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Tracks across America: The Most Spectacular RoofTop View in The World. |
Lady liberty and the stock exchange’s grand flag.
It’s the hour before midnight and I’m standing 18 floors up on the rooftop of the Standard hotel, at a Quiksilver Pro launch party. There’s nothing Standard about the Standard. The roof garden affords a spectacular 360- degree view of the city. In every direction I turn the giant skyscraper forest blinks back at me and there’s a sense of being swallowed hole by the surrounding nightscape. It’s such a perfect Gotham city moment, I half expect to see Batman haul himself over the side of the building and say hi.
The mood of the mostly Quiksilver crowd is buoyant.
Not only have they treated themselves to one of the best views of New York City but there’s also talk that the waves are really going to turn on for the contest they’ve rescued from the brink. I spot Quiksilver C.E.O Bob McNight wearing a split watermelon grin between sips on a Mai Tai. He can afford to smile now but it had likely been a stressful couple of days for the C.E.O who’d invested millions in this event. I ask one of the other Quiki crew how close the whole thing came to cancellation courtesy of Cyclone Irene and he responds succinctly. “A bees dick mate. A bees Dick!”
It had been a big day. Just after lunch I’d arrived at Pier 54, on the lower west side to watch Tony Hawk and his band of skaters defy the laws of physics at a river-side half-pipe, set up by the Quiki crew. In a career long enough to make Slater look like the new kid on the block, Hawk can still pull a big crowd and hundreds turned out to see if the veteran could still perform his signature Mctwist move [invented by Mike McGill]. The show was impressive, the skaters flying high above the Hudson River, swinging through the air like bats against the vertiginous New York backdrop. Highlights included Hawk’s tandem attack with one of the trusty young grom’s in his squad, who happily let big Tony throw a 540 right over his head, while he skated alongside him.
New York skyline and skating.
Steph Gilmore was amongst the crowd enjoying the action, perhaps looking for inspiration to take her own attack beyond the liquid coping. With the women’s tour wrapped up for the year she’d been cut loose to have a good time in a city that presents infinite opportunities for fun. “Is there anything you really have to do here?” I asked. “Not really, just party,” she responded, with a distinct hint of mischief flavouring that famous grin. “Just hunting down the biggest dive bars is the best,” she continued.
After the skate show I decided to tick a few New York must-do’s off the list and headed down town to catch the Staten Island ferry with fellow surf scribe Kirk Owers.
The free ferry travels straight past the Statue of liberty and delivers a spectacular view back towards the city from the Hudson River. The statue, the ultimate symbol of American democratic ideals, is undoubtedly impressive, although given recent economic disasters it was difficult not to wonder if the grand lady of the Hudson was having a little difficulty holding up her torch.
After disembarking the ferry we headed straight up Wall street, anticipating a herd of suits, still pulsing with the adrenalin of a big Friday afternoon trade, to come steaming out of the stock exchange. The reality was much closer to a flat day at the beach. The financial district seemed bereft of anything like the intense commercial activity one might have anticipated. “Most people have gone home for the afternoon,” a store vendor told us as we watched tumbleweeds roll down the street outside the New York Stock Exchange. The only emotional content in the moment was supplied by the giant US flag, which stretched across the building. They love rockin’ the flag here, almost everywhere you go there’s a star-spangled-banner flapping in the wind or stretched across a wall. The sole sign of business activity was derived from two young girls running a cookie stall on the opposite corner of the Stock Exchange. Chock-chip was the only thing you could buy shares in that afternoon. When a down and out black woman wandered past and asked passers by for a dollar, the girls offered her a cookie. She replied politely,
“ No thankyou darling, I need some money…”
– By Luke Kennedy
Note: Read all Luke’s New York blogs HERE
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