Mayhem in The City

Thursday, September 19th.
Interior.
Evening at a KOA campground some 70 miles north of New York City. In the tv lounge two guys are putting the room to use -- lounging -- in front of the tv, watching a re-run of the last "Friends" episode from the previous season. While typing away on a laptop at the same time...

We woke up this morning just as the morning shoppers started to pull into the parking lot. So we headed out of there and drove half a mile down the road to a boardwalk down by the beach. We decided to get comfortable for our breakfast so we pulled out the couch and parked it right on the boardwalk :) And had our breakfast while enjoying the view of southern Newark and Staten Island across the river.

After that we decided to just charge into the unknown and drive into New York City. Jens got the behind-the-wheel honors. We marvelled at the no-rules driving around us on the highway and finally discovered why all these suburban commuters drive huge SUVs; it's so that they can simply drive straight over the cement dividers between the express lane and the other lanes if they miss their exit. Amazing! :)

We made it through the Lincoln Tunnel into town and then dove head first into the NYC downtown traffic. It was nuts; a dangerous cocktail of trucks, commuters and death-wish cab drivers weaving in and out of each other without any regard for the lane dividers painted on the road. And honking furiously at anyone hesitating even a split second before starting up when a traffic light turned green. We realized that this was not our game and pulled into the nearest parking lot, thinking that we would take a walk around to get oriented. "Goodmorning gentlemen," the parking lot attendant said in a kind voice, "that'll be $16 for half an hour -- $8 for parking and an $8 fee for an oversize vehicle." Hookaaay, we thought -- maybe parking wasn't the way to go either!

So we decided to employ the drive-by drop-off tactic instead. Dan jumped out of the van in mid-traffic and Jens circled the block (or rather 3 blocks, because all the streets are one way) while Dan ran an errand. The first mission brought back a huge pile of brochures and info about the city from the Times Square Visitor's Center. The next expedition went to a hostel to hear about prices and vacancies. A dorm bed would cost us $36 per person, plus we'd have to find a place to park the van overnight, which would be some astronomical figure that we didn't even want to think about. And by the looks of things we wouldn't be using it for downtown driving anyway. On top of everything, while Jens was circling the block the van all of a sudden -- of all the places in the world! -- started to run irregularly and then shut off. Again. So we decided to just take the quickest road right back out of town.

That turned out to be a slightly nerve-wrecking experience. The van ran irregularly all the way back to the Lincoln Tunnel. And then in the middle of the tunnel -- a hundred feet beneath the Hudson River -- the power brakes stopped working. Perfect.

We managed to get out of there alive, though, and took the first exit off the highway to get the van off the road and let it (and ourselves) cool down a bit. We were also running low on gas so we filled the tank and then drove across the street to have lunch at McDonald's while the van took a rest.

Staying in the city seemed to be a no-go. So we called the KOA in Newburgh, NY, to hear if they had room for us. They did, so we decided to head up there. The van started up fine and the brake worked again. So we agreed that perhaps it just didn't like the city driving and just got a little overheated. So we would give it a chance to make it up to us before taking it to a garage again.

The drive north along the coast of the Hudson River was just gorgeous! We played it safe & scenic and took the highway all the way instead of the interstate. But the van ran without a problem.

We checked into the campground, which looked to promise a very pleasant stay, and spent the evening relaxing and unwinding. Our only off-site expedition was a trip to Taco Bell for dinner. We spent the rest of the evening watching sit-coms in the tv-lounge and then going to bed early, only to spend all night talking and not getting the rest we needed for the following day's adventures. Oh well :)