[This is part 4. See part 1, 2 or 3]

I was about to leave San Francisco on Tuesday of the third week. I got ready for checkout one day early on Sunday because I booked a day trip to Yosemite for Monday at pretty much the last minute [Pictures].

Of course, such a short visit isn’t all that useful because it takes 6-8 hours just to get there and back which leaves only 2-3 hours for walks around the Yosemite visitor’s center, but I still got to see a few nice waterfalls (including lots of mosquito bites), and the ride through California’s Central Valley has a few nice views too... Now I know why this is called the Golden State.

I booked a JetBlue flight from Oakland to Boston, that worked out very well, their self-checkin system is pretty cool and has a great user-interface (I like the ability to pick my seat on-screen).

A friend picked me up at the airport and drove us to the family’s house in Gardner outside of Boston. The New England region looks quite different from California, lots of green, lots of gray sky, looks a lot like Switzerland :-)

My stay in Boston was very short so I didn’t see and do too much. There are many interesting historic sites and things to be seen, and I have one restaurant tip: Sorelle Bakery and Cafe at 100 City Square. [Pictures]

On Thursday I took the Amtrak train from Boston to New York. The train ride featured a few very nice views of the Atlantic coast. A few hours later I arrived at Penn Station and after a short subway ride I checked in at my hotel, the “West Side Inn” on 107th street west. A word of advice: Avoid this place, the rooms are really ugly and old (certainly not like the images on the website) and some of the staff members are very unfriendly. Make sure you see the room before you pay as they don’t believe in refunds...

In my room I popped up my laptop and found 5 wireless networks in range, two of which were open, so I had free Internet access all the time. This proved to be very useful to look up and book all kinds of things about and in New York.

The city is overwhelming and the size and number of the buildings in Manhattan create an environment unlike anything else. I was here 10 years ago but I didn’t see too much of it back then. This time I stayed for about 10 days but I definitely want to come back and spend more time here, there is just so much more to see.

I booked two bicycle tours one day, the first one led us through parts of Harlem and Grand Central Park, the other one was during and after sunset along the Hudson river, then through downtown Manhattan and finally halfway across the bicyle path on the Brooklyn Bridge, which provides a truly breathtaking view of the city at night.

I noticed that a bicycle is a great way to get around the city; you get around faster than on foot but still slow enough to see things, you can stop whenever you want, and the car drivers were surprisingly tolerant, so I rented a bicycle for another two days to explore on my own. I spent a lot of time on the road. The beautiful new Hudson River Park has a bicycle path that allowed me to ride all the way from 107th street to downtown Manhattan. [Pictures]

During my stay I had to get some work done so I took the PowerBook to the public library where I could sit in the impressive reading room and connect the computer to wired Internet and power outlets, it was the perfect spot for working.

Bryant Park next to the library became one of my favorite spots in the city. It features a beautiful contrast between open, green space with trees and the skyscrapers surrounding it. This is a great place to relax and drink, eat, or surf the Internet using the free wireless network. One Monday evening I arrived there just in time to get a good seat for the first evening of the summer film festival which started on that day. By the time the movie began, right after sunset, the park was packed with about 10’000 people and the atmosphere was very exciting. [Pictures]

Wednesday featured ferry rides to and tours of both Liberty and Ellis Island. [Pictures]

As for nightlife, I went to two events, an Enabler party featuring Broker/Dealer and I saw Derrick Carter play at the Cielo club, which has a fantastic interior design.

I spent a lot of time wandering around and discovering nice shops, cafes and restaurants, and here are the ones I really liked:

• Zen Palate (several locations), Quantum Leap at 226 Thompson Street, Gobo at 401 6th avenue all have good vegetarian food (and the NY Spirit website has a useful listing of more similar restaurants).
• Pret a Manger is a chain of stores which serve excellent sandwiches. There’s one at 42nd Street and 5th Avenue so you can grab your food there and enjoy it sitting in Bryant Park.
• The Soy Luck Club at 115 Greenwich Av. (Jane St.) is a great cafe with delicious drinks and snacks, friendly staff and free wireless Internet access.
• Silver Moon Bakery at 2740 Broadway (105th St.) had *very* good bread for breakfast.
• Le Pain Quotidien is another good choice for breakfast.
• Calle Ocho at 446 Columbus Av. has great Latin food.
• Tabla at 11 Madison Av. serves Indian dishes, try the avocado salad and the cheese kulcha, and try to go there when the patio is open.

Mhh can you tell I like eating :-)

After many days of excitement and fun in New York I was ready for the last part of the trip, about a week in Washington DC. After a few more pleasant hours of Amtrak train ride my friend Larry picked me up at Union Station, I was staying at their place for the rest of the time.

We went to see the the usual things over the next few days. I noticed that the distances between all the well-known monuments are much larger than I thought. There’s also a lot more open, green space everywhere, it looks way better than on pictures.

I was *really* impressed by the size and number of the Smithsonian Institution’s museums, I love museums and I could easily spend months in all these places... The Air and Space museum was remarkable, it is great to see many of the actual pieces of equipment and aircraft that went to the moon and back, for example. [Pictures]

On another day, we explored some of the sites and monuments between the White house and the Capitol using my favorite vehicle, the Segway... Yes, another Segway tour :-). This time we even had members of the tour group crash their Segways into concrete blocks, which led to painfully hard landings on the pavement. [Pictures]

Larry is a big sports fan and I always wanted to see a game so we went to the Baltimore Camden Yards baseball stadium where we saw the Baltimore Orioles play against the New York Yankees. Of course Larry had to explain the rules and tactics to me before and during the game, I had no idea that it’s so complicated, with so many special cases :-) I really liked it, I’m sure I’ll do this again next time. [Pictures]

On the second-last day we did another tour of the memorials and monuments not covered on the Segway tour, specifically the Lincoln, Jefferson and Vietnam War memorials, I’m glad I got to see those as they are all quite impressive. [Pictures]

There are only two restaurant tips for this week:

• Bilbo Baggins in Alexandria has excellent dishes and desserts and a good selection of beers.
• Capitol City Brewing Co. is a brew pub right next to Union Station in Washington DC. Good beers and food.