Feeling Like a Normal Tourist – Taking the HOHO Bus in NYC

We have been sailing the world on Spacegrazer for more than 3 years now, so we do not consider ourselves tourists. No, we are intrepid travelers, adventurers, floating gypsies… Just call it something interesting. Being in a big city like New York though, we are behaving a lot like tourists. And that’s okay, because sightseeing is a lot of fun here.

Both Max and I had visited New York before, but briefly and before children, and before sailing… So this time will be a very different experience! The great thing is that we have plenty of time so we don’t have to “do” NYC in four days. We will probably stay for about a month. The other bonus is that we have our home with us! So when things get too hectic, we just hoof it back to loyal Spacegrazer, awaiting us on anchor in the Hudson River.

Hop On Hop Off

For our first official touristy outing into the city, we decided to go on the Hop On Hop Off (HOHO) bus tour. We already took this years ago, and we thought it would be fun to repeat with the kids. It’s a good way of getting to know the layout of the city a bit, and easy on the feet. We hit the town together with our friends on sailing yacht Mrs Chippy, with whom we have sailed to many awesome places.

We walked to Times Square, nearly fainted from visual overload, fueled up at MacD, and hopped on the bus. Well, in reality there was not much hopping going on since we had to stand in a long queue before we actually got on the bus. Even though we already had tickets! I guess it was just bad timing, because at every other stop we hopped on or off that day, it was absolutely fine. All 12 of us settled in on the top deck, installed our tour-guide earplugs , and set off.

Somewhere near Wall Street we all dashed down below and jumped off the bus to find shelter. Paul had noticed a massive rain cloud coming our way. The other people on the top deck looked at us in surprise, then got soaked as the bus pulled away. It’s funny how you develop a sense for the weather when you spend time on a boat.

When the rain subsided, we found the restaurant with the lovely name Golden Unicorn – in Chinatown. Apparently it is one of the best dim sum places in town. Before we had all even taken a seat, the staff had filled our table with delicious food, water and tea. It did not take us long to demolish everything.

Back on the bus we went, to complete our loop. We had an awesome day, which we ended in Central Park with a 99 cent pizza slice. Good times.

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