An early start today, we needed to be uptown at the eye doctors by 8.30. We made the now familiar trip quite easily, walk to 42nd street subway, catch the shuttle to Grand Central, catch the 6 train to 77th street, walk two blocks. 

I saw the same orthoptist again who did the usual drops and 20 questions. 

We also chat about different things as she goes about her business. Today we discussed Paris, Weber BBQs, thanksgiving and car racing. Last week we talked about travel to Australia, vacation leave laws in the USA and Australia and extreme sports. Our conversations are short, but we cover a lot of ground. 

After a short wait I was ushered in to see Dr Nissen. He was his jovial and good natured self. He was just back from a conference and indicated a cure for my right eye was on its way, perhaps for my 65th birthday. We chatted about his foundation, fund raising and eye treatment and care in general. As he peered into my eye I waited for the tell tale ‘hmmmm’ or ‘oh dear’, but non came. He sat back and said it all looks good. There was still a little frayed retina at the very edges which we needed to watch, but the main tears had been repaired and were holding well. He suggested another visit on Friday and perhaps some more laser to finalise the minor tears at the edge. The good news is normal activity can resume, which is great given we’ve got a play, Misery with Bruce Willis tomorrow night and Bill Joel on Thursday. Plus a couple of walking tours and some more shopping to do!  

We finished at the doctors quite quickly and decided to he’d way downtown and walk the high line. So we jumped on a train at 77th and headed to 14th. We arrived about 30 minutes later and walked along 14th for a couple of kilometres, stopping into a couple of stores along the way and finding an old style diner for breakfast.

Mardi had poached eggs and I had a quesadilla the size of a small country. Yum. 

We continued on our way, walking through Chelsea markets as we made our way to the high line. We stopped in to anthropology, a great little store and then picked up a litre of chocolate milk, our favourite milk in NYC. The milk is from Ronny Brooke Farm and is like drinking liquid chocolate mousse. Yum. Yum. 

We made it to the high line starts on Gansevoort street, just below 13th. We walked to about 24th before getting off and making our way further down town to the world trade centre precinct. The sun was continuing to shine and the weather was perfect. We caught the subway into the WTC area and walked around a bit spending some time in in the grave yard at St Pauls Chapel. We were less than 500 metres from where the original towers were, yet the church remained undamaged. Amazing. 

We walked across to ground zero and sat and reflected for a little while. We couldn’t not notice the very very heavy police presence. From cars and paddy wagons, to full swat vans and fully armed police. A very strong show of visible strength. 

Mardi sat for a while and I walked around for a bit. 

We left the area for some retail therapy and popped into Century 21, a dodgy souvenir store and Aroma Cafe for a hot chocolate, although they’d run out! We headed back up town by using the walkway between chambers and park place subway stations. Wow! What a labyrinth. We thought Times Square was confusing. At least five flights of steps, some up and others down. Two,long walks along platforms, corridors and tunnels. We eventually made the transition and boarded an express train uptown. After boarding the train, we were back at 42nd street in about Ten minutes. It was worth the effort doing the transition downtown. 

We arrived home just before dark. I went out again a little later to take some photos before we had dinner in and fu is he’d a massive day. 18000 steps, or so, the Fitbit tells me.

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