Saturday morning was the perfect time to take advantage of members' hour at MOMA, wander through midtown, and see how much of Central Park had re-opened. The best time to see The Scream was early in the morning. I also checked out a small exhibit on the design floor about the opening scenes of Goldfinger.
Then I wandered North talking to visitors as I went. I stopped to see the dangling crane and finally entered Central Park to walk the reverse of the Marathon route up the East Drive. In the last few years, I took this route after a long day on double decker buses where I talked about how to view the Marathon and why the buses were not on their normal route. I loved rooting for the runners who were still on the course at that hour; they were my kind of people. I decided to go off route because I was delighted to see people who came to run the Marathon actually exploring the Park.
Back at home, the should/shouldn't have cancelled the run discussion was playing out in the Tourguide and Tourist communities I inhabit in Cyberspace. The Tourism community was strangely silent. Hopefully they were/are working on the New York is open for business message that needs to be heard round the world. A poster I know who is a police officer provided my reality check about the decision. He pointed out that first responders of all types (police, fire, medical) had been working long hour 7 day shifts for days and there really weren't "resources available" to handle the race. I'm glad it was cancelled. I decided to offer free No Marathon tours for Sunday and Monday.
On Sunday, I met lots of runner/visitors in Times Square who mostly spoke French and watched many runners passing through on their way to running in the Park anyway. After no one showed, my tour not taken turned into a fun walk up through the Park via the finish line and eventually across the Great Lawn and out North of the Metroppolitan Museum of Art. The Park felt like Marathon Day. The runners ran. The bystanders cheered. The weather was gorgeous but the visible tree devastation was sobering.
I planned the Monday tour thinking that visitors who didn't run on Sunday would be up early with energy to spare. The good news for visitors and New York was that people who needed to run on Sunday ran their hearts and legs out and saw more of New York than they would see from the Marathon course. People who wanted to volunteer got out to Staten Island and Brooklyn and Queens and helped out any way they could. Consequently on the first "normal" back to work Monday, Times Square was really empty between 7 and 8 AM.
This is me all alone in Times Square at almost 8AM on Monday morning. Eventually, I decided to do my planned tour on my own.I visited my favorite photo op street corner where you can take pictures of the Chrysler building, Empire State and 1 World Trade Center from the same corner. I discovered Free Coffee sponsored by MSNBC at Rockefeller Center and noticed the Warhol exhibit at Christies which I visited on the way home.
After stopping at Grand Central and wandering over to the UN, there was virtually no traffic on the M15 until it reached the East Village. I scratched the idea of going all the way downtown and got off at the East Village. I munched my way to the Eldridge Street Synagogue with dumplings from the original Vanessa's. I also stopped in at the Tenement Museum and on my way to the subway I got a knish at Yona Schimmel's. I would have also stopped in at Russ & Daughters had I read the article about their Sherpa Manager that was published in the New York Times the day before.
No more empty free tours for me. If you would like to learn how to explore New York like a native with a "native" (I started life in New Jersey), contact me with your dates and needs.