Day 15 - New York City
The weather wasn’t great when we woke up, drizzly rain and overcast. Still, we decided to make the most of it and set off towards Bloomingdale’s to get out of the rain! Although the colder season has just finished here, we were having trouble finding warmer clothes that we could take back to Australia for winter. We did eventually find some discounted bits and pieces, as well as a nice Burberry scarf for Katie. I found a nice pair of gloves in a shop nearby which will be appreciated while waiting for the train throughout winter!
We then made our way downtown towards the East Village and met up with Kyle, an old friend of Katie’s. Together, we went out for some brunch nearby, then took a walking tour led by Kyle through the East Village, the West Village and the Meatpacking district. We then walked along the High Line, a disused raised railway line that has recently been turned into a park. Katie was very excited at one point during the walk when Kyle told us that we were walking past Liv Tyler’s house!
It was a great walk and was fantastic to see yet another part of the city. We said farewell to Kyle and headed back uptown, back to more familiar territory on 5th Avenue - Tiffany & Co. to be precise! Katie found a beautiful bracelet to remind her of our honeymoon and left the store a happy newlywed.
That night, we had tickets to see a play in the theatre next to our apartment, the Walter Kerr. The play was ‘The House of Blue Leaves’ and starred Ben Stiller, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Edie Falco. It was excellent - quite funny, although a bit dark at times, and we thought that all the performances were fantastic. Between the two plays we saw during the week, this was our pick.
We grabbed some pizza to have with champagne at home after the show, then had the sad task of starting to pack, as it was our last night in New York…
Katie and Ann in Times Square
New York Public Library
Day 14 - New York City
Today we headed out for a spot of shopping on 5th Avenue. We picked up a nice bag for my 30th (and another on, just because) and then I wandered around Bloomingdale’s for a few hours. Meanwhile, Simon headed to the New York Public Library and spent some time wandering the reading rooms. He then headed to Little Italy and grabbed a pizza from Lombardi’s. He got a few comments from people on the train as he brought the hot pizza back to our apartment! We enjoyed a bit of yummy pizza before heading to Banana Republic to stock up on some winter clothes for Simon.
We then came home to get ready for dinner with one of my high school friends, Ann Card! She has been working in London for the past two years and is over in NY (and Las Vegas) for a holiday with her boyfriend Luke and brother Dave. I was soo super excited to see her! We went to Ruby Foos for a yummy dim sum dinner then checked out Times Square. They had been awake for 24 hours due to the time difference, so we were very impressed they made it to dinner!
Next to the stage at Iridium
Grand Central Terminus
Katie on the Brooklyn Bridge
Day 13 - New York City
Today we thought we’d tackle the Brooklyn Bridge. The sun was shining and although it was quite crisp, it was a nice enough day. Refreshing is a positive word. :)
We got the train to the bridge and walked across. It has the most amazing views of Manhattan and surrounds. It’s pretty amazing that the Manhattan tower of the bridge is just sitting on sand! Simon is constantly comparing everything to computer games he’s played set in NY. “it takes heaps longer to walk across here in the game” haha. Once across, Simon was keen to find Grimaldi’s, a well know pizza store. On approach we weren’t surprised to find yet another queue. I’m pretty much over waiting in queues. The take away line was the same line as the eat in so there was no escape! There didn’t seem to be much organization to the line and there were some pretty annoyed large groups still waiting for tables an hour or so later. The pizza was good, the cheese probably the highlight but I certainly wouldn’t line up for it again!
We scoffed down our pizza at a port under the Brooklyn Bridge then thought about how we were going to tackle our next mission: to get Craig some chocolate from the Mast Brothers’ factory in Brooklyn. After wandering along the water not really knowing where we were, we thought a taxi was our best bet. We found the chocolate factory in an interesting part of Brooklyn. The guy serving us was very ‘happy’ and his mates were outside playing on their skateboards. Life’s good for them! We got the choc Craig requested then strolled through a suburban part of Brooklyn looking for a metro station. Simon loved the contrast from the hustle n bustle of NYC. He found a bagel store (hard to resist) before we finally found a train headed for Manhattan.
Once back, we decided to go check out Grand Central Terminus and surrounds. I hadn’t been to Bryant Park before - looks like a nice place to relax and have an after-work drink. I know it of course from Project Runway and fashion week. :)
We then rushed back home in time to get to the Iridium Jazz Bar where we had booked a table for the night. It was a dimly lit, underground jazz bar- very fun! We saw Marc Ribot and band play from our front-row seats - they were very good. Great night and looking forward to some shopping tomorrow… hope the shops are open! :)
I thought Katie was joking when we dropped by the gift shop…
Day 12 - New York City
Today’s goal was to get out to have a look at the Statue of Liberty, so we set off all the way downtown to the ferries at Battery Park. There was a one-hour queue for tickets, followed by a two-hour queue for security, which were a bit daunting until Katie had the good idea of one of us lining up in each queue at the start - genius!
After queuing like cattle for a few hours and going through security, we finally ended up on the ferry heading out into the bay. It was a foggy day, but still gave us great views of the Statue as we arrived at Liberty Island. The weather cleared a bit as we were wandering around the island and we took plenty of photos of the Statue and the Manhattan skyline.
A few hours later, we were back on the ferry that next stopped at Ellis Island. We decided not to stop off there as, once again, there were queues to get on and off the ferry. We stayed on and were soon back at Battery Park.
All trip, we were looking forward to the evening and our booking at Daniel, one of the five three-Michelin-starred restaurants in New York. We ventured into the upper-east side and found the place easily. The restaurant was beautiful, decorated with flowers throughout and was arranged like a big dining room with plenty of service and no music. We had a corner seat and could look over the whole room.
We started with some champagne, although they no longer served Katie’s favourite, we managed to find a pretty good replacement with the help of the sommelier. We settled on the three-course option, but everything on the menu looked amazing. The appetiser from the kitchen was an ‘homage to peas’, including a pea puree and a small lobster salad. That was followed by our entrees: Katie had the peekytoe crab salad and I had the wild herb ravioli with ricotta. Then the main event: my ‘trio of milk fed pig from Quebec’ was outclassed by Katie’s ‘duo of beef’ - although both were simply amazing and were accompanied by a beautiful bottle of Corton-Pougets burgundy. Dessert, though, was still to come… I ordered the blackberry and fromage blanc vacherin, while Katie ordered the ‘warm guanaja chocolate coolant, with liquid caramel, fleur de sel and milk sorbet’. In addition to these amazing dishes, the kitchen also offered freshly-cooked madelines and a range of tiny flavour-infused chocolates with our coffee and espresso martini. Pretty much a perfect meal if you ask us!
We reluctantly left Daniel and headed south, wandering down Madison Avenue. We didn’t’ get too far before we thought we’d drop into the bar at Gilt for a nightcap or two. A couple of cocktails later, we continued window-shopping down 5th Avenue until we got to the theatre next to our apartment building. There was a crowd gathering out the front, so we had a look to see what the commotion was - Ben Stiller was just to leave from the stage door and we hung around for a few minutes to watch him come out to his car and sign a few autographs on the way. We’ll see him in action when we go to see his play on Saturday night!
