"Let the River Run"

Liberty and Ellis island from the Staten Island Ferry

"Let the River Run" was written and sung by New Yorker Carly Simon. It was played to the image of Melanie Griffiths on the Staten Island Ferry to Manhattan in the film "Working Girl". This iconic image and the song was in my mind when we joined the crowds to board the Staten Island Ferry and had a splendid view of Ellis Island where so many of the New York population first entered the United States to start a new life. I read in Helen Hanff's "Apple of my Eye" that if there was a family member with an illness, that person was refused admission and the whole family had to return to Europe or send the sick person back alone. There were many suicides in the Hudson over these issues. We had brilliant views of the Statue of Liberty from the Ferry as well. Being hungry when we got to Staten Island, we thought we would have a sandwich from the Subway bar, but there were queues of the ubiquitous builders, or construction workers, there and we went instead to the Au Bon Pain nearby, where you can get a coffee and a snack. We took our snacks out onto seats which overlooked the moored ferries, the one in dock was called the John Kennedy. After a pleasant lunch and spotting a Monarch butterfly, which we were surprised to see in New York, we had the pleasure of a Ferry ride back to Manhattan and on the subway to the nearest station to the East Side Tenement Museum. Here we were just in time for a tour of some of the tenements.