Memorable moment: New York City ‘Snow Day’

‘Memorable moments’ are those travel memories of a time, a place or an experience that stick with you and bring a smile to your face years later. Here on the blog, the ‘Memorable Moments’ series is like a set of postcards on the fridge – each one a snapshot and the short story about what made that moment memorable.

In 2015, I will be opening this series up to guest bloggers of any genre. If you have a memorable travel moment you would like to feature, shoot me an email or leave a comment below and I can add you to the schedule. You will need to provide one reasonably good quality photograph (can be watermarked), a story of 200-400 words which describes that moment, and a short bio and link your blog.  

New York City Snow Day

Snow Day in New York

Dateline: 19 December 2008

For years I had dreamed of spending a white Christmas in New York City – Bing Crosby had a lot to answer for. Finally, in 2008 we were in New York at Christmas time. But the ‘white’ part was up to the weather gods. I wasn’t that fussed about whether the snow fell on the big day itself, I just wanted it at some point during the festive week.

On the morning of 19 December, we woke up to fine but cold weather. We were watching the morning TV news in our brownstone apartment in Harlem, and saw that they were listing all the New York State schools that were to have a ‘snow day’ that day (i.e. a day where school is cancelled due to snow, heavy ice, or low temperatures) plus the weatherman was warning of a storm for Manhattan itself. It didn’t seem possible, as there wasn’t even a hint of snow at that point.

We headed off to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where we became engrossed in all the treasures on display. Mid-morning, we happened to be near a window overlooking Central Park and discovered the scene above! We could hardly believe it!

We decided it would be fun to walk across the Park from the Met to Columbus Circle, in the still-falling snow. We were wearing completely inappropriate footwear, and the then 5 year old Impossible Princess was in one of those fold-up travelling strollers, as she was recovering from a nasty illness.

The first fifteen minutes were fun. We marveled at the whiteness of the landscape, the magic quiet of freshly-fallen snow, and the story-book beauty of the Park. After that initial fifteen minutes, we were a bit over it…and all blaming each other for the idea to walk across the Park. We were wet, cold and miserable by the time we reached Columbus Circle. (See this NY Times blogpost for a description of the day’s conditions.)

But we’d experienced a ‘White Christmas’ landscape up close and we all still talk about it as one of the most memorable moments of that holiday.

Oh…and does anyone else think the child in the middle of that photo is a ghost child?  Perhaps the ghost of White-Christmas-Past?

Have you experienced a White Christmas?

You can read the original on-the-road post I wrote about this day here.

This post is linked to:

 #SundayTraveler series hosted by Pack me to

 

 

 

 

Travel Notes & Beyond

 

#TheWeeklyPostcard at www.travelnotesandbeyond.com

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