#irieone

The Big Apple, the city that never sleeps, New York City Baby! 

This was my first time making the trip down south, and I was excited to check it out!  Having grown up watching hundreds of hours of skateboarding videos from NYC, looking up to NY Locals, and fantasizing about skating around the city, this was definitely a dream come true. 

Bell - Crooked Grind

The Trip was sparked by a visitor coming from Barbados, who wanted to make the most of his time while visiting the east coast of North America.  Adrian, of Movement Skateboards, flew in to Toronto, and then we drove from YYZ to NYC.  Adrian is one of the most mellow characters you will ever meet.  This mellow attitude does not transcend into his appearance however, and no matter what he was always looking fresh, smelled of AXE & cologne, and was rocking  the freshest gear.  Preparation to maintain this freshness however took a little of time to achieve, and regularly we found ourselves waiting on Big A to “freshen up” before we were able to go skate for the day.  Because of this, we coined him the ‘Slowest Man on Tour’.  Seeing how there were no other contestants, he was immediately awarded the ‘Slowest Man On Tour’ of the Year.  SMOTY 2015.

The crew was myself (Gravey), Adrian ‘SMOTY 2015′ Bowen, Luke ‘Irie’ Shepherd, & Michael ‘WSB246′ Bell.  Luke and Bell are also from Barbados, currently studying in Toronto.  With school done for the year, it was no better reason for a road trip.  One Canadian, Three Barbadians, and a concrete jungle.  The recipe for one hell of a trip.

In New York City, we stayed with another Barbadian Transplant, Alan, aka; BIG MON.  Alan is a friendly giant, and he treated us like family while we were there.  It was a huge blessing to have a place to stay, and to have a host that was down to hangout while we were there and show us around.  Thanks to Alan, we ate great food every meal, got the low down on the Subway system, and he even showed us around when he wasn’t working.  Due to his knowledge, we were able to accomplish a lot of things during our 4 day visit.

SMOTY 2015 - lookin good as always

As for the skateboarding…  Whoa.  The city never sleeps and it seems like every where we went, there were always skaters around.  We went to LES, which is a park under the Manhattan bridge, with the smoothest ground and cool plaza style park, it was a dream spot.  We watched the locals from Labor Skateshop destroy the park, before venturing off to some street spots. 

LES Park under the Brooklyn Bridge.

We also had the pleasure of skating the High Bridge Skatepark.  Designed by OG NYC legend Steve Rodriguez, this is New York City’s biggest skatepark, it was crazy!! part of the park was even covered by the bridge so you can skate somewhere if its raining. The park also had lights, and we skated well into the night.  At this park, we also had the pleasure of skating with OG NYC ripper, Danny Supa.  Dam, you’d think after so many years of murdering it on a skateboard that we would be slowing down, but let me tell you, he ripped that park a new a-hole, landing everything with ease, cruising the whole park!

This was a great way to end the day that started like this… “Hey Mike, your Van is gone..”

We had parked in the same spot for 2 nights before the NYPD decided to tow the ‘Get Buck’ Van.  Apparently we were parked in a no parking zone, but the sign was a little confusing, due to other signs around it saying that you could park there, except for street cleaning days…  Anyways, Alan came through for us big time and called the local impound, they had the Van and this was a relief, because if it was stolen, we were screwed as far as getting back to Canada went…  We spent a good half of the day biking downtown to pay the $185.00 impound fee, and then biking back to the impound in upper Manhattan to get the Van back.  This time around we made sure to park it in a safe place, eh.

Alan & Bell out for a rip, heading to pay the impound fee.

Captain Luke - Tre Bomb

Gravey - Wallride

On our last day in the city, we ventured off to Queens, and checked out the famous Flushing Meadows fountain.  Having grown up watching EST videos, Zoo York Mixtapes, and the Static Videos, this whole trip was a really cool experience, however, something about this fountain had me in awe.  It seemed to just ooze skateboarding history right out of the fountain.  We were there for a few hours skating the ledge over the grate, and checking out the Maloof Money Cup Park, only a stone’s throw away from the fountain.

We went out for dinner on our last night, and came across a peaceful protest, walked around the city and took in some sights.  It was Dead Ass Brick outside though, so we ventured back to our NYC Irie Castle and called er a night, we had a long drive ahead of us in the morning.

One last street spot before we made our journey back to Canada.  This spot was actually at the apartment we were staying at, and rather than start the trip off with an injury, we saved it for the last day.  Rolling away from this beast felt amazing to say the least, what a way to end an awesome trip!  Check out the new Crewzine for the photo from this spot!