4th of July Greenpoint Skate 2002

4th of July Greenpoint Skate 2002. July 4th 2002, by Peter Nikkel.

Skating up North on Manhattan.

This report is about the fantastic ending of a two weeks vacation in New York City and Philladelphia. A report on the previous two weeks will follow as soon as I will find time for it :-)

The day started out great, with a nice picnic in Central Park with a group of (dance) skaters. It was still very hot (100F).Just sitting in the shade caused me sweating already.

At 5:00 pm we started a skate organized by Derek. We took off at Union Square at the same place where the Wednesday Night Skate starts. The roads were quiet when we skated accross the 3rd and 1st Avenues to the Queensboro Bridge.

(click on thumbnail images for enlargements)

Note about the video's: Some player start playing back immediately, press "pause" and wait for the full video to load. Or right click and "save as ..". (MPEG version's only this time)

Queensboro Bridge.

View from the Queensboro Bridge (north).

Darci challenging an officer with a water gun.

The Queensboro Bridge has a very long ramp (bicycle track), very good for training uphill skating. I love this bridge :-) Next to the bridge you will find the Tramway (Dutch: kabelbaan) to Roosevelt Island. The police were dividing the city into sections as a safety measure, so we had to hurry up accross the bridge before they closed it. And they actually did right after we left the bridge!


Jack skating the super uphill climb..	John and Steve..	David in the new Empire skate shirt!	Delia, to fast for the cam.

Dancing Merenge

Band playing Merenge.

Arrival at Derek's place

From Long Island city we continued accross the Pulaski bridge to Greenpoint. When we entered the street where Derek lives, the hood was in party mood already. A latino band was playing Merenge in front of their house. This woke up the dance moves in us. We didn't even take the time to get rid of our skates, just dance baby!

Movie: Dancing in the street 1.9MB

BBQ

Derek was an excellent host: gallons of cool water where waiting for us. Time to eat! Derek and Kevin did a great job at the BBQ. Nice food, plenty of beer and soda's. More and more (skating and non-skating) friends entered the party.

Chef de cuisine Kevin Burgers, burgers. Everybody is having a good time.

The fireworks! :-)

After the eating we went up the roof to watch the fireworks. We had a first class view on Manhattan
right opposite of the Empire State building and exactly at the point where they set off the fireworks.
The fireworks were sponsored by Macy's, a big department store in the US. They had placed it on barges on the East River. Meanwhile, Stealth fighters protected the city in the evening sky.