Roosevelt Island Run

Our route. The missing parts were when I called
the 34-year old to tell him it was cold and Cookie
should wear her coat during her walk.

The Dylan Murphy's Running Club likes to keep our runs fresh, which is why we often spend an entire week e-mailing potential new routes. The Professor and T planned out a run to Roosevelt Island for bright and early on Saturday morning. We met at 67th and 2nd Avenue and headed off towards the 59th Street Bridge (aka the Queensboro Bridge, aka the Ed Koch 59th Street Bridge... Seriously? Why don't we just keep renaming the thing?)

Running along the bridge is extremely noisy.

We couldn't figure out how to get to the pedestrian path at first and awkwardly kept running back and forth across the median. Finally a police officer yelled directions from his patrol car. Thank you NYPD! The majority of our run was spent on this pathway, which is loud and kind of ugly. The view is pretty cool but only if you're not scared of heights.

We arrived in Long Island City, Queens. Parts of Long Island City are nice. We weren't in the nice part. It reminded us of our days in Hartford, specifically the area near Friendly's Towing. Many a Trinity student has woken up to find out their car has been towed from its illegal parking spot, and have been forced to find someone to navigate the ghetto with them to get it back. Thankfully navigating this ghetto wasn't as difficult and we made it to the Roosevelt Island Bridge pretty easily.

The bridge takes you to a parking garage. Bizarre, I know. We found the staircase and finally made it outside to Roosevelt Island. It was anticlimatic. I asked the Professor and T to share what they had learned about the island during their studies. (They didn't seem to remember much besides a mental institution, a small pox hospital, and a farmhouse.)

The Professor and T approaching the Blackwell Island Lighthouse

Roosevelt Island was once named Blackwell Island (hence the name of the lighthouse) and Welfare Island because a lot of the people who inhabited the island were poor. They keep trying to market this place as somewhere that normal people will want to live, but I think they're failing miserably. I actually have friends from camp who live on Roosevelt Island in the Octagon, home of the former insane asylum.

Learn more about the Blackwell Lighthouse.

We continued on around the island. As we looked across the East River, I commented on how we were so close and yet so far. I don't care if the distance is swimmable (although no one would actually do it because I'm pretty sure you will grow an extra hand if you attempt to get in that water, not to mention you'd probably get run over by a ferry or a garbage boat), you are too far away from Manhattan. Roosevelt Island is such a weird place because technically it's part of Manhattan because it's not an outer borough, but you can't walk off of it directly to the island of Manhattan.

There a bunch of these cool statues in the East River
and there was a plaque explaining them but I didn't read it closely.
If you know what these are, please comment below or e-mail me.

I was pretty tired by the sixth mile of this run. Cookie and I spent all of Friday afternoon and evening together, and that pup wipes me out. No trip to Roosevelt Island would be complete without a stop at the former Smallpox Hospital. Thankfully Roosevelt Island treats its inhabitants well and has a building of toilets readily available. I was downing water because I felt super-dehydrated, but then I had to super-pee.

The remains of the Smallpox Hospital

At this point I was done. I wanted off this island immediately and I wanted food. We decided to take the tram back. Cross "Take Roosevelt Island tram" off the bucket list, because I have been dying to do this forever (and by forever, I mean last Spring when I saw it while sitting in traffic in a taxi on the FDR.)

the tram!

the view of Manhattan from the tram

Oh hello First Avenue!

Upon our arrival, we decided that we needed food and we were not going to Dylan Murphy's. We ended up going to Jackson Hole and it was delicious. And an entire bottle of wine was only $20!

I ordered an East Sider burger as a chaser to a plate of nachos.

The East Sider Burger

Ham AND Bacon

In case you don't feel like eating a burger smothered in cheese and pork products, Jackson Hole makes chicken sandwich versions of their many burgers. You can also order salads, especially if you want to look good for you future spouse.

Sorry sweetheart. You married a fat ass.