The Amazing Race! Canada/USA Road Trip July-Aug 2016 - Day 6 (Day in NYC)

[neilhd]

Today we were up at about 07:30. We had no fixed plan for breakfast, other than "find a cool NYC diner of some sort".

We turned right at the end of our block, heading south, and stumbled upon the Tick Tock Diner in the New Yorker hotel. This has been mentioned many times on The Dibb so obviously this was the place to go.



Our server was a kind of taller, fatter, gruffer Danny DeVito. I don't mean that in an insulting way or anything, he just looked a bit like that. After everything we ordered he'd ask "Any bacon, ham, sausage?" in a very gruff New York accent. It was kind of all one word: "Baconamsawsayge?" So it was a bit like this:

"I'd like this omelette please."
"Ok, any baconamsawsayge?"
"No thanks. My son would like the pancakes with maple syrup."
"Ok, any baconamsawsayge?"
"No thanks. Can we also have 2 cups of coffee and 3 orange juices?"
"Ok, any baconamsawsayge?"

You get the idea. The food was ok, not brilliant, and fairly pricey. I wouldn't rush back. The downstairs toilets in the New Yorker bear mention for looking like they were next to an enormous bank vault door. The lobby of the hotel was nice, too. I've since found out that Nikola Tesla (my geek hero) died in the New Yorker.

We finished and walked back North to 42nd street to find Madame Tussaurds. Not because we were going there, but because that's where we had to pick up our tickets for The RIDE (yes, it's capitalised!) bus tour. We picked them up, then grabbed a Starbucks and did a bit of souvenir shopping whilst we waited. We also used the loo in Senor Frogs restaurant (this is the "official" toilet for The RIDE) as this is where The RIDE departs from. More on that place later!

I'd had an email a couple of days earlier asking if they could move us from the 11am to the 11:15. That was fine so I agreed. Had I realised why - I might have changed my mind. It was very immediately apparent that the entire tour consisted of us three, and several million 8-12 year olds on a Day Camp trip. I didn't count them, I'm just guessing how many based on how much noise they made. Oh how wonderful, we thought!

The RIDE is seriously cool though. The seats are arranged theatre-style so you sit facing out at the street, with floor-to-ceiling windows. Actually the ceiling is glass, too. There are many LCD screens around the bus that give info as you go around, and there's interactions with street performers along the route (dancers, singers, musicians, a freestyle rapper and so on). I won't give too much away, but it was actually amazing and the best bus tour I've ever done by a long shot. The 2 hosts on board did a good job controlling the kids, too. If you go to New York I seriously recommend you do this. We got it as part of our NYC Explorer pass, which made it very good value, too.

The rapper:


Break dancer:


Ballet dancers:


The bus:


When we were finished we headed north again on foot towards Central Park, stopping to buy a few snacks en-route:


We went into the posh shopping mall at Columbus Circle to use the loos, and then crossed to the park. Ele wanted to hire bikes, so that’s what we did. It was quite expensive ($70 for all of us), but good fun. We circled the entire park (all 6 miles of it, including the hilly bit at the top!). Joe has only recently started riding bikes again, actually. He learnt a few years ago but never actually liked doing it until about 3 months ago, when he discovered it was fun. Good thing, because he was seriously out of practise before and never would have done it if he hadn't ridden quite a lot since the spring. As it was, he managed the 6 miles without a problem.





Bradley Wiggins showed up:




The only problem with doing this though, is you don't see much of the inside of the park, which is where all the interesting stuff is. We did come off the outskirts and head in a couple of times, but you can't ride down those paths so it's a bit of a hassle. We sat for a time on one excursion to the interior, watching a baseball game and eating an ice cream. If was very relaxing for a while.

We returned our bikes and assessed our dinner plans. Joe wanted Shake Shack, so we decided to hail a cab (just for the experience really) and go there. Joe did the hailing:




Shake Shack was absolutely rammed so I vetoed that idea, and we instead went to John's Pizzeria which was just over the road. It's a lot bigger on the inside than it looks from the outside. There was a 5-minute wait for a table. We ordered 2 pizzas and a ceaser salad. We also had some garlic roll things (think the Domino's Twisted Dough Balls). There was TONS of food!



The pizza was really good. Expensive though. We didn't finish it and took a few slices home with us.

We waddled back up to a market we'd passed earlier, and I bought a New York cap for a very cheap price. Joe wanted one of those graphic equaliser T-Shirts like the ones they sell in the Men In Black gift shop at Universal Studios, but they were about $45 so I said no. Ele bought a scarf (that's right, she also bought one yesterday - well remembered!).

With that done we went back to our hotel. Joe and I tried on the robes:



Then we went to sleep!

[Mortimer Mouse]

We loved, LOVED the RIDE and were lucky enough to see one of the rare Duane Reede stores, on our tour

I'm impressed you manged all that walking and cycling in the summer heat.

[neilhd]

Haha, those Duane Reed stores are very hard to find!

Wasn't ridiculously hot actually - about 29/30 degrees I think.

[abiknox]

Another great day, I love a bit of bike hire

[disney owl]

fitted lots into today

[stecee]

The RIDE looks fab, a lot better than the HoHo buses, can you get on and off or do you stay on and do the circuit.
Another great day

[neilhd]

Originally Posted by stecee

The RIDE looks fab, a lot better than the HoHo buses, can you get on and off or do you stay on and do the circuit.
Another great day

See more...

Once you're on, that's it. No stops.

[Glee Fan]

Love the robe photo!

Busy day - have to say have never come across the Ride before and we went in 2014. It must have totally passed me by!

[DisneyDaffodil]

Great report

I hadn't considered the RIDE for our upcoming trip in July until my husband spotted it last night. It seemed quite expensive but your report makes it sound worthwhile, so I'm considering it now

[neilhd]

Originally Posted by DisneyDaffodil

Great report

I hadn't considered the RIDE for our upcoming trip in July until my husband spotted it last night. It seemed quite expensive but your report makes it sound worthwhile, so I'm considering it now

See more...

You should - it was one of the best things we did!