completely rude to snap a photo since he was about to go on stage (and we weren't quite sure it was him until he did):

Opening act - Chaim Tannenbaum was really good:

Then the large presence of Loudon and his amazing lyrics and guitar playing.  What a character!  We were amazed and amused.  Totally worth the entrance fee.

They sang together for a couple songs and were really good:

Thursday evening we had a one-night stay at the Midwood Suites in Brooklyn (due to the planned-but-changed concert) and we really liked it.  It is a bare-bones hotel but nicely done and newly renovated.  Breakfast at the Salud Cafe (Mexican organic) next door was excellent.

We spent Friday mostly scouting for the race Saturday, a nice day for walking around town.  While we were down at the south end of Manhattan to pick up our keys for the AirBnB place we were staying at next, John suggested a ride on the Staten Island Ferry.  Sure, great idea!

Also a good excuse for a little nap  :)

Returning ferry with the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in the background:

Somewhat gray view of Lady Liberty, but at least it hardly rained that day:

Back north... My first attempt at the Book of Mormon lottery (John also put in a ticket over at Kinky Boots), no go but fun to hang out with the crowd hoping to get lucky:

After that we tried the "free museum evening" for the first time, spending a couple hours at the International Center for Photography.  Their current exhibit of "A Different Kind of Order" was varied and interesting.  We hung out there until they kicked us out, then picked up our luggage from storage, grabbed a couple awesome slices of pizza from a place called Cer te (eco-friendly AND delicious), then jumped on a subway for a quick trip over to Long Island City.

We had not been in this area before, but it turned out to be a perfect place to rent a room through AirBnB for the weekend.  Close and convenient to Manhattan, quiet neighborhood, little shops, it seems like a place with a lot of potential.

Saturday - race morning breakfast at our favorite bagel place in the whole wide world (thank you Jason!):

I still get hungry whenever I look at that photo.

Next up was the Xplore urban race on Saturday afternoon... more fun in the city!

Xplore race in NYC

We went to New York for a long, fun-filled weekend, including our first go at the new Xplore urban race series.  It was the second Xplore race ever, so we weren't sure what to expect, but it turned out to be entertaining, just challenging enough, and an excellent tour of the city.

They allow solo racers (very few urban races do), so we figured we should try running solo just to get a feel for it and to give John a break from my direction-giving for a couple hours.  Then last week my knee started aching at annoying times like going up and down stairs, possibly from being tweaked during the Boston boxing workout.  Highly fortuitous that John would not have to wait while I carefully walked around the streets of New York.

We decided to start with the checkpoint in Bryant Park, having solved the pre-race hints and knowing the location of CP5.  Plus it was only several blocks away, so we started off north along 6th Avenue.  One of the race guys followed us with a GoPro camera strapped to his chest, so it's possible our traffic/pedestrian-dodging antics will make it on film somewhere.  Ah yes, the joys of trying to run through NYC crowds!

At the park we paid $2 each and joined some children on the carousel, taking videos of each other as the ride started, the horses moved up and down, Flaubert Frog next door told funny stories, and children all around made noises like they were having a great day in the park on a Saturday afternoon.  If we hadn't been so focused on getting the 30-second videos correct before the music and the ride stopped, we might have felt conspicuously out of place...

Next we went west toward Times Square.  I noticed that my knee was feeling OK, that was a nice surprise.  I still couldn't keep up with John on the street but I managed to keep him in sight for one block.  We found some cartoon characters on a less-crowded-than-normal corner and set up our "X-pose" photos with a happy (or at least he looks that way?) Mickey Mouse in exchange for a couple bucks:

And a bit of an Elmo photo bomb to boot:

A short ways from there John almost lost me in the huge crowd but I caught back up as we waited in front of the M&M store for one of the female characters to FINALLY show up on screen - that took a bit of patience, good for resting up for the next dash...

...around the corner to the Ambassador Theater:

John had some freedom to play around with his photos:

Now for a quick subway ride up to the west side of Central Park and a mosaic in Strawberry Fields that we had not seen before - very nice!

Kip mentioned as I was starting east that we would be running near a lake and if I happened to see a boat on the water I should get a photo for CP9.  Good call!

John!  Boats!

I continued east, slightly north, then slightly south to get around the edge of the water and over to the boat house where Kip could get a precise read on my location.  John saw me go northeast and decided I didn't know what I was doing, so he took off southeast.  That's when I lost him, or I guess more accurately, he lost me...

I cruised past a small wedding party by the boat house, complete with live music, and I briefly considered getting my "street musician" checkpoint out of the way there but decided that would be WAY unclassy.

Over to the next little pond and Alice in Wonderland!  We love this statue and the quotes around it.  Kids love to climb on it.  A woman was happy to take my photo here now that John had gone and left me:

A short while later John got himself reoriented, getting his own photo at the back of Alice:

Time for a long subway ride south!  Kip helped me get to the green line on Lexington, and it wasn't until I was almost there that I remembered that all green-line trains were running local (vs. express) that weekend.  This meant that I couldn't switch to an express train to skip a few stops on the way down, although I still might not have done that anyway.  A train showed up right away and I got on to mull over the transit options.

Not finding any great alternatives, I settled in for the ride.  It was really strange being on a subway in the middle of a race all by myself.  I took a deep breath to try to relax.  Read through the remaining checkpoints.  Deep breath.  Reviewed the photos on my camera.  Closed my eyes for a second.  Rechecked the map.  Imagined where I might be going from here.

I looked up to see that we were pulling into Grand Central.  Not even past the start/finish yet!  Holy cannoli, this was another patience test.  Usually I can start a running chatter of commentary in John's direction when I'm nervously sitting on public transportation trying to hope for the best, not this time.

Half an hour after leaving Alice I was running down Mercer Street to these stairs where Billy Joel himself sat for the album cover of Innocent Man.  I was psyched to be here!  I had already decided that if this needed to be my skip point, I was coming back here after the race to see it.  Could not pass this one up - very cool indeed:

Dressed a bit differently and with a little more hair than me:

After that excitement, it was time to run to Washington Square Park and get a little wet.  I took off all my electronics and briefly considered taking off my shoes, but as John rightfully pointed out afterward, I would have had my adventure racing license revoked if I had.

A nice woman took this video of me touching the base at the center of the fountain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0b6IIf45WQ&feature=youtu.be

Kip had told me to be on the lookout for a single pigeon and a street musician.  At one corner of Washington Square I found a jazz band that didn't seem to mind my silly attempt to dance along in exchange for a couple dollars.  I will spare myself the embarrassment of uploading that one to YouTube.

However, there were no pigeons to be seen.  Maybe something to do with the "Do Not Feed the Pigeons!" signs all over the park?

I ran a few blocks up to the next park - Union Square.  I decided to take a chance and detour into the park proper past all the market stalls, and I spotted pigeons!  Except there were 3 of them!  And they were in a fenced-off grassy area so I couldn't play sheepdog and try to isolate one.

So I commenced working on one of the strangest selfies I have tried to date - using a big bush to cover up two pigeons while leaving a single one in view.  But they kept walking around, in the wrong directions, dang it birds, work with me!

Here is the best one of that scenario, complete with a look of perplexity on my part:

On my way back to the street I rounded the corner to discover two pigeons happily pecking away at crumbs on the sidewalk.  This shot was WAY easier - thank you dude!

One more park - Madison Square, where I had to convince a couple strangers to help me with poses in front of the art installation.  Not just one picture, but three with the same person, in different corners of the park that required walking together in between them.  Hmm, this CP was by far the least exciting to me.  John skipped it in favor of running over to the High Line, that's how much he didn't want to have to bother other people about it.

I got lucky and found a couple willing ladies, at least the one in the photo was happy to help.  Turns out they work for the park, which I thought was pretty funny.  They must see all kinds of things (and people) during their days at work.

High five!

You go girl:

Glad that's over - fist bump!

Here's John's alternate photo of a cat mural on the High Line trail - nice!

I decided to try the subway to get back even though I was only about 10 blocks from the finish line.  That would have worked great - IF I had caught the train that was closing its doors as I ran down the stairs.  Instead I waited on the next one, including a delay after I got on, argh!  Yep, shoulda ran it back.

More patience - only one stop this time - I hoofed it up the stairs and down 35th Street to the finish line - first one there, really?!

Then the race directors asked the question I have heard so many times (in different languages even) - "Where's John?" - I answered that I honestly didn't know.  Happily, a few minutes later he came running down the street.  All of our photos were good so we captured 1st and 2nd place.

Zack Attack rounded out the podium in third, so they are now on top of the Xplore leaderboard - nice job!

It was a super fun race and we look forward to the chance to Xplore another city in future.  Thank you Logan and Jonathan and crew!

A day on the Cape

We got to spend a day touring Cape Cod, and it turned into a beautiful day - gorgeous weather, sunshine, a few people and cars (there was a bike race going on) but not too crowded.  We spent the morning in Provincetown but neglected to get any photos.  The highlight was climbing up the Pilgrim Monument for great views and some history lessons.  Breakfast at the Portuguese Bakery is also worth a mention.

Another fun stop - the Highland Light for a climb to the top:

Ducks on the roof!

Lunch was a seafood plate of lobster bisque and crabcake sandwich, yum.

We walked from Salt Pond over the Coast Guard Beach in order to get a little sample of the National Seashore.  Wow, what a beautiful beach.  Lots of people out enjoying the afternoon, some fun waves, boogie boards.

And beautiful sand and water:

It was a fun weekend in Massachusetts!

GUR Boston and 2 race finishes

Our third (and last planned) year running the GUR race in Boston - always a fun time!  This year the race started downtown, so when we decided to begin with a checkpoint in the Back Bay it was time to jump on the Green line.

We hopped off at Copley Square and bought some baby shampoo at a CVS before running to the charity drop-off for Room to Grow:

While trying to find an Arlington T stop that didn't say "Exit Only", we spotted a Duck bus speeding along the next block, but we weren't fast enough with the camera to catch it on film:

One block away we were successful in getting underground, PLUS we found a willing participant in the "get a hug from a man with a beard" tic-tac-toe square:

Back on the street near Fenway, the easiest tic-tac-toe square ever - not just 2 but 4 people (out of many) with Red Sox garb - thanks guys!  At least we didn't have to find someone wearing red socks this year...

Oh, and go Red Sox!

We did a ping-pong/cup challenge at the Boston Beer Works:

And another checkpoint down the street at an ice cream place:

From there we ran toward Massachusetts Avenue, around Fenway Park (cool!) and on little streets while Sheila tried to help us muddle our way up a side alley, over the interstate, across a big street with no street signs, and eventually toward a sign pointing to "Mass Ave".  I recognized part of the Boston Marathon course, I'm pretty sure.  Then we were on Mass Ave and there was a bus!  Somehow, through all the perplexion, we took a dang direct route and managed to catch a bus at exactly the right time.

The bus driver lady was totally into helping us, wanting to solve clues and pointing out the right stop to get off for our next checkpoint (which luckily was in Cambridge and not back in Boston south of the river - that was not obvious from the clue).  We ran downstairs at a boxing gym, did a challenging workout, and got our picture with a belt buckle even larger than the ones they give out for 100-mile races:

Around the corner to an improv place where a guy was trying to wrangle a bunch of teams into telling jokes.  He managed the crowd well, and we ended up with our fliers and a blurry picture:

We ran east over to The Garment District to do a little shopping - John, how would these look on me?

And around the corner to a pool hall where John sunk 3 balls on the first try - good one!

More running - up to Cambridge St to get a couple tattoos:

There was quite a bit of running in this one but we seemed to be moving pretty well.  One more location in Cambridge, the School of Groove.  We walked in to find a family up on stage about to sing a "Boston classic often sung at Fenway Park".  John had guessed "Take Me Out to the Ballgame", but no!  When the piano player (a talented race volunteer who must work there) started in with the tune to "Sweet Caroline", I was so excited.  I think I'm still a bit emotional about this city since April.

When they were done we jumped on stage and took our turn blasting out the lyrics in a very off-key fashion (my sincerest apologies to Sheila who had to hear this on the other end of the line).

We debated getting on the Green line from there but decided to run it in.  Great decision, because we finally found our elusive Duck tour vehicles lined up at the Museum of Science:

One more checkpoint to go!  We found West End Johnnie's one block from the finish line, declined an offer for a free drink, and played a Plinko-type game for our final race photo:

The finish line was so calm that we were sure at least one other team was already in, but no!  We were the first ones there, our photos were good, and we finally won an urban race in the city of Boston!  Sweet (Caroline)!

My biggest take-away impression was that everyone in the city was so super nice.  The folks at all the checkpoints, random strangers, the bus driver, especially the other GUR racing teams.  I feel a real affinity with this place.

To top off a mahvelous day, we returned to the Back Bay and walked down Boylston Street from Hereford to Copley Square.  Marathon Sports is open again and appears to be doing well:

And we finally crossed the Boston Marathon finish line - a personal worst marathon time (almost 4 months) but at least we finished it!