Posted on Tuesday March 8
This week, The Community School’s Residential Program students are on their annual “big city” trip. Their destination: New York City! They’ve got big plans for their week in The Big Apple, including checking out museums; visiting Central Park, China Town and Little Italy; walking the Brooklyn Bridge, visiting Ground Zero, riding the train to Grand Central Station and more. Students and chaperones are staying in Jersey City, in a converted historic firehouse, generously donated for the week by friends of the school. This is the first big city trip for many of our kids, and this year, they’ll be blogging their daily adventures for all of us back home in Maine…
Day One: Leaving Camden… and arriving in Jersey City!
Monday, 3/7: Arrived in Jersey City after 11 hours on the road! By the time we got out the door of the C School, it was 9:00am, even though we woke up at 6:30 so we could make good time. That was to be expected, I think. In any case, we headed out in some pretty serious rain that cleared up by the time we got to Massachusetts. Lots of lengthy bathroom breaks later, we were somewhere in Connecticut when we hit traffic. The highlight of many of the students’ day was realizing that on the other end of the traffic was a flood of water all the way across the road! The van and the scout and chase cars all made it through some deep water and into the city, where we enjoyed the skyline at night and took a minor accidental detour on Riverside Drive. Then the tunnel across to the amazing firehouse, where we are now all cozily writing our first impressions in our journals. My highlight of the day was walking to the waterfront in on the NJ side a few minutes ago — we could see the whole NYC skyline, including the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building. We stood out on the fishing pier and pointed out particular buildings that were cool to see, and then Dawn and KJ danced under the night sky while Joseph sang the Star Spangled Banner. It’s a big world! –Carrie Braman (Lead Teacher)
Student impressions/highlights as paraphrased from their journal entries:
Tired! Wet Nervous Stressful drive! Water flowing across the highway… Lucky parking spot Joseph’s driving Laughing in the van Philosophical questions Quiet dinner Fresh air Clear night 7$ butter If all the buildings in the skyline were robots, that would be interesting! This house is beyond awesome Want to go shopping tomorrow! Looking forward to sightseeing and eating different foods (maybe seeing someone famous!)
Schedule for day two: SOHO, Canal Street and China Town; walking food tour and visit to Ground Zero.
Check back tomorrow for a complete re-cap of the first full day in the big city…
