NYC Waterfalls

M and I took a Circle Line cruise around the lower east side of Manhattan yesterday to see the NYC waterfalls set up by artist Olafur Eliasson (thanks KF - for the heads-up about the free tickets). I had ordered four complimentary tickets online a couple of months ago, with the expectation of bringing M's mom and my dad along. However, I called up my dad yesterday morning and he didn't want to go (says he sees them every day during his morning strolls along the FDR Drive). Then, in the early afternoon, M gets a frantic phone call from his mom while we were eating lunch at church, and apparently, one of the bird cages at his mom's place had fallen down, breaking the bird's leg. M's mom was very upset about it, and took the bird to the vet in the afternoon.

We ended up venturing off to Pier 16 by ourselves, and got there a little earlier to pick up the tickets, then loitered around the will call booth, trying to scout out two people to give the remaining tickets to. We eventually saw a couple that looked promising, so M went over to ask if they were on line to purchase tickets for the waterfall cruise. They said yes, and M ended up giving them the tickets. The guy wanted to give us money back (Circle Line charged $10/adult ticket), and was going to give us $10 for the two, but we refused to take it... didn't seem fair since I had only paid $1 service fee for the four tickets. He then offered us free Mets tickets for tonight's game that he wouldn't be able to use, but again we declined the offer... I told him we were Yankees fans.

The cruise itself was a little uneventful, especially towards the end when we were at a standstill just killing time, all the while breathing in toxic fumes from the boat. It definitely would not have been worth the $10 had we paid for it at full price, but I could live with the $1 service fee. We did get a good view of the falls, but with our new camera, we could have zoomed in on them just as well from the pier. At least it was a different experience and we got to take advantage of this summer event NYC is offering. Below are some pictures (one of each of the falls).

Underneath the Brooklyn Bridge:
By Pier 35 (or better known as the sanitation dump):

At the Brooklyn Piers (which we noticed they are finally renovating):
By Governors Island, where we just paid a visit to a few weeks ago:

And in case any of you are wondering, the bird with the broken leg is back home taking antibiotics, but may still be unstable. The vet said that if the bird stops eating or is acting abnormal in any way, there probably isn't much more they can do for it. At least M's mom seemed to be in better spirits after taking it to the vet yesterday.