Day three we took a break from public transportation and took a trip to my motherland. The Bronx is just a ferry ride and about a dozen train stops or so away, but by car, we’re looking at an hour and a half adventure across bridges and highways and parkways and traffic MY GOD THE TRAFFIC. I want to cry just thinking about it.
When you visit New York, you don’t really think about The Bronx as a must see destination. It’s got a pretty bad rap, even though it’s where hip-hop was born. Hahaha, sorry, dad jokes are getting more potent and harder to contain as I get older. The Bronx is a melting pot in its own, with so many pockets of so many cultures and nationalities, it’s like the United Nations in the form of a city. And a big city at that. The Bronx is enormous, home to the largest zoo in the U.S. – The Bronx Zoo – which was literally a 10 minute walk from where I grew up. The New York Botanical Gardens, a stone’s throw away from the zoo, was another glorious place full of beauty and tranquility. My father used to sneak us in through a hole in the side gate, and we would walk a bit till we found a small natural waterfall in the Gardens. Yeah, you can visit Manhattan and be fine never venturing off of it, but you’ll be doing yourself a disservice. You shouldn’t be afraid of The Bronx. Well, no, you should be afraid of some neighborhoods, particularly after dark. But overall, it’s an experience in itself that I’m proud to call home.
If you’re a fan of Anthony Bourdain – which, if you’re not, promptly X out of my blog here and never tell me because I will judge you – he dedicated an episode to The Bronx. Parts Unknown, his show on CNN which currently has a few seasons on Netflix, focused on it in season 2, episode 4. I managed to find somewhere that has it available to watch, so you can do so here. Netflix unfortunately doesn’t have season 2 available anymore. But it’s a great episode if you want to know more about the rich culture of the borough. He said something during it that made so much sense and is 100% truth:
“If the Bronx were a neighborhood in Manhattan, sort of shrunk down, you’d have hipsters crawling all over this place.”
Ok, obviously, I can talk about The Bronx for an entire post. But that’s not what this is about. Oh yeah, speaking of The Bronx, know why it’s called “The” Bronx? Back before the borough had a name, they were trying to figure out what to call it. They looked at the map and noticed The Bronx River was flowing all the way through it. The river – named after Jonas Bronck, a Scandinavian who died after settling on a farm which was located next to the river – was the determining factor in naming the borough. They changed it from “ck” to “x” though to make it easier to pronounce. So there you go. The Bronx is named after a river (which was named after a man), which is why it gets “The” before the name.
OK seriously, back to the trip. We took the cars because both families went and where we were going no subways reached. City Island is a glorious mecca of seafood nestled deep at the end of Pelham Parkway. I used to go there all the time as a kid and I never took advantage of it. I remember it being a lot bigger though.
It’s roughly the size of a cafeteria, but my childhood memory remembered it being the size of a mall food court. Still though, it’s great, fresh seafood. Fried shrimp, clam chowder, fish, lobster, clams, corn on the cob, fries. So much awesomeness and tastiness. And some ice cream to top it off too. Thick and rich, and approved by the youngest.
A big part of the experience is taking leftover fries – all the soggy ones that no one liked to eat – and going out to the edge of the water and feeding the seagulls.
I remember doing this as a kid and having a blast tossing the fries and watching the birds catch it in midair. They would swarm and cause chaos for those fries.
Unfortunately rules changed and there’s signs every few feet warning to not feed the birds. We didn’t want to test the waters. Hehe.
Another thing I used to love doing is putting a quarter in the binocular things that let you see all the way across the water to the other island. Only problem is that when I was a kid you can barely see anything out of them, so I can only imagine what they looked like now.
We left there with the intention of going deeper into The Bronx. We were going to go to Pelham Parkway, my old neighborhood, to get some John & Joe’s Pizza. This used to be our number one stop anytime we came to New York. By far, still to this day, the best NY style pizza I’ve ever had. Sure I might be bias considering I grew up a 2 minute walk from it, but still, it’s great. Sadly, we didn’t get to go over there. But, we WERE going to head to S&S Cheesecake.
Now, this place. Lemme tell you about this place. It’s the absolute, most bestest, creamiest, richest, most velvety cheesecake you’ll ever have. Follow the link above and you’ll be able to order yourself one for anywhere from $30 – $50 without shipping! In person, a small one is just $10 though so make the trip if you’re there. Again, while living in NY, I have no idea how my parents did not keep this stocked in the fridge at all times. I don’t know how it is now because we never made it there, but before the storefront for S&S was legit a brick wall with a door. That pic you see here is not mine, but that’s how it looked last time we were there. The first time I took the wife to get a cheesecake she thought she was going die. It looks like something out of a mob movie, where you go in thinking it’s a cheesecake bakery and you accidentally walk in on a drug deal and everyone in suits and gold chains turns around and looks at you as you ponder all the wrong choices you made leading up to that moment. MAN, I wish we just went. We didn’t though. It would’ve put us an hour out of the way even though it was measley 9 miles away. Little did we know what was in store for us as we left City Island.
We made a plan. We were going to go back to Staten Island, get the kids ready for bed, and leave them there with my sis and her fam while the wife and I went back out to the city in the evening. It would’ve been a long night for us but we rather have done that than go into the city the next day – the 4th of July – to do what we needed to do before heading home on the 5th. According to maps, it was going to take us 1.5 hours to get back to Staten Island thanks to traffic.
We WISHED it took that long.
We were stuck in traffic for FOUR HOURS. Four grueling, tortuous hours that had our tempers and rage at all sorts of levels. My sis and her hubs who left the parking lot a mere 4 minutes before us, were also following the GPS, and told us they were also in traffic. But decided to just follow their NY Jedi senses and turn off the directions and go back ways.
They made it home in about 2 hours. Meanwhile, I was getting cut off in midtown by Jersey and Boston drivers, trying to get into the Holland Tunnel. The wife finally figured out an alternate route as we made it to an intersection that took us 45 minutes to get to from the previous intersection. Good thing too because I would’ve freaked the eff out being stuck in that type of traffic while in the Holland Tunnel. Ever seen Daylight? A 1996 Sylvester Stallone flick which had him saving a bunch of people who were trapped in the Holland Tunnel after an explosion. Reeeeeeeeally good movie, I remember loving it a bunch. Sure it probably doesn’t hold up at all but whatever, it was great. Viggo Mortensen was in it to. Ugh, now I want to watch it. Anyway, really didn’t want to live it so yeah. And all that because I missed a turn because I was admiring the One World Trade Center we were passing. Yeah, that’s city life for you. Miss a turn and it sets you back 1.5 hours. Go me.
We made it home, finally. We drove and drove and more and more traffic. We saw the Seaport District, Brooklyn Bridge, Wall Street, so at least it was scenic. We got on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and I discovered that I have a DEATHLY fear of suspension bridges. Holy. Crap. I was like sweet, lets ride on the top level. Got up there, looked up at the tall towers seemingly touching the skies, and then below at the water that seemed so far that my hands are sweating just thinking about it as I’m typing. Seriously, while driving on it and discovering my newly found fear, my hands had sweat on them that I haven’t felt in ages. I tried getting the wife to take a picture and she refused to even look out the window. I was there screaming at people who DARED to change lanes as if we couldn’t fall to our death at any moment. Ok, I need to stop, I might pass out thinking about it.
It was too late to do anything after we made it back so we had to venture into the city on the 4th like we didn’t want to do. At least we had some good fried shrimp in our bellies. Or… memories, since we were hungry again after being in traffic for so long. Until the next and final NYC post!
Boy Oh Boy, I sure miss all those NY places. My young play grounds were Long Island. Lived all over it and loved it back then. Was born in Port Jefferson . This was back in the 40’s and 50’s when things were less crowded. Happy days to you, Betty