How good is the Shake Shack (a famous New York fast food joint in Madison Square Park)? I don’t know. Not a clue. But, I can tell you that it is massively popular. In fact, I think it’s too popular. The picture above is a bit of the line (I couldn’t fit the whole line in the frame) at 1:30 PM on Saturday. In the time I watched, the line was moving at a rate of about one person getting served every minute. At that rate people near the back of the line would be waiting for the better part of an hour. For a burger.
Unless you are on the burger pilgrimage, this sort of dedication to a simple food product is baffling. Sometimes when you’re traveling, your need to realise that even though something is a tourist destination, that doesn’t mean it should be the be all end all of your trip. If you go to the Louvre, you don’t have to spend hours queuing to see the Mona Lisa. Trust me, it’s smaller than you think and there is plenty of other great art to see without crowds of people jostling for a better position. Same goes for the Shake Shack. I’m sure it’s good, but I bet you can find a burger that’s just as good, if not better, without the wait. Just because something is famous and a tourist destination, doesn’t mean that you have to see it. Reach out and find the next big thing. Odds are you’ll spend less time in line and more time enjoying where you are.
Growing up in the mountains, I wasn’t raised spending time on the water. As an adult, however, it’s something for which I’ve cultivated a great taste. In California I had a chance to cruise around on a motorboat, raft down the American River, and sail around the San Francisco Bay. Each activity offered it’s own thrills, but the best thing was just spending time with friends chilling on a boat. You have to work as a team to keep the boat going and at the same time do have plenty of time to just chat and relax.
The biggest challenge of course if affording the boat. I was lucky enough to be with people who either owned or had access to boats. If you’re on the road though, it can be a challenge to get yourself on a vessel. Just taking a glance at a place I would want to hire a boat – Sydney Harbour – it looks like it would cost Australian $ 550 (£300) for a half day hire in the middle of the week. I reckon though, if you were backpacking and were qualified to sail a boat, you could get other backpackers to pick up the tab for the boat if you took 5-6 people out on the water. Certainly a much handier backpacking skill to have than being able to play Hotel California.
I’ve never thought about driving to a large parking lot and having a party out of the back of my car. As such, it’s hardly surprising that the phenomenon of tailgating took me a little bit by surprise. But here on the North American U2 tour, the stadium parking lots turn into a massive series of parties, each of which is a veritable gold mine for new ONE members. It’s fantastic.
Just as every city and stadium presents a different way to sign up ONE members, I also find there are people with a variety of motives for joining. Everyone has a different reason for joining, from people who have a personal experience with extreme poverty to environmentalists to are concerned that not enough is being done to help the poor adapt to climate change. Whatever the person’s reason for joining, all it takes is a few seconds of introduction to ONE for most people to be convinced that they want to be members. And hence, I love all the tailgaters who give time (and sometimes food) to my ONE volunteers. Party on in the parking lot.
When I’ve got an hour to veg out in a hotel room I like to flick over to the Travel Channel. Today though, I was sadly disappointed with what was on: National Parks: Extreme Maintenance. Really? If you get rid of the ‘Extreme’ you’re admitting that it’s a show about cleaning national parks. The segment I saw was about cleaning up bird droppings and feathers on Alcatraz. Ew.
My ideas on travel might be a bit different from most, but this doesn’t strike me as winning travel show. In fact, it doesn’t appear that it really was a winner as I couldn’t find any mention of the show on the Travel Channel website, and only found the most obscure of references on any Discovery Channel websites. Obviously they aren’t super proud of that one. Maybe I should put together a pitch for a show.
I like the feel of Chicago, especially the way that it opens onto the water. As soon as I arrived I grabbed my running shoes for a run along the river and then down the lake front. I enjoyed the run so much that the next morning I did it again, this time with my camera. The slide show above is from that run.
