A Window With A View
My family and I went on vacation to the USA in August 2016. First, we flew to Pembroke Pines, Florida, and spent one week in my sister-in-law´s home. Later, we boarded Spirit Airlines flight 857 from Ft Lauderdale to La Guardia to spend a week in Manhattan.
I selected a window seat on the left because I thought I would have the east coast under my window if we flew north. I love seeing and taking pictures of the panoramic view as it passes my viewing field as if I were watching a movie. It is like observing a live map of the earth below — its cities, beaches, bays, sand banks, and curious cloud formations. Everything looked the way I imagined because it was such a beautiful day.
I was thrilled when we flew closer to Manhattan because the plane was to land in La Guardia, located on the island’s eastern side. So, I would have a privileged view of its skyline while the plane approached the airport. I had only one pass at it, so I began feeling this FOMO, the perfect Manhattan picture, so I began to shoot away.
We flew over the Verrazzano bridge, the Statue of Liberty, Lower Manhattan, Lower Manhattan with One World Trade Center, Lower Manhattan with One Trade Center, and a little bit of the Brooklyn Bridge.
Lower Manhattan with One World Trade, the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges, Mid-Town Manhattan, and the Empire State Building.
I continued shooting Upper Manhattan as we were landing in La Guardia.
I did it!
I had Manhattan at my feet, literally!
After careful consideration, I chose three pictures: Lower manhattan with the two bridges and the One Trade Center tower, Mid-Town Manhattan, and Mid-Town with the Empire State Building.
I selected the first one to be the main pic of the article because I love the Brooklyn Bridge. The picture has four planes: The first one is in Brooklyn. The second is the East River, with the two bridges crossing it majestically. The third one is Lower Manhattan, with the One Trade Center towering over the city. The fourth is New jersey fading away on the horizon.
When we were in New York City, after sightseeing everything you see in that town, we went several times to have dinner in Little Italy, and to finish the day, we took the subway to the Brooklyn Bridge station and walked the bridge to enjoy the night view from there — unforgettable.
I carefully edited the picture to eliminate the filter effect of the plane´s plexiglass window and to give it more clarity, given the haze of the Manhattan afternoon.
This is a gift to all New Yorkers, especially to my friend Stefan Day, as a token of appreciation for his work of making Storytelling a true instrument of societal transformation.
