Here’s my response to “What is the most interesting thing you’ve done as a Local Guide?” for the Connect Live 2020 Application.
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**We exited Port Authority expecting a gentle segue from New Jersey into New York City. But oh!- how wrong we were. As we crossed the gates, BAM! - we’re front and centre in the throbbing heart that is NYC. The city that never sleeps. In front of us, the enormous New York Times building loomed. I fretted about how we’d navigate ourselves in this concrete jungle.
As we had just landed in the States, we did not have a working network connection on any of our smartphones. We were planning to get one at the airport, but since we were trying to catch the bus to the city, we abandoned that idea and decided to improvise as we went. Luckily we were heading to New York City, and we’d heard that the vast WiFi system covered almost all streets. (My next goal is to make an extensive list of reliable WiFi spots in NYC, but that’s a story for another time!)
So as we gradually absorbed the sights, sounds and smells that the Big Apple had on offer, we came up with an action plan to cover the most number of places in two days. Which was all the time we had until our return flight to Chicago the day after. We had to act fast! So we headed straight to the nearest McDonald’s, grabbed a frappe, and linked up to the WiFi. Being the only Local Guide in the lot, meant I had to take command.
Soon, I had my idea laid out. We would all split up from here, all seven of us, and walk as far as we could, keeping an eye out for worthy attractions to cover. It was risky, of course, in case we got lost. But I assured them that they could almost always get on the WiFi at any time and check on our live locations. I also told them to download the offline map of Manhattan for added safety. I further instructed that it was crucial we then added these worthy attractions to the “DIY Walking in Manhattan” List I had created on Google Maps. That way, by the end of the day, we would have a decent list of attractions to visit. I pinned Grand Central Terminal as our rendezvous point. ( I was hugely delighted to find that Madagascar, the animated movie, had a scene in Grand Central Terminal! )
The plan worked! We had split up at 10 AM. There were some scares as we got lost in the alleyways quite a number of times. But then we soon got the hang of it. We noticed on the offline maps that the alleys, row wise, were called streets and those, column-wise were called avenues. The renowned 5th Avenue, would be the median, splitting the streets up as East and West and the numbering went up one by one across the blocks. We were suddenly a lot more confident, thanks to Google Maps. After covering miles on foot, block by block, we eventually covered the entirety of Manhattan. We rejoined at 6PM at the rendezvous point, with huge satisfaction. Our list was complete!
The next day, our last in NYC, would then be spent covering up on the other attractions my mates had added to the list. Of course, between stops we would load up on the oh-so-delicious $1 Pizza slices, which were in every street you looked at. Some interesting finds on our list included the Friends apartment (We were huge fans of Friends), the Charging Bull, a canoe spot at 42nd Pier and Brooklyn Bridge, an amazingly Insta-worthy spot.
PS: Being a petrol head, I had come across the gem of my visit, Manhattan’s car showroom district, north of Hell’s Kitchen. Between W 51st and W 55th Streets were an assortment of showrooms for me to cherish, as I visited each and every one of them, feasting my senses on Lamborghinis, Porsches, Audis and the like.
My six mates were not happy when they realised I’d added all of them to the DIY Walking in Manhattan list!
This was a short recount of our quaint little visit to Manhattan, and on such a tight schedule as well as budget, we had managed to cover almost everything. I can surely say that this local story wouldn’t have been possible without Maps! Thank you Google!
