New York, New York and Cincinnati

Von nzvr4poker, 01.10.2009, 666 Aufrufe, 1 Kommentar | Kommentar hinzufügen

I am now reaching the halfway point of my North America trip. Before I know it I will be in Aruba and playing in the big tournament there. From all accounts the field could reach over 500 players and generate a prize pool of over $2.5 million US. It is exciting stuff. However, before then I am exploring the United States of America (U.S.A.).

Obviously if I was to stay in the eastern time zone, I would visit New York and Miami. This would ease my acclimatisation to the time zone and also weather patterns before arriving in Aruba. After arriving into Newark airport on Thursday, I took a bus trip to my hotel in downtown Manhattan. It was roughly 45 minutes and on the way I saw the New York City skyline. It was overwhelming. The vast amount of skyscrapers was mindboggling to a New Zealander. I mean it’s just like Buenos Aires in Argentina and Seoul in South Korea but with an American twist on things.

After walking to my hotel from the bus stop I realised just how close that I was to Times Square. There were an endless number of things that I would be able to do over the coming days. I settled into my hotel for the night and watched the college football game between Ole Miss and South Carolina. South Carolina ended up winning a close game against the number four ranked Ole Miss team.

Unfortunately, I became quite sick on Friday so spent the day resting up ahead of my big weekend of sightseeing and travel. On Saturday I wandered down to Times Square where I had a nice meal in Planet Hollywood before registering for a bus tour of the city. The tour was fairly comprehensive and I got to see the likes of the Empire State Building, the Madison Square Garden arena and the Ground Zero tribute, before hopping off to see the Statue of Liberty.

After I checked out the Statue of Liberty I walked up to the subway and caught the train back to Times Square. As I still wasn’t feeling well with a nasty cold bug, I rested up. The following day I had an early morning flight to Cincinnati. My favourite American football team – the Pittsburgh Steelers were set to take on the Cincinnati Bengals. The game wasn’t set to kick off until 4.15 pm, but the only flight I could get in order to settle in to my accommodation and make the game on time was the 8 am flight. Fortunately, it only took two hours to arrive and I got in a quick sleep before putting on my Steelers jersey and walking the short distance to the stadium.

The football stadium in Cincinnati is an architectural masterpiece. Paul Brown Stadium can seat 65,000 and even though the Bengals have been consistently bad for a while now they have sold out something like 45 home games in a row. There mustn’t be anything better to do in Cincinnati. My team got off to a great start, leading 13-0 causing the crowd to boo their home team. Cincinnati managed a field goal before half-time reducing the deficit to ten points, with Pittsburgh leading 13-3. After half-time Cincinnati managed to further reduce Pittsburgh’s lead after they intercepted a pass from the Pittsburgh quarterback, returning it for a touchdown. At that stage Pittsburgh’s was only leading the game by 13-9. However this woke Pittsburgh up from their slumber and they surged ahead further to take a 20-9 lead into the fourth quarter. Cincinnati came roaring back and with just 14 seconds left, their quarterback threw a touchdown pass for a 21-20 lead. I was stunned as all of a sudden my team were set to lose after taking an almost unassailable lead. Cincinnati added to their woes with a two point conversion and held on to win the game 23-20.

The next morning I flew back to New York where I was set to stay one more night before moving on to Miami. I chose to stay in the same hotel as its close proximity to everything was really handy. In the early afternoon I met up with my friend from New York, Cathy Brown, who had dated my cousin a few years back. It was awesome to catch up with her and we had lunch overlooking the Hudson River across to the state of New Jersey. After lunch we had some time to fill in ahead of the baseball game between the New York Yankees and the Kansas City Royals, which was starting at 7.05 pm. Cathy said that there was a place where you could hit baseballs called Chelsea Piers field house, so we headed down there. I didn’t think I would be decent at hitting so I chose the slow speed of 35 – 45 miles per hour. However, I managed to make good contact with all the balls that came out of the pitching gun. After getting some rest and a drink, we walked across to a subway station where we could take the train to the Bronx.

Yankee Stadium was truly stunning. I was blown away on the approach to the ground realising the link that the stadium had with the storied history of the Yankees baseball franchise. This year is actually the first year of use for the new Yankee Stadium, but a lot of the historical features of the old stadium have been replicated in the new one, keeping the charm and prestige of the ballpark in the new stadium. 

However, I had to wait for the start of the game as there was a rain delay of approximately two hours. After the national anthem was sung the game got underway and the stadium seemed to be fairly full with about 40,000 people taking their seats. I have to say that the food in Yankee Stadium was also the best out of all the stadiums in North America that I have been to so far, with the hot dogs being especially delicious. The stadium can hold 55,000 but as the Yankees had clinched the division title the previous night, the game was essentially a dead rubber for both teams, and this was reflected in the smaller crowd figure.

The game was scoreless for the first three innings, before the Yankees scored in the fourth, only to have the Royals even the ledger in the fifth inning. New York added a run to regain the lead 2-1 in the bottom of the fifth inning, before the teams traded runs in the sixth inning. A baseball tradition happens before the home team is due to bat in the bottom of the seventh inning. This is referred to as "The Seventh Inning Stretch" and is no different in New York where ‘God Bless America’ is sung, followed by the ground attendants dancing to the tune of Y.M.C.A while sweeping the base paths. After the entertainment, the Yankees blew the game open with five runs in that inning, and held on to win 8-2. I had really enjoyed my first live baseball game.

Tuesday was a travel day for me as I made my way to Miami. I am now here for four nights before I leave for Aruba on Saturday. I look forward to finally playing the tournament and hope that I can have a deep run and get a good result. Talk to you all soon.

Here are some photos from New York and Cincinnati.

The towering Empire State building.

A view into Ground Zero where the new Freedom Tower is being built to replace the old Twin Towers.

I paid my respects to the fallen in the 9/11 terrorism attacks.

The world famous Statue of Liberty.

The lively Times Square at night time in downtown Manhattan (one of the five boroughs of New York city).

Here I pose for a picture in my Pittsburgh Steelers jersey with a Cincinnati Bengals fan before the start of the american football game in Cincinnati.

A view of the field before the game at Paul Brown Stadium in Cincinnati.

Here I am hitting some baseballs at Chelsea Piers field house in New York.

Grand Yankee Stadium in New York before the start of the New York Yankees/Kansas City Royals game.

My friend Cathy and I at the baseball game with the Yankee Stadium field in the background.