Randomly exploring New York City on foot, walking until you can’t walk no more, you realize that you haven’t come far towards the end of a day. There is always something to discover round each block or peaking round a distant corner, forcing you to change direction or scrap plans or make you keep going.
United Nations
Maybe not your typical city break destination, but I wanted to see the United Nations, only to find a rather unspectacular looking building flanked by international flags. I am not sure what I had expected to see, but in hindsight I really like the 39 storey high Secretariats Building, which is only a small part at the centre of the complex.
Until I started researching the architecture of Chicago, I had no idea what a “curtain wall” was. This building designed by Oscar Niemeyer and Le Corbusier was the first in New York City to utilize this type of non structural façade covering
Columbus Circle
At the time we explored New York City mostly on foot, we only made it as far as Columbus Circle. It was on my list because I loved, and still do, the original Ghostbusters movies. This is where the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man begins his cheerful rampage in the 1984 movie.
As we flew home before the New York Marathon took place on the first sunday in November 1992, we never got to see the spectacle, only the flags scattered around the city. Could we have stayed, we may have seen Frank Lebow, the founder of the Marathon run (or rather walk) his last course to celebrate his 60th birthday after he had been diagnosed with brain cancer. He died two years later and had completed a total of 69 marathons world-wide.
When the first New York Marathon took place in 1970 only a handful of people ran around Central Park. Over the years it grew to be the largest Marathon in the world and the course was expanded to cover all five boroughs of New York.