Macy's 4th of July Fireworks Show
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| Macy's 4th of July Fireworks Show - Hudson River |
July 4, 20011 / New York, NY -- About a million New Yorkers converged along 3 miles of the Hudson River in Manhattan to see the Macy's 4th of July fireworks show. Joe and I were two of them.
The show was scheduled to start at 9:00 PM, so because we're only 4 avenues away, we left around 8:00 PM which should have given us plenty of time to get there. We were planning on being south of 44th St which would give us an unobstructed view of the river, because north of there is the xxx aircraft carrier and then the cruise ship terminals which completely block the view. But when we got to 12th Avenue and 49th St, everone was heading northbound. So we quickly learned that once the prime areas filled up, the police closed off access to those areas and forced people north to evenly dispurse the crowds. So we ended up between 51st and 52nd streets with a big bridge between us and the river. Somewhat disappointing, but we weren't alone and had to just live with it.
When we were almost there, we were turned away by the police because of the camping chairs we were carrying. "Chairs are not allowed" they said frankly with no further explanation. So I quickly walked them all the way back to our apartment while Joe waited.
The show itself, once it started around 9:30 was amazing. There were six barges evenly spaced along 3 miles of the river, from about 53rd St to 20th St. All the fireworks were perfectly synchronized where each barge set off the same type of firework as the other at the exact same time. We'd never seen anything like it. It went on for almost half an hour, finally ending with a great grand finale around 9:50 PM.
While it took several hours for a million people to get to the viewing area, we all left at the same time. To say it was crowded is an understatement. All streets and corridors were completely crammed with a slowly moving stream of people. Automobile traffic was blocked on most of the streets closest to the river. It was orderly and civil, but crazy.