Route of this walk.
WHERE: The “Joker Stairs” (West 167 Street, Bronx), the High Bridge from the Bronx to Manhattan, and the Highbridge Park stairs (Manhattan)
START: Yankee Stadium, the Bronx (161 Street subway station, 4 and D trains, fully accessible)
FINISH: 168 Street subway station (A and C trains, fully accessible; 1 train, not accessible)
DISTANCE: 2.3 miles (3.7 kilometers)
Photographs and video by Clarence Eckerson, Jr. Maps courtesy Google Maps.
Profile of today’s walk.
Saturday, October 30 started out cloudy with a good chance of rain, but by the time we gathered in front of Yankee Stadium, the sky cleared and gave us beautiful weather for this walk. I organized this walk to benefit Adapt Ability, a great organization that provides mobility solutions for children and provided my with an adaptive tricycle the previous two years. Accompanied by friends old and new, we climbed the “Joker Stairs” at West 167 Street (see my post from October 4, 2020) and then walked to and across the High Bridge, then up the stairs in Highbridge Park in Manhattan (see my post from May 31, 2021). The Joker Stairs have 132 steps; the Highbridge Park stairs, 96 steps. Before walking back to the subway, some of us celebrated the day and each other with lunch and drinks at a fine, unpretentious restaurant, Havana Heights, in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan.
Clarence Eckerson, Jr., the creative genius behind Streetfilms, took the video and still photographs that accompany this post. I cannot say how grateful I am for you to have made this visual record of a fine day.
The video and photographs in this post tell the story. November 4 will be the third anniversary of my stroke. I’m glad to be able to do what I do, and that is because so many people have helped me get here, some of whom joined me on this walk.
ONWARD!
Left: At the base of the Jerome Slope, West 165 Street at Jerome Avenue. These stairs will be on an upcoming walk. Right: Clarence going up the Joker Stairs.
At the top of the Joker Stairs, West 167 Street and Anderson Avenue.
Left: Walking across the High Bridge, with the soon-to-reopen High Bridge Water Tower in the background. Right: at the top of the Highbridge Park stairs.