NYC, New Jersey '08

Its been a long time since I went anywhere or did anything other than working my two dead-end jobs and going to the gym every morning trying to get in shape. But things are not as grim as it often seems. Through my new job I was able to participate in a very neat event taking place under the Hudson River in the Lincoln Tunnel.

I was invited to attend the Lincoln Tunnel Challenge, a 5k (3.1 mile) event benefiting the Special Olympics of New Jersey. I had never done any such events before so in all honesty I had no idea what to expect, however I was very excited to participate in a charitable function and invited my sister and best friend to attend with me.

The plan for the event was to go to the Coach USA garage and take mass transit as was advertised on the event web site and highly recommended by the people from the company. However after getting home late the night before, being burned out and unable to get out of bed in time I overslept that opportunity.

Not to worry there was plenty of parking and after arriving in Weehawken in much less time than it would have taken if we were to take a bus, we were on our way to register in order to receive our numbered bibs and the timekeeper RFID chip. Shortly after the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey had the southern hole of the tunnel blocked off and we were walking towards the start finish line. My sister had just received a ticket from EZpass for going through the wrong lane on the GW bridge so I made sure to take a picture of her on foot at the EZpass toll booth... not paying the toll again, as usual! ugh...


I had been going to the gym every morning for the past few months so I had full intentions of running the entire length of the tunnel and back, but since it was crowded and my skater shoes made my feet hurt right away, a nice stroll through it was what my sister and I actually ended up doing. We took pictures throughout our walk, especialy at the dividing line between New York and New Jersey under the Hudson. My best friend though ran, and finished the challenge in half the time that we did, which was impressive. The tunnel itself, which was apparently cleaned before the event was quite dirty, the air in there was very stuffy but nevertheless it was all right. It surely provided for many great picture ops on both sides of the river, and the presence of all the NYC Grey Line sightseeing busses added to the ops available for us. I had never been on a double-decker bus before so it surely added to the memories.

I cannot wait to do this again next year!