Carol spent four or five hours traveling to Ridgewood on Friday, and unfortunately, I gave her another five hours of transit riding on Saturday. She also got a taste of the real New York on Friday: there was a bomb scare at the Port Authority Friday morning, all of New York’s finest keeping people out of the building and adding more anxiety to her trip. She’s a good sport.

We began our day at the National Museum of the American Indian in Battery Park. The exhibits were filled with wonderful objects, mostly from Northwest Coast Indians. The building, the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House, is also worth seeing. This is the centennial of the building commemorated with an exhibit in the rotund.

We boarded the Staten Island Ferry, just a short walk from the museum. Although New York is largely empty in August, all of the tourists seemed to be on the ferry. It can be a wonderful ride; next time will be better.

I had a goal in mind this trip; it wasn’t just to ride on the ferry. I always wanted to visit the Jacques Marchais Tibetan Museum, not realizing what the trip entailed. We got on a bus, conveniently waiting for us outside of the ferry terminal. Unfortunately air conditioning on the bus was only marginal and the trip was long. Then there was a long walk up a steep hill to get to the museum. It was interesting, particularly learning about Jacques Marchais, but I would not return unless I was driving. By the time we got back to the ferry we both felt like we had become a sodden mess.

Carol wanted to see a play. We went to the TKTS booth and got half-price tickets to Curtains. After dinner at a charming Japanese restaurant we settled in and enjoyed the play. It was cute. The best person was Debra Monk, a wonderful, talented, older woman with a great voice. It’s a great joy to see an older actor doing a great job.