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The Empire State building changes it lights nearly every night to commemorate some person or anniversary. While the Olympics has been on they had different lights on each side of the building representing countries flags.

We can see the east and south sides from our window but this photo from Twitter shows it in better detail.

© @isardsorensen

On Saturday the city had the second of three Saturdays in August where they hold Summer Streets and they close Park Avenue to regular traffic all the way from 72nd Street right down to near the Brooklyn Bridge.

On my newly acquired bike I set off over the Manhattan Bridge and managed to navigate my way down near the bottom onto the closed road. I've done it once before when I was here for summer and although it's definitely better if you take your time and take in the sights you don't normally get to see from the road, on this occasion I had to get up to Central Park before the road re-opened at 1pm.

I was later in leaving as that morning we finally got cable tv installed in our flat!

You have to keep your wits about you as the streets are full of people walking, running, skateboarding, roller blading, all ages biking and the usual unicycle sighting. Plus the usual idiot on a bike trying to race through the whole thing at speed.

© http://www.particularityblog.com

After a bit of a break and then another lap of Central Park, I headed over to the Westside Greenway.

The inaugural NYC Ironman triathlon was taking place. It started at 7am so around 3pm the winner was heading towards the finish. Most of it took place over the Hudson in upstate NY into the Palisades before they ran the mile long George Washington Bridge back into Manhattan.

I guess it's a big event with qualification for the Kona event available but I was still surprised to see the finish setup, complete with large finish spectator gantry and helicopter tv footage beamed onto a big screen.

I finished the day with a cycle back down the Westside and stopped for a couple of pics at the USS Intrepid. The Space Shuttle that was carried to NY a few weeks ago is now stationed under a bubble canopy on the deck.

After all that, I was out in the sun for five hours total. Just over three and a half hours cycling for about 40 Miles. Sunburnt arms and totally shattered! Too much sun.

Mumfords in NJ

One of Heather's favourite bands is Mumford and Sons. We recently went to their opening US tour gig across the Hudson River in Hoboken, New Jersey.

Held on a pier just across the water from midtown Manhattan made it pretty unique.

There were great views from the pier to lower Manhattan too, including the sun setting on the new One World Trade Centre develoment.

While waiting the FOUR hours before the main act came on, there was passing entertainment in the form of one of the big cruise ships heading past. The people on one of the ferries to the nearby terminal were waving to us too.

Once the sun had set the Mumfords came on and they were really good. They're not totally my cup of tea but they did sound amazing and the crowd seemed to love them and know most of the songs too.

Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Something we have had on our to do list for a while is to visit the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens.
Neither of us had been before and Tuesdays are free admission. So now that Heather's work exam is out of the way we decided to head out of the house for around FIVE hours in the 95ºF sun. And yes, I did get a little more sunburn.

The gardens are 102 years old and sit back to back with the Brooklyn Museum and guess what they have in their car park....

Thankfully we did stop halfway round for some lunch and to refill our water bottles.

They also had some cool (not temperature-wise) pavilions so we jokingly went inside for a couple of minutes into the desert zone, the tropical zone and the warm temperate zone as outside wasn't obviously hot enough for us.

They had some thistles, which I've also actually seen in the scrub between the trees opposite our house!

The best part though, was probably the Japanese garden complete with its carp & turtle laden pool.

Like all good school english stories I'll finish it by saying "a fun day was had by all".

You're getting hotter... you're getting cold

On Wednesday around 11am I went for a run around the nearby Prospect Park.

I ran about 15mins, felt okay... in the shade of the trail, but when I came out down the far side of the park and had to do more out in the open I really started to feel the heat.

I could feel that these were the hottest conditions I've run in! My heart rate monitor really gives you an idea of how hard you are exercising compared to normal... as if I didn't know. But the numbers were extraordinarily high.

Normally I could cruise (jog) along at 150bpm but when I was forced into walking every three minutes, and after each stop at the water fountains my HR was sitting at 155. When I started to run again, despite trying to go slow now, it jumped right up into the high 180's!

So I ended up jog/walking the last 30 mins of the run. Even funnier was stretching my calves outside the house (134bpm), walking up the three flights of stairs (165bpm), then coming inside and trying to untie my shoes (191bpm). A delayed reaction to the stair climb plus the heat inside the kitchen.

Unknown to me it was nearly 100 degrees outside! Although I must be acclimatising somewhat, as I've found myself thinking at times "It's okay, it's just 75º".

Then at the back of 4pm the sky darkened and all hell broke loose. Thunder, lightning and torrential rain. The weather website made for a funny picture.

So basically it dropped 17º but was still 20º!

Then because of the storm the next day was a lot cooler. Indeed, I read that the high temperature in Central Park was 76º which was the first time since June 26th it hadn't hit at least 80ºF.

Then on Friday, the most complete polar opposite in one persons body reaction to weather happened.

I finally bought a new bike! Tracked down the one I was after away up on West 81st street in Manhattan. I paid for it, was just away to leave and the sky just opened and started more rain of biblical proportions. To be fair it had been darkening with a chance of rain but c'mon!!

Once I realised it wasn't going to stop I just went for it.

I've never (at least not for along time) felt so cold on a bike. By the time I was halfway down Manhattan I was shivering.

I've also never seen Central Park, the Manhattan Bridge or Brooklyn Bridge park so quiet!

The prescription insert in my Adidas eyewear started misting up too. Of course by this time the glasses themselves were covered in water and I couldn't see out of them anyway! So I took them off and cycled a few blocks without being able to see, oh yes. At nearly 4pm on a Friday of course it was practically rush hour traffic too.

After I deemed that too dangerous I stopped and thankfully found putting the cap that I had with me on under the cycle helmet and then putting back on my regular glasses was alright to continue.

Took me 1 hour 40 mins to get home and then ring all the water out of my t-shirt, socks, etc and empty my shoes out.

Of course, you can't just chuck your stuff in the washing machine either. And because it was Friday, the washing is now held over to Monday as the weekend is apparently far too busy a time to go to the laundrette unless you get there by 8am.

Other than that excitement, my final resident paperwork is posted and I have been job searching in the hope I have something lined up by the time I am actually allowed to sign up for work somewhere.

We also went to see a gig on Tuesday, Delta Rae. Not 100% my cup of tea, but amazing voices and a couple of really good songs including a brilliant Fleetwood Mac cover version (The Chain). Read Heather's music blog for a gig report.

I only mention them in case they go on to be massive and I want it noted we seen them before they were big.

Ooohh Ahhhh

Last Saturday to celebrate some friends turning 30 I was invited to play paintball!

It was all the way across the other side of Staten Island which meant getting to the Staten Island Ferry for 9am. The ferry is free and is noted in guide books as a cheaper way to get a decent view of the Statue of Liberty than paying for the normal tourist boat cruises.

Plus the trip meant I got a good view of the fifth borough and the one I'd never visited properly. The bus from the ferry terminal to the paintball venue took around 50 minutes, which was okay going there as you could see the contrasting housing on the island. Massive mansions, proper american houses with yards and normal New York style flats and 'dodgier' areas.

We played on & off for about three hours. It was in the high 80's but mostly shaded. I wore my heart rate monitor as I was interested to see what my HR would be, plus the calorie count.

I've played before and know how the adrenaline of the situation really pushes your HR up.

So I averaged 156, what I would do for an easy run, maxed at over 200, and burned 2000 calories, ha ha. Our referee did compliment me on my stealthiness though!

The return journey to the ferry on the bus, not so nice. A quick march to the bus as they only come once an hour, followed by a tired, dirty, sweaty trip back, counting our bruises and then a change of clothing in the ferry terminal toilet.

Just like the end of The Dark Knight

That's how you live here though. I hate it. No time to go home, just onwards for food and drinks at a bar in the nearby financial district. Worse when it's in the sticky 80's and you feel so grubby.

Finally I got home at around 10pm for a shower and to check out my wicked bruises.

The best one... of seven

A short hike

Last week, myself, Heather and two of her friends went on a hike. One of her friends is possibly doing a Kilimanjaro trek next year so needed to try out some new boots. Plus I get out of the house and get to see another new part of America!

We hired a car and drove the 50miles from the centre of Manhattan to the Bear Mountain area. This involved heading over the George Washington Bridge into New Jersey, up the Palisades and back into New York state.

Bear Mountain Bridge

We parked at the Fort Montgomery State Historic Site car park and once we'd found where the start of the route was, it was fairly straight forward. I even remembered how to read a map.

But what with everything being back to front in this country, I found out that the dotted line on the map turned out not be a thin wooded trail like back home, but instead a larger forestry road.

Short and steep was the order of the day:

© http://www.nycdayhiking.com

Popolopen footbridge

The footbridge was all smashed up from the last storm in the area but luckily the water was low enough and there were enough stones to make our way across while staying dry.

Once over the water it was a fairly steep climb but really enjoyable. Bone dry rock but even had to use my hands a lot to pull myself up. Once we got to the top the view was superb.

The same bridge we were level with at the start

As the area has some old forts and historic battlegrounds, there is a cairn at the top in memory of fallen comrades.

Plus it borders the US West Point Military Academy so we could hear gunfire from the top of the hill away in the distance.

The weather was again, really hot and sunny but luckily there was so much shade on the route otherwise I would have struggled. I took a litre of water with me, but we had to stop at some guys house in the woods on the way down to refill our bottles. When you start to run low on water and are a little dehydrated it's really easy to see how you just want to pour all of it over your face.

For the whole route I've never seen so much wildlife under your feet. Centipedes, tonnes of those big daddy long leg type spiders, ants. Even seen the tail of a snake slither away under a rock. A big hawk circling the top of the hill. But the big winner on the day was this guy right by the side of the road.

Independence Day

The weather has been so hot and sunny during the day and it means that nearly every night you get these red-ish skies as the sun sets.

Every so often in Scotland you get a "red sky at night, shepherd's delight" kinda moment but it's pretty much like this every night at the moment.

This was taken from our window (with a powerful zoom ;) looking across to Manhattan with the new World Trade Centre buildings under construction on the left hand side.

Yesterday was the national holiday for some kind of independence from some other country or something.

We just spent it downstairs with the neighbours having a BBQ and then when the fireworks started at the back of nine we went up on our roof. They used to be on the East River but unfortunately they moved the celebrations over onto the Hudson this year, we still got a reasonable view though.

In other news, my paperwork is FINALLY ready to roll. My new cv is just undergoing the finishing touches and after a lot longer wait than I thought, I can get in touch with the real world again, and get a job.... somewhere.