The weather forecast for Saturday and Sunday in New York was rain. No problem. Rainy days are perfect for visiting museums and New York City has plenty of them. We bought tickets good for five days on a double-decker sightseeing bus - one that had a clear roof so that we could see and not get wet if it was raining.
Two things I didn't count on. 1. The ear buds they gave you so you could listen to the pre-recorded tour information were barely long enough to plug in. Every time Mark moved, my ear bud came out. (I was only using one because using both of them made it too loud.) Mark couldn't use the ear buds at all because he would have to remove his hearing aids and he hadn't brought the container for them. 2. It was raining so hard that you couldn't really see anything. And you'd think that you should be able to see something the size of the Empire State Building! It also didn't help that the recording may have been a bit out of sync with where we were. Traffic can be quite variable, after all. But we went around again on a day with no rain and it made all the difference in the world. But it still wasn't that great for Mark because he wasn't getting the background information - like Macy's being the largest department store in the world. (If I hadn't told him, he might still think it was Harrod's.) So I had to double as a tour guide, pointing out Macy's the Flatiron building, the Apollo Theater, etc.
We take a tour bus in any city we visit to get an idea of the things we'd like to see more of and get our bearings. All in all, New York is a very walk-able city. In fact, you can probably walk to your destination (in Manhattan) just about as fast as you can take a cab, depending on how far you're going. When our bus passed the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Saturday, we noticed that there was a line that snaked all the way outside. We decided we'd get there early on Sunday. We would skip the bus tour because it would take us all around the park before arriving at the museum. We'd decided to walk. We had a vague concept of where it was - we knew it was on one side of the park so we set off on foot to find it.
Before we got there, it started raining. Not one of those fine misty rains like you get in London but a torrential downpour - more like what we're used to in Texas. And when it rains like that in Texas, we stay home unless it's just something we have no choice about.
Mark always says that there's no such thing as "the wrong weather", only the wrong clothes. He has a PG Field waxed duster and a wide brimmed hat. This is probably "right" for rain. On the other hand, I had a down coat - knee length - but designed to keep out cold. Not quite as effective with rain. It was water repellent and all the rain rolled off it and straight on to my pants, which quickly became soaked from the knees down. And somehow, water was getting in on my arms. Mark had on waterproof hiking boots. I have a pair of rain boots, but they were in my closet at home. (I didn't want to overpack!) I had on running shoes and they were soaked through, as were my socks. The faux fur collar on my coat was soaked through and dripping everywhere. We can probably sum it up by saying I was miserable! And to make it worse, I was not convinced that Mark was leading us in the right direction. (Let's just say he has a history of leading me astray.)
When he realized that I was essentially soaked to the bone, he decided that we should abandon the museum and go back to the hotel to put on dry clothes, even though we should have been very close to the museum. Initially I resisted - Had I come that far and become that soaked for nothing? At that moment, I didn't care if I got sick and died but he was opposed to that idea. In the end, I gave up and we hailed a cab and returned to the hotel. It was easy to change clothes and shoes but I did have to wait several hours for my coat to dry out.
It is possible that Mark is right about clothes and weather. However, if there are "right" clothes for that kind of weather I don't own them. Nor do I want to own them. I will be happy to minimize my time out in the weather.
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