By grannyg, on October 22nd, 2011 Today is a photo free day. Sorry, but sometimes I don’t feel like looking through the lens, not often, and today was one of those days.
Today was the day for going to Brooklyn. We decided not to walk across Brooklyn Bridge after all, the past few days had caught up with our legs and I really needed a day where there was a little less walking. Subway to the rescue. I find the subway fairly easy to navigate, so long as you know where you’re going of course, getting to Brooklyn from the hostel required two trains.
Essentially we were there for the shopping, there are two clothes shops which have larger sizes – Lane Bryant and Redress NYC – both fantastic – I got a couple of things and Jay bought herself a good few things. To recoup our spent energy we found a sweet little cafe not far from Redress, nice and funky with delicious Red Velvet Cupcakes.. mmm. That was all we had energy for – sad to say- but short and sweet is better than not at all.
After dropping the bags off at the hostel (and checking account balances!) we headed across town to catch the Circle Line boat, again, no photos sorry… the boat ride we chose was 3 hours long and circled the entire island of Manhattan. If you ever get the chance to do this I totally recommend you do. In our minds we think of Manhattan as being the midtown bit we see in movies and t.v. shows. But this shows you so much more – like the northern tip where you have to travel through bridges which turn sideways for you as you go past rich forest like grounds on the Manhattan side or as you travel between Brooklyn and North Manhattan you can see remnants of industry which made this city. Our guide was very entertaining which always is a bonus.
After we docked, we realised one of the buses we caught goes right past the movie theatres around Times Square, so we decided to treat ourselves for the evening. I don’t know why but the idea of a movie theatre being on the 10th floor was mind boggling to me!
So that was Day 5!
By grannyg, on October 21st, 2011 
Side streets in Soho
Day 4! Today was a work day essentially, the plan was to visit as many yarn shops as possible for a “One day in…” article for entangled. So there won’t be many photo’s today, as most of them will be for the article.
My loyal intern schlepping the streets with me
I spent about an hour or so last night mapping out the whole trip, capturing screenshots of the relevant maps on the ipad, writing a list of the shops and which train or bus to take to get there. That was fun enough by itself… (sad but true)
KIP oldschool
The trip started in the downtown area, went up to Soho, across to the East village and ended in Midtown.
We started with 8 shops on the list and made it to 5. Which isn’t too shabby!
There was also a bit of shopping, the first shop we visited was in the same building as Century 21 (an amazing discount designer store) and we were there early enough for it to not be to insane. All I bought was nothing! Jay got a couple of pairs of shoes and a handbag. So restraint all around!
Over sized softies - crochet detail FTW!
Soho is a great area to walk around, lots of top end designer shops with inspiring window displays, and also funky quirky places. I’m not sure what the above shop was, but I couldn’t resist a picture of the window creatures, for fairly obvious reasons.
Too many choices!
And of course you can’t do a day like this without stopping for lunch. As we were leaving Purl Soho and heading around to Wool and the Gang we found this gorgeous tea salon. Going from that route, it must have been along Broome St. The front of the shop is retail and stocks all things tea, chocolate and even gelato! Beautifully arranged and styled.
(Macaroons, Florentines and Hot Chocolate – balanced eating Soho style)
The rear of the shop is the tea salon, we decided on hot chocolates and treats. If you ever find yourself there, order the small hot chocolate, we did and we couldn’t even finish it! Very rich and delicious. We were taking photos while dining, but weren’t told until we were leaving and in the front part of the shop that photos weren’t allowed! Corporate espionage aside, it’s more likely that most picture takers are tourists, bloggers etc who will spread the joy of your business more so than harm it.
All up a very productive and tiring day.
(I’d like one to go please)
By grannyg, on October 11th, 2011 
(cable car leaving Manhattan)
Another stunning day weather wise also helped by having had a good nights sleep. First on today’s agenda was the cable car to Roosevelt Island.
Incredibly this is actually a commuter cable car and how many get to and from the island on a daily basis although it can be jam packed at peak times. I’m not sure I’d be as in love with it on a windy day packed in like a sardine can! But on a quiet glorious day with only a handful of people it’s magic. The ride only lasts about 6 minutes and once on the island we only stayed until the next car came along. The island is essentially a suburb and is connected by subway and bridge as well as cable car.
From here we found our way over to Central Park Zoo where we wandered around for a good couple of hours. It’s a small zoo but nicely laid out with a few animals that Auckland Zoo doesn’t have so was interesting from that perspective. I was slightly disappointed there wasn’t a Zebra with a treadmill though…
As the Zoo is at the south-east end of Central Park it meant we were in prime position for the legendary part of 5th Ave. What we didn’t realise though is today was the Hispanic Day parade and as well as holiday crowds there was also parade crowds and parade! It made progress through our shopping agenda slower but much more fun.
My first stop was the Apple store which was crazy busy, I was interested in seeing if there were any gadgets or attachments I might ‘need’ – I only actually came away with something I really did need and was only $30 poorer for it!
Right behind Apple is the legendary F.A.O Schwartz store… toys and candy galore! I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves…
Breakfast at Tiffany’s is a classic movie that both Jay and I love, so it was a compulsory stop for us.
Jay did come away with a lovely pair of earrings. As we were heading there though I saw 3 young woman dressed in black dresses with up-do’s and pearls, eating pastries from brown paper bags! They were obviously in town for their own recreation of the famous opening scene of the movie! I’m guessing they didn’t plan on 5 million other people in town for holidays and parade!
The Hispanic Day parade was amazing! I couldn’t believe how long it was, it went on for hours and we must have been about half way and the dancers and performers were still looking as if they were enjoying it!
After this we headed down to Union Square and found Kinokuniya store (Japanese books etc, great for manga and craft books) where we browsed for a while then had coffee. Then it was time for home. Today we used more public transport, buses and trains, which is really easy to navigate thanks to the cities fairly logical layout.
After another nap in the early evening we headed out to my favourite local diner for dinner, it didn’t disappoint!
Until tommorow!
By grannyg, on October 11th, 2011 
(McDonald’s in chinatown)
Day two started out quite early for me after waking at 4am and not being able to go back to sleep, luckily Jay got a full nights sleep. We eventually got the day started after a good breakfast here at the hostel.
First activity of the day was catching the subway down to the World Trade Centre site, the buildings have progressed so much since last year. I didn’t have the camera out by this stage, Jay might have a couple of pics which I’ll access later. From here we walked downtown to catch our final bus tour, this time to see Brooklyn.
(Heading under the Manhattan bridge kind of hoping the stupid man in front of me was a few inches taller)
It’s a holiday weekend in the US – Columbus Day – and as such the city is teeming with so many more visitors. And I can now see why there is a bit of disdain for ‘tourists’ from New Yorkers… Anyway, Brooklyn bus tour.
(some monument somewhere in Brooklyn commemorating something which might have happened somewhere)
You know how I said the quality of the tour depended on the tour guide? Today’s tour guide was not that great… and being early on a Saturday there was little traffic so we whizzed around the streets. It felt almost like a typical parody of a tour group where you are told to look left and by the time you do what you were looking at is long gone.
(view of Manhattan from Manhattan bridge)
For me the only highlight was going over the Manhattan bridge in an open top bus and also getting an understanding of how big Brooklyn is. I’ve had to rethink my plan for the day we spend there now. So it was worth it for that alone I guess.
(entrance to High Line on 14th st, unsure of reason for roses)
Next up was the High Line park, I’ve been interested in this park since last year but I only found out about it after leaving. Originally an elevated train track for freight being shipped into the west side of the city, the line even runs through buildings so they could unload directly into businesses, which went out of service in 1980. It’s fate was up in the air, so to speak, until 1999 when a friends of the high line committee is formed to turn this structure into something more useful. It was a 10 year journey to get the park open! You can read all about it here.
(beautiful Jay – the crowds are swarming behind me…)
We joined the high line at 14th st and walked it until 23rd, along with approximately 5million other people… it was so crowded it was insane. We didn’t really get a chance to do anything except keep on walking, the sun was quite hot and all the shaded spots for sitting were taken.
(details referencing the origin of the high line like the wheels on these loungers .. which we didn’t get to sit on,…)
Despite all that I still found it enjoyable; you may notice I have a thing for old buildings and walking the high line provides you with great views of character filled structures at a level you don’t usually get to see them from.
After getting off at 23rd we trundled over to where I thought I was supposed to meet a friend to do the Circle Line boat tour of the island. Once I’d figured out we were only 20 blocks away, we grabbed a cab up to the correct pier. Once there I realised the insanity of the proposed outing, half of the midwest of the USA were also there to take the boat ride… I called my friend and we decided to skip this and instead go hang out at Grand Central for ice cream and coffee and good catch up.
Jay and I got back ‘home’ around 4pm and really did not feel like moving after that. Our legs wouldn’t have let us anyway… I managed to nap and catch up on sleep then plan the next day.
All up a great day and a warning to myself to not overdo the tourist trail on a busy holiday weekend.
By grannyg, on October 8th, 2011 
(views of lower Manhattan)
We are here and it’s great to be back! New York, I really missed you.
The journey here was as good as a 24 hour trip can be. Both planes flew to where they were supposed to and even managed to be early, all our luggage was where we expected to find it, all officials were friendly and helpful, and we managed to nap a little on both flights. We got in to our backpackers just before midnight on the 6th October NY time. Needless to say we both fell into the bunks without much fuss, slept solidly and woke up between 7 and 8am.
Today was all about being a tourist!
(the most beautiful Jay)
I was initially reluctant to go up the Empire State building again as I’d already been last year and wasn’t interested in another 2 hour wait to get up. However as Jay hadn’t been up and it was on her to-do list I made sure we were smarter this time. We headed up almost first thing – roughly 9.30ish – it was a very smart move, absolutely no queues and the fence at the viewing deck was no more than 1 person deep. And I’m really glad I did go up again – last year I went up in the evening – as it was a breathtakingly clear day and we could see for miles.
(upper west side)
I decided to try out my new wide angle lens today so you’ll notice some pictures are distorted as a result – viewers, do not adjust your set.
Anyway, we were unsure of how jet-lagged we would be so set a plan to do the hop-on/hop-off sightseeing buses as a way of seeing lots with minimum effort.
(United Nations Building)
I’d neglected doing these last year and was keen to see what I’d missed out on. There are 4 routes, downtown, uptown brooklyn and night-lights, today we did the downtown and uptown routes.
(A church that has been a work-in-progress for over 100 years)
We had a great time sitting on top of the double decker buses scooting around the city, the traffic was quite busy today so we were able to crane our necks at the sights a little longer than others might have.
(the Guggenheim)
Generally I think they are a must-do but not an only-do, I really got to see more of the beautiful buildings that New York has and learned some interesting history and facts I might not have otherwise.
(a mosque above a pharmacy in Harlem – i think)
But comparing to how I felt on my first day last year, I certainly don’t feel as if I’ve been part of New York today.
(the Met)
Another good thing about these type of tours is to get a feel for what you want to see and cross off your list what you don’t need to. Jay and I will be revising our plans a little for the upcoming days.
(apparently this corner was where MLK would speak – I found this quite cool)
These tours are really dependent on the guide you get because not only do you get commentary on the sights but of course they litter their dialogue with their own observations and bias.
(central park south)
The guy we had for the downtown tour was quite informative and generally good. But we had the best guide for the uptown tour – Brenda. She gave good facts!
(random lower east side building with awesome staircase patterning!)
My favourite Brenda fact is; New York’s roads were initially laid out over existing Native American’s tracks and the track that Broadway was laid over originally stretched from Manhattan right up to Canada! Isn’t that a great fact?
As you can see we’ve been so lucky with the weather and being out in it for so much of the day meant I didn’t really notice any jet-lag effects – bonus! Thanks to the advice of a couple of wise woman I now know that sunlight is the best defence against jet-lag.
And that pretty much was today! Tomorrow is another fun sight-seeing day. We walk the high-line and see all of Manhattan by boat – til then!
(photo’s in no order whatsoever and do not relate to what I’m saying, if they do, it’s a happy accident)
By grannyg, on October 6th, 2011 I’m resurrecting my poor neglected blog to show off again! Yes, grannyg is headed back to New York – will it cope? – and beyond to the New York Sheep and Wool festival aka Rhinebeck. All under the disguise of promoting entangled magazine of course! This year I’m also heading over to London with little side trips to Paris, Brussels and Manchester.
You’re all hating me right now aren’t you?
It gets better though. My lovely daughter Jay has worked hard all year and saved her pennies to come along and be my slave. Isn’t she great? Well THAT’s not entirely true, slavery is illegal after all, but she is entangled’s fantastic intern and will be helping me at Rhinebeck.
Why do I need help? Well my suitcase is bursting with samples from local NZ indie fibre suppliers which I’ll hand out to the lucky Rhinebeck attendees. I’ll also have vouchers for free issues of entangled magazine. So if you are heading up to Rhinebeck look out for us, and if you hail from any of the cities I’m visiting feel free to meet for a coffee!
Better go – is that my boarding call?
By grannyg, on August 15th, 2011 
For readers from foreign parts, there’s this strange ball sport called Rubgy and every few years there is a World Cup event to see who is the best team ever. New Zealanders think they are quite good rugby players and often think they own the sport. Well some New Zealanders – the rest of us just keep quiet in case we are shipped off to a barren island for not really caring. According to some sports radio jockheads “If you don’t support the RWC – you’re not a New Zealander” – thankfully he doesn’t hold much sway outside of his radio studio on sports and in fact is a bit of a laughing stock for his inventive malapropisms.
However a country as small as ours sees any reason to get loads of foreign visitors down here as a way to “get on the map”. Which perplexes me somewhat – do our places on the map expire? Is there a time limit I don’t know about? So if you, as a country, haven’t performed some magnificent feat of sportyness or attracted campervans full of British-y type tourists do you then have to be removed from the map? Surely when two little funny shaped islands were sketched onto parchment a couple of hundred years ago, that’s it, we were on the map? Answer me people! Are we on the map or not!?
This general nervousness about falling off the map extends right into the halls of power and suddenly there is “public money” available to spruce the place up a bit. Usually we get some flowers and a pretty welcome mat at the airport. But something must be amiss in the halls of power, perhaps non-sporty people are infiltrating the ranks because money has been spent on art! Art in a public space! That has function and form!
Having long given up on learning about things happening to do with the big sport event I was blissfully unaware of this until a few weeks ago when I attended a meeting at the Handweavers Guild of which I belong. Each meeting there is a speaker and they are usually very interesting and great fun but I’d have to say this particular weekend will probably not be topped for a long time. A fellow guild member is the partner of Billy Apple - a fairly legendary conceptual artist – and we were fortunate that she had brought him along to be our guest speaker.
The main focus of his discussion that day was about his most recent work which was about converting various areas of public space into attractive and relevant public works of art. I’ll let the quote from the city council’s website explain;
The Corner Post
Billy Apple
Wairepo Swamp Walk and corner of Sandringham Rd and Walters Rd, Kingsland
The public art project ‘The Corner Post’ by Billy Apple in Kingsland is located at two sites adjacent to Eden Park. Wairepo Swamp Walk is the first road in New Zealand designed in it’s entirety as artwork. The second site, at the corner of Walters and Sandringham Roads, is a pedestrian plaza linking Eden Park with Kingsland Station, which features a scaled up corner post.
Conceived as a site-specific work, the function of each space is underlined by a mathematical concept called the ‘golden ratio’ - a numerical ratio defined as 1:1.618 that often occurs in nature and was first recognized by the ancient Greeks. Billy Apple often uses this proportional system in his art practice. In this instance, the golden ratio dictates the overall dimensions as well as the location of elements within the geometric design.
Wairepo Swamp Walk is a three-dimensional space consisting of large black and white slabs of poured concrete, which reference rugby and cricket, framed up on either side by volcanic dry stone walls. The area is designed as a shared space for use by vehicles and pedestrians, and incorporates a series of lampposts running the length of the road. At the corner site Billy Apple’s golden ratio calculations give rise to another black and white footpath and a scaled up corner post topped by a flag is located at the centre of a green ‘field’, created using a product called Synthite that consists of recycled glass imbedded in resin.
The “corner post” (above) is situated at the end of the road where Eden Park stadium is (where the Auckland games will be played) and right across from the train station and bus stops. On a functional level it will fulfill the need of a visible and easily described meeting point for visitors to meet. On a form level it looks to be a simple design representing a playing field with goal posts, but thanks to hearing the designer himself talk about it I was able to look closer and notice all the things which make the difference between functional and brilliant design.
For instance, I was there pretty much at mid-day. It will be no coincidence that the shadow of the post lies along the white stripe.
The longitude and latitude of your position. Notice the gap between ground and post? It has some relevance which I can’t remember now but when hearing him talk about it I was impressed…
Wairepo Swamp Walk - A purpose built and fully designed shared space road!
It’s hard for any city to spend ratepayers money on aesthetics, there will always be detractors. Funnily enough I’ve not heard anyone saying bad things about these places. I love them.
By grannyg, on July 24th, 2011 
Where was I? That’s right, Sydney.
I love harbour cities, I find the concept of getting around by ferries terribly charming. Although I couldn’t live somewhere which was dependent on getting everywhere by ferry, too much stress if you miss one. I suspect this attraction is because of the novelty for me, I grew up on a farm and we drove everywhere, sure there was a school bus, but public transport was what we used when visiting new cities in the holidays. Occasionally I’ve been known to behave like a 3 year old at the sight of trains, tunnels and ferries…
Sydney didn’t disappoint me there, buses, trains, ferries and monorails were all our means of transportation.
I made an early start on the Sunday and wandered down to circular quay – quite a public transport hub.. oooohh!!! After much deliberation of time available vs money left, taking a ferry to Manly Beach won my attention. It takes about 30 minutes and is quite a spectacular journey, the views of the landmark Sydney Opera house is worth the trip alone (see previous post for pic) as well as the Harbour Bridge.
You also get to appreciate the vastness of the sky, it’s just bigger and bluer than here in Auckland.
The ferry approaches Manly on the southern side where the Harbour is, a short walk through the township takes you to the main coast where spectacular surf beaches are. The shopping area has a mixed vibe to it, relaxed, trendy, urban, wealthy, hippy, shabby, sharp – all kind of mixing in and around the trendy cafes, the beaches and markets.
I’ll let the pictures talk for me..
Makes me want to go back…
By grannyg, on July 5th, 2011 
Sydney, Australia. Just a short hop across the “ditch” for us New Zealanders, but would you believe one I’ve not really done before? Well sort of, I had a 3 day stopover on the way back from India in 2002, but I’ve not flown to Aussie for a weekend jaunt before. There is a first time for everything. Back in December last year two knitting friends and I decided it would be great fun to go and visit our Sydney knitting brethren for the legendary WWKIP events they have. It didn’t take much arm twisting, so we booked out tickets quickly before commons sense prevails – true, there’s no harm of that happening!
Well, it didn’t take long for June to roll around, and before we could say “kitchener stitch” we were smack bang in central Sydney. It’s roughly 5 – 6 hours door to door, that is, from when we leave home until we get to our accommodation with a 2 hour time difference. Again, why hadn’t I done this before?
It was a whirlwind three days, the first was a fantastic yarn crawl in Newtown and central city, which has been cleverly crafted into an article for entangled! I loved Newtown, it’s a funky, character filled suburb with great cafes and interesting shops.
Best coffee and teas – ever!
so much temptation in one small block of shops…
This HAS to be the cutest auto shop in the world..
Love!
You know I can’t resist a good corner building! I love the idea of a wedge shaped lounge or study for some reason.
With a china cabinet full of colour like this.
Lit only by rose shaped fairy lights….
But I digress!
we were there for the yarn, here is a sneak preview from the yarn crawl which will show up in entangled (don’t tell anyone!)
People, this was all in one day! I’m going to have to put day two and three in separate posts I think!
But what else have I been up to? Well it’s still all about the magazine, I’m still working full time at day job and working on magazine during evenings and weekends. There has been crafting though I’m pleased to say, but no baking – much to a certain teenage boy’s dismay. My knitting still manages to get done during coffee before work and during lunch times. I’m managing to fit some sewing in on weekends when there isn’t so much magazine stuff to do. Spinning still happens, I manage to squeeze a little of that in some evenings when I’m waiting for dinner to cook. You know how I like the busy, well I’ve got plenty of the busy, although I’m pleased it’s manageable and doesn’t ever feel like “too much”.
Around the house a few things have changed, I had one international student move in and out in February, he had to go back to his home country. Conveniently a twitter acquaintance was looking for a place to live, so she moved in. In April our longtime international student decided to attend college in a different country, so he moved out, we decided not to replace him in order to leave a spare room for Jay to use. She has moved back to Auckland now and is a resident nanny for 4 days a week and splits the rest of her week between mine and her fathers house. So my parenting days are drawing to a close, both of my own children are young adults now and I’m not responsible anymore for others children. I’m liking it!
The only other big news is I’m heading back to New York in October for Rhinebeck vs2! With a side of London. Yep pretty lucky.
I’ll leave you on that envious note shall I? Stay tuned for more Sydney adventures
xxooxx
grannyg
By grannyg, on June 8th, 2011 
Remember these babies? Well I’ve a few left, and need to make space. So OUT THEY GO! Madness!! Only $10!!!! That’s below cost…
you can find them here – get organised for gift giving now. Limited number of course.
Also, look out for a few upcoming blog posts. I’ve not been generating enough content for full podcasts to be recorded, but I still have the odd thing or two I’d like to share with you.
Until then!
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