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by Claudio E. Cabrera
It’s about 14 miles from South Ferry to Inwood, via Broadway, and in one day a group of people, brought together by the Upper Manhattan Experience, took every step. We walked the length of Manhattan.
Six intrepid Inwoodites met up at W. 207th Street and Broadway at 9 a.m. for the third annual Broadway Walk on May 2.
The plan: take the 1-train downtown to South Ferry and walk back along Broadway, stopping at whim along the way, each step bringing us closer to home.
Claudia Lynch, one of the coordinators of the event and main organizer of the Upper Manhattan Experience, peered up at the sky and down to her jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, unsure if she made the right clothing choice for the day.
“I was thinking sun dress and sandals before I came out,” she said, headed to the train. “But I wasn’t sure how hot it would be. I’m not exactly a morning person so I didn’t have enough time to prepare.”
She might have preferred the sun dress.
The temperature was already an unusually hot 80 degrees, and I was re-thinking my decision to choose jeans over shorts. It was too late, we were on our way.
Downtown, four more walkers met up with us, and we took the first of 28,000 steps that would be needed to get back to Inwood.
Like me, this was the first walk for Ari Rabinowitz and Lynn Ricket.
Ari has lived on the Upper West Side for most of his life and moved to Inwood a few years ago. Lynn, a Maryland resident, recently moved to the area for college.
Both were up for the challenge, especially Lynn since not long before she boogied for seven straight hours in a dance marathon.
“I figured I could accomplish this after dancing for seven hours straight,” Ricket said. Besides, this would be rewarding. “It’s exciting to see all of Broadway in just one day,” she said.
Ari was here because he wanted to meet new people. He’s been to many UME events, and figured the walk would be both healthy and rewarding.
“I like to walk in general, but to have people to enjoy a walk with on a nice day makes it even better,” he said.
At Wall Street we were met with a Romanian Street Fair and we picked up some delicious gyros. Not long later, the first bathroom break came near Canal Street at an always-good-for-a-pit stop Starbucks location.
Around noon we ran into the protests against the recently passed Arizona immigration law in Times Square, there we met up with a few more people, and continued north.
Around 1:30 p.m. we stopped for lunch at Central Park, snacking while watching some street performances.
The sun was scorching: feet, calves, and for some, even necks were in pain.
Sitting there in the grass, sandwiches in hand, no one felt like getting up.
“How are we going to get up from this grass with this nice breeze?” said Renata Zablocka, another organizer of the event.
But we had a goal, and got up and continued our walk, pausing for a classic Mr. Softee Cone near Columbia University and making a few more stops at a handful of convenience stores. At W. 168th Street we stopped at some benches, the last extended break before our push home.
It was around 4:45 p.m. Another Starbucks stop and a bit of window shopping in our neighborhood were the only stops. Deborah, one of the other participants who lives in the Southern Heights, said it didn’t feel like walking anymore.
“We are now in our neighborhood and now it feels like the journey is almost complete,” she said.
It was 6 p.m. when we reached W. 207th Street and everyone began Tweeting and updating their Facebook statuses to alert their friends that we survived the eight-hour trek. There was only one place left to go.
“Where else? Piper’s Kilt for a burger and a cold beer,” said Renata.
After a day of walking, there was just one more stop – home.
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