In early May, on a Sunday we collected our rented bikes and set out to do the NYC 5-borough bike tour. That's 42 miles around the 5 boroughs of New York, Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island. Here's the route....
We were up bright and early to start down at Wall Street at 9am. There were about 32,000 other riders so it was a very well-organized event, if a little chaotic at the starting block...
Here we are ready to go!
The whole of 6th Avenue was closed off for the cyclists. It's hard to explain how strange it felt cycling up a street that's probably the busiest in Manhattan, with no cars, yellow cabs or anything, just pedestrians lining the street to cheer us all on. We cycled past all the sights too, up to midtown, past Rockefeller centre and Radio City hall, then up through Central Park and Harlem.
Here we are having just left Central Park...
Next we went up through the Bronx and back down into Manhattan on the FDR drive, which is the main highway that runs around the edge of Manhattan...
Once we reached the 59th Street (Queens) bridge, we were looking forward to the views as we crossed, although Sarah was ready for a chocolate fix at this point. After a quick Mars bar we were on our way across.
Cycling across the bridge was such an incredible experience! There was a rest point at the other side so we stopped to stock up on the free bagels!
The views of Manhattan were amazing...
Next was a ride through Queens and on into Brooklyn, which was a long but fairly easy ride. Luckily there aren't many hills in NY!
The motorways (highways) were the worst part, particularly the very last one as we exited Brooklyn and went into Staten island. Mostly because they were very long and tiring, with very little things to distract us!
We finally made it! Once we made it to Staten Island, we had to wait a couple of hours to get the ferry back to Manhattan with our bikes and all the thousands of other cyclists. The whole day was exhausting but so much fun and such a great way to explore the city. The worst part of it was actually our sunburn by the end!! We'll definitely be doing it again next year! Maybe with a little more practice beforehand this time!
