Rockaway

A 20 plus mile bike ride today to Rockaway Park, a neighborhood on the Rockaway Peninsula in the NYC boro of Queens. (I’ve heard this is the largest urban beach area in the U.S.) Great start to the day, beautiful blue sky, however two flats before we even left Central Park. Not that anyone can help having a flat so we were all patient and finally we left the park through a little morning traffic. We took the Riverside Park bike path south to make our way east to the Manhattan Bridge. All calm. All good.

Then as we made our way east, the maddening rush hour traffic intensified as we approached Chinatown. If you have ever been to Chinatown you know that street traffic in this area is CRAZY. Yep, right in the middle of CRAZY was yours truly, dodging the elderly who just happened to cross the street right in front of… an oncoming bike, street vendors who can’t see over their carts, therefore oblivious to… an oncoming bike, people going thousands of different directions with cars honking and no one paying attention… to an oncoming bike. Yes, I’m the oncoming bike! I practiced my deep breathing and said my prayers.

Finally a little bit of peace as we crossed over the Manhattan Bridge only to be plunked right in the middle of more maddening rush hour traffic in downtown Brooklyn. The nerves were about shot at that point, but I persevered and soon we were in a calm neighborhood setting headed for the beach. Why did it seem to be getting colder and where was all the cloud cover coming from? Did I feel a drop of rain?

Perfect timing for a nice lunch at the Wharf, a neighborhood pub right on the water with long distance views of Manhattan. If you really look you can see the city in the distance in the photo. It seems winter set in as we ate lunch. So it didn’t take much convincing me to take the hour plus subway ride back to Manhattan. Home by late afternoon and what I really needed was a massage to eliminate the tension, but instead I settled for a nice long warm shower. Ahh…tranquility of the Gotham Den. Nice.