Doing tourist stuff and a little bit more sailing

So here's the final story of my adventures from the Era of the VOC.

After I left the Half Moon replica I intended to visit my cousin, who lives in Manhattan, and stay at his place. I wasn't able to contact him at first and ended up not even be able to see him, because he was really really busy with his work. So I ended up staying at Steve's farm untill I flew home and I went into Manhattan by metro every time.

The first three days I met up with Swantje again (she had left the ship 4 days before me). Together we visited a few museums (Guggenheim, Metropolitan museum of contemporary art), Central Park & Central Park Zoo, the Empire State building, the Public Library, Soho, Chinatown, Times Square, and so on. It was great to meet Swantje again, but unfortunately she had to leave on thursday. So on thursday I went on my own to the Museum of Natural History (where I spent 3 hours but still only saw half the museum) and South street Seaport Museum (where the Peking is docked, yes the one from Irving Johnsons movie "Around Cape Horn").

During those 4 days in Manhattan I saw a lot of variety, different styles of buildings, different ethnic groups, different neighbourhoods, tourists from all different parts of the world, etc. But when I came through another bit of Manhattan a few days later, it was still different again. I think that's what makes New York New York. The fact that you could encounter litterally anyone or anything makes it truly the worldly city that it is and also truly "New Amsterdam".


On sunday we were going to go sailing on Steve's boat, together with his niece. But her mother (Steve's sister) dropped her off 4 hours later than expected. So we went to the movies instead (Aliens in the Attic, very hilarious movie in which a few aliens land on the rooftop of a house and the kids try to keep it secret from their parents). And the next evening, which was also my last evening in the States, Steve and I joined one of Steve's friends on his boat. Which means that I was sailing on my first AND last night of my sailing adventure at the other side of the Atlantic. A great conclusion, don't you think?

There's so much more to tell, but there's just not enough time and space to tell everything.

At the moment I'm back at home in Wageningen. I've been going through my photos and I put some of them on Picasa: http://picasaweb.google.nl/sanne.koenen/HalfMoonAndNewYork?feat=email#
I'm missing the crew from the Half Moon and I wish I could have stayed on to sail a bit more, but on the other hand it's also nice to be back at home again.

Thanx everyone for reading my weblog and posting messages on my site!

Till next time!
Keep in touch and take care!
xx Sanne