About two weeks ago, I made a long stopover at JFK airport. In stead of spending the whole day at the airport, I decided to go for a run around town and do some sightseeing. As my only visit to NY was while flying the other way, when I had the time to make an hour-long (or short if you wish) walk near the Empire State Building, I did not have a clue about good running places. A mail to the ultralist provided a lot of valuable feedback. Thanks go to everyone who made suggestions. In particular, a special mention goes to Mark Leuner, who provided a complete description of a running route, including a link to a map with the route. I decided to go for his suggestion.
After sunny Santiago, NY made a rather grey and drizzly impression on me. Temps went for me from 35 degrees to 35 degrees (from Celsius to Fahrenheit). Brrr.
Reaching a starting point near Brooklyn Bridge took a rather long time as the subway was interrupted by construction works. Squeezing a whole train into a shuttle bus is not a good idea, I can tell you.
After some turning around to find the best spots to snap the view on Manhattan, I crossed Brooklyn Bridge. This is one of my favorite parts of the NY run. If ever you want to do something similar, don’t skip this.
Arriving in Manhattan, I turned to the East River and followed it south to get a lousy view on Lady Liberty. I guess the view is never spectacular and a drizzly day certainly does not help to get a nice view. From the Battery I took a little downtown loop to Wall Street and Ground Zero and back to the Battery. From there on the run went north through Hudson River Park.
Hudson River Park is often merely a cycleway between a busy road and the water, but it offers some pleasant running. At 68th St, I headed east towards Central Park and made a loop around the park. There, rain started to fall and the rest of the run I would have to face a pouring rain.
Central Park is certainly not my favorite place. It gives me such an artificial impression and is so crowded… But that might be up to personal taste. After Central Park I added a big loop south towards Times Square. The people on the ultralist had advised doing this as it would be too crowded. It involved some slaloming, but rain probably had thinned the crowds somewhat. It was fun for once. After that I turned towards the Chrysler Building (just say oh and go on) and the UN headquarters (nothing interesting). From there on I ran back north, crossed Central Park once more and headed west towards the West Side YMCA, where I hoped to take a shower. It was funny to see that after a few hours of rain Central Park was entirely deserted. Those New Yorkers must be softies. In the end I decided that I was running out of time and jumped in the subway back to JFK. A quick wash in the airport toilets had to do the job. Fortunately I almost do not sweat with those temps.
I have a map with the (simplified) track as I logged it. The total length of the track is about 30 miles, but as it is rather jumpy (lots of urban canyons) that sounds like a serious overestimation of my running distance. Spending lots of time taking pictures and looking around it took me somewhat less than five hours.
All pictures that I took during the run can be found on Picasa, at the end of the album, starting from this picture.
In conclusion, I loved this way of discovering NY. According to me the nicest running is along the rivers. Central Park is too artificial and crowded according to me. Running along some of the legendary places in the inner town is funny, but I guess you should only do that once. Unfortunately, an unasphalted running surface seems hard to find. I didn’t see any apart from the bridleway in Central Park.
Too bad I won’t have a lot of time when I am changing planes again at JFK in two months on my way to FHSP. I would have loved to discover the city a bit further.