We caught the subway from Bergen Street down to Coney Island on the Atlantic Coast. The day was cool and pleasant and as the train travelled along its overhead tracks we could watch the endless, grimy suburbs of Brooklyn roll past.
The once-fabled Coney Island has fallen on hard times these days and is shabby and derelict. Many of the old rides that generations of New Yorkers played on have fallen into disrepair. We walked from the subway up to the Boardwalk that runs along the beach for several kilometres and paddled in the cold water of the Atlantic Ocean where it washes up onto the pale orange sand of America. As we walked, we watched tat vendors vainly trying to sell souvenirs to tourists and a cop rounding up a collection of truants.
We visited the New York Aquarium, which had some very good displays of tropical fish and marine mammals, but it was so crowded with groups of screaming schoolchildren that it was hard to enjoy the displays. We lunched on hot dogs and fries at the famous Nathan’s Hot Dog Joint. The food was absolutely revolting: soggy and tasteless, and in fact almost inedible. I gave most of mine to a dosser on the street outside. The only funny part of the meal at Nathan’s was a wheezing mustard dispenser, which didn’t yield any mustard initially, and coughed up a huge gob of the stuff, smothering my chilli cheese dog with yellow goo. Back at Cobble Hill, we spent a couple of hours at the Bagel Point Café.
CurseOfTheTraveller 