Name: Rosemarie John
Route: Port Imperial Weehawken to Midtown Manhattan
Life as an Independent Travel Journalist has taken me to many interesting places in the last two years with the most recent adventure being the exciting trip to New Jersey and New York City. I had twenty-four ferry rides, a whole lot of pizza, steaks, slices of red velvet and the privilege of being featured in New York Waterway’s Commuter Spotlight of the month! So who am I?
I spend every single day of the week for many hours writing countless lines of descriptive text and editing photographs. I love journeys and I love describing them. But I wasn’t always a writer... I graduated with a Degree in Accounting and a Masters in Business Administration, but my soul was seeking a different path. I journeyed through many positions in the service industry until one day I landed a job as an Aerospace and Defence Journalist in Malaysia where I found my calling.
The life as an Aerospace and Defence journalist was an exciting one, but that stint soon ended when I moved to Indonesia with my husband. His work took him there and I found myself lost in a place where English is hardly spoken. Where life is pretty superficial, with the rich, richer and the poor, poorer. It was a beautiful country with its vast landscapes and interesting culture no doubt, but not a place for a person with my expertise to excel. I soon converted my energy into something more interesting by changing my writing genre to travel and culture.
I created a blog called Scribbles of an Electronic Gypsy and experimented with it for a year. When I received tremendous response and writing stints with the local English newspaper and some magazines, I decided to open a more professional site where I tell the world of my travels. Instead of writing everything in first person as most travel bloggers do, much akin a diary journal, I decided on a different approach.
The new website is not about me, myself and I. It’s a site where people can learn what to expect from a trip to a certain destination in an informative way without all the drama on how ecstatic I was to be there or how my dreams came through when I set my eyes on Borobudur for example. It may be a different take on what you would call a personalised travel site these days but that is exactly how I want it to be. I only write on destinations that I have been to. I do not run sponsored press releases or articles of places, accommodations or culture that I have not witnessed for myself.
My musings and opinions are unconfined and unfettered. Travel, that perennial itch of the human race is something that I need to scratch through my musings and through the unfastening of my own purse strings. Mid 2011 saw us relocate to the tiny island of Singapore where life has become all that more vibrant and inspired the creation of my new website, Travel and Beyond: www.travelandbeyond.org
My trip to New Jersey and New York was the highlight of December 2011 and travelling up and down the Hudson by ferry during my 16-day stay in New Jersey was the easiest mode of transportation. Though my husband was there on business, I cashed in on the ride since the Big Apple has always been on my bucket list. Plus what better way would it be to usher in my birthday?
I spent my birthday roaming through The Intrepid, sat inside the Concorde cockpit and explored the insides of the Growler Submarine. I couldn’t help but imagine that I was inside Captain Nemo’s Nautilus! Not forgetting lunch at New York’s oldest pizza joint – Lombardi’s in Little Italy and hours spent photographing the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, a scene right out from Ken Follett’s Pillars of the Earth. Sigh... I just have to revisit New York all over again!
Sixteen days isn’t all that long when it comes to exploring a city when time was of the essence. New York has so much to see and I didn’t want to get caught up in heavy traffic. Opting to ride the ferry instead was the smartest decisions during my stay. I didn’t want to spend too much on accommodations in Manhattan either, so I opted to stay at Homewood Suites at Edgewater instead.
With travel time cut down and with the complimentary shuttle on both sides, exploring Manhattan was a breeze. My experience with New York Waterway’s services was just what I needed and I wrote all about it on my travel site too. You can read it here: http://www.travelandbeyond.org/2012/01/06/travelling-from-new-jersey-to-new-york-by-ferry/
Travel and Beyond portrays a kaleidoscope of all things travel related mixed with just the right dosage of history and culture. You can follow my musings on the following links below:
Follow me on Twitter: @TravelnBeyond or www.twitter.com/TravelnBeyond
Follow me on Facebook: www.facebook.com/TravelandBeyond
Read my musings at: www.travelandbeyond.org
Let me leave you with some photographs from my travels thus far... including a few from the city that never sleeps!
