Today, we explored Lower Manhattan and a tiny bit of Brooklyn on the last of the four year-round New York City Volksmarches offered by the Princeton Area Walkers.

We got off to an inauspicious start, thanks to the MTA and Google; the walk directions emphasized that we should go to the Chambers Street Station serving the 1-2-3 lines instead of the one serving the E. Google suggested we walk to the 59th Street station and take the R train to 42nd Street and transfer to the 2 (Express).

Easy, right? But when we got to 59th Street, the next few trains on the schedule were N trains; we let the first one go but then I looked carefully at the map, and then at the Google results, and realized that the N and the R both went to 42nd Street. That was ten minutes lost.

At 59th, the first train going to Chambers Street was the 1 (Local), so we let it go by. Ten minutes later, a 2 pulled in and we got on, only to hear the conductor announce that it was going to operate on the local tracks and make all stops – another ten minutes lost.

But we finally got to the starting point and began the walk. We were greeted by a wonderful display of tulips in front of PS234.

We also passed a Zucker’s Bagels & Smoked Fish restaurant – they were so busy that they hadn’t taken down their Passover special board.

This neighborhood had been badly affected by the damage caused by 9/11.

After a few minutes, we reached Nelson Rockefeller Park and the Esplanade. Like almost everywhere else we’ve been on this trip, there were tulips in profusion.

Colgate-Palmolive used to be headquartered on the Jersey side of the Hudson; they moved, but left their clock behind.

Near the North Cove Marina, we got a very nice view of the top of the new 1 World Trade Center reflected in a nearby skyscraper.

We also got to enjoy the ferry and sightseeing boats near the Statue of Liberty.

If we come back to the area, I’d like to visit the Museum of Jewish Heritage.

Ellis Island is nearby, so this statue of Mother Cabrini (the first naturalized US citizen to become a saint) is in the right place, as is another sculpture called “The Immigrants”.

The American Merchant Marine Memorial fits the area, too. The sculptor based it on a photograph of an actual event.

We’ve heard a lot about Castle Clinton on the Bowery Boys podcasts, so I was happy to see it in the flesh…errr, stone. It was built to defend New York from the British, and placed so that its guns had a 360-degree field of fire. The guns were never used, and the expansion of Manhattan brought it firmly onto land; it became a theatre for a while and is now the National Park Service headquarters for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. It’s rather low and nondescript, so I didn’t get a good photo, but it provided a great vantage point to see all of 1 World Trade Center.

Our walk next took us to Bowling Green, the oldest park in New York. It’s tulip time there, too!

We walked by other historical buildings, including Fraunces’ Tavern, where George Washington bade farewell to his officers. It’s still an active restaurant, but we went to Just Salad instead.

I might not have noticed this mural on the International Telephone and Telegraph building if the volksmarch instructions hadn’t pointed it out.

No trip to Lower Manhattan is complete without seeing the New York Stock Exchange and Federal Hall.

We didn’t go into Trinity Church, but we did pay our respects to two of its permanent residents.

Our next stop was the National September 11 Memorial. The last time we were in New York, the site was still under active construction; now, you can see the pools where the Twin Towers stood as well as seeing the new 1 World Trade Center towering over the area.

The Oculus is a very interesting building above the new WTC Subway/PATH station. It’s supposed to look like a hand releasing a dove, and it’s aligned so that its floor is washed with light every September 11th between 8:46am (the first impact) until 10:28am (the collapse of the second tower). Naturally, it’s also a high-end shopping center.

The climax of today’s volksmarch was a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. This was the second time that Diane and I had done the bridge walk; it was quite a nice day for it!

And then all we had to do was walk back to the Chambers Street subway station to finish the walk. We took the E train back to midtown; it was a lot easier than our morning trek!

We had dinner at Raku It’s Japanese on East 52nd Street; it was a nice, unpretentious neighborhood place with friendly service and good food. The waiter talked us into trying sparkling sake and we liked it!

On our way back to the hotel, I saw what looked like LARGE parking tickets under the wipers of several cars. I was wrong.

Each ticket contained a different quotation about kindness; seeing them was an unexpectedly pleasant way to finish the evening.

We didn’t do a volksmarch today – instead, we took a Bowery Boys Walk through the site of the New York World’s Fairs – Flushing Meadows Park.

We entered the park from the 7 train at Gotham Plaza, just as I had done on my visit in 1965 (Diane lived on Long Island, so her family drove to the fair and used an entrance near the parking lots).

There’s an mosaic based on an Andy Warhol portrait of Robert Moses at the entrance to the park; it was installed in 1998 and has seen better decades. Warhol and Moses didn’t get along well – Moses had the murals that Warhol painted for the fare covered up; this mosaic is based on one of the images that Moses had covered.

There were less controversial subjects for the mosaics, though, like Elsie the Cow, one of the stars of the 1939/40 fair. Our guide told us people were upset that Elsie didn’t have a companion, so the Borden Company created Elmer – who became the namesake of the glue. Diane’s Dad always called Elmer’s “cow glue”, but I guess “bull glue” would have been more appropriate.

Our next stop was the Unisphere (which had been the site of the Trylon and Perisphere in 1939/40). It’s aging well, though the lights marking cities around the globe no longer light up at night.

The 1939/40 World’s Fair took up almost 1200 acres; the 1964/65 version was 646 acres – much of the rest was used for parking lots. We walked through a good part of the park; there aren’t that many clear reminders of either fair left, since almost all of the structures were taken down soon after the fair ended, which left room for some nice trees.

One remnant is much older than the fair – it’s the Column of Jerash from 120 CE, donated by the King of Jordan. It’s not the oldest artifact in New York City – that distinction goes to Cleopatra’s Needle in Central Park – but it is the oldest human-made object in Queens.

The New York State Pavilion is still standing, though the terrazzo floor embedded with a map of the state showing all the Texaco stations is long gone. It was used as a skating rink after the fair closed and Diane skated there; our guide told us about plans to try to restore it.

There are time capsules from both fairs buried together, to be opened in 6939; they were sponsored by Westinghouse, which is unlikely to survive as long as the capsules.

It was an interesting experience and brought back some memories of the time I’d spent at the Fair – Kyle told many stories and showed us photos from both fairs that helped bring the site to life.

I’m glad that the site has been turned back into a park for the most part – there were lots of people there playing games, barbecuing, and enjoying the weather. And it’s still tulip season!

We took the subway back to midtown and did our part for global warming by having lunch at Angelo’s Coal Oven Pizza on 57th. It was delicious.

After dinner, we met an IBM friend for drinks at the Campbell Bar (formerly The Campbell Apartment) at Grand Central. It’s an interesting place, and it was quiet enough to encourage conversation – so when a band started setting up, we left.

Our last stop for the day was for ice cream, at Emack and Bolio’s on Second Avenue. It was excellent, and I look forward to trying their Boston location next time we visit Jeff.