Welp, I did it.

I actually visited a place I wrote off the bucket list due to politics and all.
Then I got the married and had to check out the home base commanders stomping grounds. I had visions of the movie 'Escape from NY' on my mind.
Was an odd feeling not to be carrying everywhere as I do in the comfort of my gun free state. Belt felt less tighter and I didn't feel as fat I think.

Of note:

First off, I did not see a single gun store on long island or on Manhattan.
I must say I loved the bagels I found.

I did not see the big deal on the NY pizza though.

Bums....
Dayum! I only seen 3 bums in all of my walking around downtown NY.
In my shitbag town at least 15 assholes begging for gas money or handouts on my way to the Wal-Mart here. I expected to have seen at least eleventy billion of them there.

The subways did smell like a sewer pipe busted somewhere when I entered the caverns descending below. Was surprised that there  were not roving gangs of hood rats roving the system that I was thought to believed inhabited them and preyed apon people traveling. Nice!

JFK airport beer prices suck. Have to admit that Denver airport prices suck also. I think I lost about $300 on bar tabs waiting for planes at both airports...

The outdoors:
Driving through the Bronx and other desolate places like East St Louis are similar.  This was due to some GPS unit saying , go here....When tansitioning to the sheeple movers, Subways and rail, I had pleasure in seeing a crew of 5 or 6 able bodied men strip a car in no time flat along one of the train stops on one of the roads that dead end along the tracks waiting for the train to pull out of the station. It is unfortunate that they don't use their skills on some NASCAR activity I suppose. Them boys had skills!!!

Drivers:
Driving skills I have always know people from there to be repulsive, dangerous  and irresponsible drivers. I found myself many times flipping off and yelling at people with NY plates due to their driving habits I have seen in the places I have resided in.

Enter: Letting the trusted NY lady family friend drive my rental car that she was not covered in....
I spent a lovely time in the state driving all over by the wife and then the steering wheel changed hands. Said childhood friend of the wife took the wheel since she knew the route.

HO Lee Fuk!!!!
I remind you I spent a few days checking out cool places and did a lot of the OOoohs and AAAAhhhs of the place.

This Psychotic lady, (otherwise known as a local driver friend of the family, took control of a rental that she was not covered under) began to raise my blood pressure. Actually I thought I was going to stroke out while trying to act calm
We began driving around 80 MPH on the roads with no more than a car length in front of us. She plays tour guide, often looking off to the sides of the roads pointing at places and not paying attention to traffic. I am thinking we are going to die.. Brake lights in front of us as we accelerate to our inevitable collision or other drivers squeezing in an apparent brush with death in front of us. I think this drive killed most of my fun out of this vacation at this point.
We are on this road for over an hour whipping through lanes, cutting people off with inches to spare off the front and back bumper the whole time. She is not paying attention to the road or traffic and spending a lot of time trying to rest her left leg on top of her right thigh. I am grateful to be alive I do say...
All In all it was a good trip. I am thankful to be alive.

Your state has many beautiful places. Hiking is an hour away though and I did not see any national forest or BLM land to explore.

Taxes are the debil there I have come to know.

I can see why a long range rifle is not needed.
I have tried the seafood and was not too impressed. Lobster roll had crushed shell or something on it and the Reuben sammich sucked real bad.

Some place called the Angry Otter had the best fries ever!

To think ARFCOM has a start or continuing presence there must be maddening in such a gun unfriendly zone.

Was a fun trip. I might have to do it again in the future.

I don't see how you people on Long Island pay the taxes that you do, dayum!

Was a fun experience!

Cheers

Well, glad you had a good time but you do need to get Upstate sometime and see what the real New York state is all about.

I am glad you enjoyed your stay.  Not a lot of federally owned land here.  Only a few national monuments.  But the Adirondack Forest Preserve is forever wild by state constitutional decree.  It is larger than Yellowstone, Yosemite and the Grand Canyon combined.  There there is the Catskill Forest Preserve too.  The Finger Lakes Region is pretty impressive too.  Letchworth State Park is great too.  Voted best state park in tn country.  Over 60 miles of hiking trails there.  

New York State is a beautiful state obliterated by a single corrupt political machine with two subdivisions.  One named democrat and the other named republican.

Pizza generally sucks these days in NY, all the Italians moved to NJ.

Still great pizza at the Jersey shore, Nino's Seaside Heights.

And several hole-in-the-wall joints in the borroughs
Same for Italian food in general. Arthur Ave.(Bronx) Still has Great food.

Glad you had a good time... next time, take a spin upstate to the Adirondacks.

You want nothing to do with anything related to BLM you find in NY.

I just might have to go back and check out the non island parts one of these days.

I did enjoy the hike to some granite faced hill that had a bunch of water falls running the course through a stream.

I know we have ARFCOMMERS there and they must shoot somewhere. I will have to investigate the places to shoot for the next trip in the future. I wont be able to take much of anything in my safe I know but possible of something not scary to the sheeple out there. Heck, I had to deal with a true liberal in the friend of the family go on rants about Trump and how guns are icky and everything that makes me cringe. Only to not upset as first time visit with a friend of the wife on the first visit meeting some of them. That was the same lady that had the dark force driving my rental car.

Will have to do this again!

Gun stores rare on LI? I can think of like 10 off the top of my head..

Dark Storm Industries in Oakdale
Campsite Sports Shop in Huntington
South Shore Sportsman in Merrick
Hunter Sports in Massapequa
Bensons in Medford
Chesters in Ronkonkoma
Jerrys Firearms in Bohemia
Coliseum Gun Traders in Uniondale
T&T Gunnery in Seaford
Orion 7 in Middle Island
Long Island Gun Source in Port Jeff
Freds Gun Store in Port Jeff
Britt Firearms in Mineola

There are quite a few more that I didn't list too.

I walked right by Robert DeNiro and one of his sons yesterday in Central Park. Spoiler alert: He's short as fuck.

That's my NYC story for today.

Yes, but that number would probably equal just the number of stores in Tampa, FL. We are thirty miles wide and 120 miles long.

Been to T&T, Dark Storm, American Outdoor Sports in Farmingdale and LRB in Floral Park. 

Yeah, downtown is more of the financial sector so the homeless don't hang out there. Penn station on the other hand and the surrounding mid town areas are rife with them. At least Bloomberg continued the Guiliani era policies of keeping most homeless people off the street. DeBlasio has adopted a more San Francisco mentality of leaving them alone and now we have homeless all over Penn Station and copyright infringing weirdos in Elmo and Batman outfits in Times Square. I think the high taxes and hateful attitudes from everyone around you are the 2 biggest things that erode your want to keep going in this place the most. Everything you liked about your trip is here, it's just that our glasses are too fogged up to see them anymore.

As far as I'm concerned NYC and the surrounding area there is not even NY state. Come to western NY and you find open fields, gun stores and no sky scrapers. My NY state handgun permit is not even valid in NYC so I don't go there...next time visit Harlem or Buffalo if you want to see gangs, hookers and crack dealers.

Rightoo!!

Didn't need to see hood rats. Was supposed to be a vacation sipping on wine, eating over priced food and enjoying myself. Most accounts it was met.

Gun laws though... dayum