Snow Goose: The Big Apple,

On our way south to move back on to Snow Goose, our 40 foot steel ketch, we normally swing north to New York City for a short visit with my sister her husband and kids. They live in a quite section of Brooklyn.

This is an example of the houses where my sister lives in Brooklyn

The big city intrigues me with it’s frantic pace, its noise and bustle. It’s a great place to visit but I’m not sold on living there. The cost of living is so high that to be able to enjoy a life there you would have to make upwards of a 6 figure income to have a house, and a life that wasn’t anything more than working and sitting at home at night. Also the incredible energy of this city is balanced by the solo existence and avoidance that everyone give to each other. I call it the “New York stare”. When walking down the street everyone makes eye contact until the last 20 feet (as they size you up to see if you are a serial killer or not) and then at the 20 foot mark, the eyes turn away and never look at you again… you simply ceased to exist in their world. It’s a city of 8 million plus people packed tightly together mostly living separate lives… or at least, that’s how it seems to this outsider.

The "New" world trade center

We went down to lower Manhattan and took a look at the new world trade center, it’s one tall building! Right next to it are the memorial fountains for the old twin towers. The fountains are huge holes in the ground with a wall of water falling down into the holes. It’s surrounded by a rail inscribed with the names of all of the people who died. It’s all rather sobering to see.

The large square area with the water falls is the footprint of the old world trade center tower. The smaller square hole is another hole (that you can't see the bottom of) and the water just falls off down into nowhere... kind of creepy.

While in NY we visited the largest Gothic Cathedral in the USA. It was started in the late 1800's and is still under construction. What a place!