If you are looking just for pictures, click
here. If you want the story, keep reading...
We stayed at the DoubleTree Guest Suites at 47th and 7th in Times Square. I highly recommend this place if you
have to stay in the City. the rooms were very quiet, the a/c worked great and the rooms were very spacious. Ana had gotten quite a discount due to her airline miles and hotel points.
View from the Hotel:
06/28/07:
Ana, Pepper and Shawn flew in from Tampa to Newburg, NY as their flights had been cancelled due to inclement weather. I flew in to LaGuardia by way of Washington DC for the same reasons.
At any rate we all got back to the Hotel around 7pm. We both had the pleasure of our neice and her boyfriend delivering us from our gates to the Hotel. Mike really should charge admission for his tours of NYC!
Upon arriving, I stopped at a street vendor and got a pretzle. which I had devoured about the time that Ana and crew showed up.
Check-in was a breeze and we all got the famouse cookies.
We started out the night by eating with Shawn and Pepper's
friend Jeff, his Gail, daughter Alissa and friend Damon. We went to Benihana on 56th
in Midtown. While I am not a huge fan of habachi (or asian cusine at all) the
food and company were great!
After dinner, we headed east for some night time sight seeing
in the city. Our first stop was 5th Avenue. We strolled down 5th avenue,
stopping for shots at St. Patrick's and Rockefeller Center.
After going into the Rockefeller Center to see if the "Top of the
Rock" was still open (it wasn't), we headed back down to Times Square.
The place was packed. We stopped in the Hershey's chocolate store and
strolled along Broadway. Being the MINI freak that I am, I couldn't help but
stop for this picture:
Yes, Hammer and Coop. At any rate I took Pepper and Shawn subterranian, via
the Subway. Since the Shuttle to Grand Central doesn't run after midnight, we
took the 7 train over instead.
Ana snapped some shots of some of the lighting fixtures in Grand Central
while we were there. It was crazy how empty the place was (aside from the NYPD
presence).
At any rate, at this point we were done. We stopped and picked up some candy
and headed back to our Hotel.
06/29/07: Pepper
and Shawn had only a few hours on Friday morning, so I took them on a rather
whirlwind tour of the city.
Breakfast:
We stopped at a small bagel shop on 45th, Times
Square Bagels. We went for the obligatory bacon, egg and cheese on a roll and
some coffee. We stood outside hotel across the street and used their flower
planters for our tables.
From here we took the R to the 23rd Street Station. We got out right next to
the Flatiron Building. Since some people seem not to know, the Flatiron Building
looks like a "flat
iron" from the sky, hence the name.
Afterwards, we took the R back up to 34th and Broadway to - you guessed it,
the worlds largest store, Macy's Herald Square. 10 Stories (9+basement) of
shopping...
Next, we travelled back up the R over to Central Park and 5th. We walked
passed the mobs at the Apple store who were there for that morning's release of
the iPhone, and then into FAO Schwartz.
Of course I had to get the shot of the Piano Tom Hanks made famous in Big...
At this point, Pepper and Shawn needed to get back to the Hotel. We took them
back and then Headed out to Coney Island.
For those keeping track at home:
Ok, so we headed out for Hot Dogs in Coney Island. Nathan's
Hot Dog'sto be specific. This is the real deal, the original Nathan's
Hot Dogs! They had not began to setup yet for the 4th of July hot dog eating
contest yet. Google
Map of Coney Island.
Here are a few shots from Coney Island:
There isn't much left to it anymore, everything is going away slowly to make
way for Condos.
From Coney Island we hopped on the D train up to 79th Street and walked the 2
blocks to Jessica's place.
Dinner:
3 Hour Tour....At least they were on a boat. We left Jessica's
house around 3:45 to go up to Danny's house in Peekskill. 3 hours later we
arrived.
Danny took us all to a quaint little Italian place in Peekskill, I can't remember the name of it offhand but it was good! I had the veal parmesan sandwich and some Italian nachos.
06/30/07:
We woke up a little late and were going to have breakfast at
Maxie's but we decided against $15 3 eggs omelets. Instead we hopped on a train
and headed down to Little Italy. Being that it was around 11:45 we decided to
stop for lunch. We tried a new placed called Novella, it was pretty damn good.
They had an amazing sangria. We started with a cold antipasti plate that had
mortadella, asiago, parmesan, capicolla and some other meats. They brought out
some wonderful Italian bread to go with it. Ana and I both had Panini
sandwiches, I had the veal and she had the chicken. Both were out of this
world.
Ok, the veal is good, but we had to stop by dessert heaven. This would be
better know as Ferrara's, located on Grand between Mulberry and Mott.
I'll let the pictures do the talking....
Seriously, you can order online from them :) Check
it out!
Ok, now that we were stuffed, we went shopping down near NYU for those that
are wondering, we walked down Broadway and continued on past Houston (pronounced
Howston.)
Here is a few from in the subway:
We finished up shopping and headed back to the Hotel. We ended up making a
quick side trip to the Gap store to pickup some jeans and a shirt.
Then the night got more entertaining. Jessica and Mike arrived and the women
decided they were going to "run down" to Sephora and get some makeup
and leave us in the Double Tree's bar. Bad move. Mike and I proceeded to drink
up a $100 bar tab, and our barkeep Alex was even tossing us free drinks from
time to time. 2 Hours later Jessica and Ana came to retrieve us. We headed down
to Planet Hollywood where we had some awesome LA Lasagna, and Texas Nachos.
Amazing. (we also downed 2 terminators - doht!)
From Planet Hollywood we took the subway down to the "Dirty Disco"
and drank and danced the night away.
At any rate, we had to head home. It was about 4:00 when we got to the subway
station, which, was filled with some interesting people to say the least.
07/01/07:
Shawn set the alarm for 8:00. Which meant I got up at 8:00. Did I
mention my stomach was reminding me that drinking heavily is bad? At least I
didn't have a headache.
At any rate, we all finally got motivated around 10:30. We headed out and had
lunch at the Brooklyn Dinner. This
was not your typical diner, but the food was a welcome addition to my stomach
this day. Nice toast and 3 eggs and coffee got me up and running.
From here we took the subway down to Chambers Street and walked down
Broadway, stopping to see City Hall, the Woolworth Building and then onto Ground
Zero.
From here we continued down Broadway to Wall Street. We took pictures of Isamu Noguchi's Red Cube, 1968,
and Trinity Church.
Look at these striking dudes:
Trinity Church:
On down to Wall Street. Lots of Amazing history down here. Snagged a shot of
the place where George Washington was inaugurated (back when NYC was the Nations
Capitol) and some pictures of the NYSE and some of the Federal buildings.
From here we strolled down to the Brooklyn Bridge and walked out to the first
pillar. On our way back we grabbed a cab to take us up to Pier 83, we had a 2:30
spot for the Circle Line Cruise of New York Harbor.
The next group of pictures were all taken from the water (to see them all you
can go to the pictures link at the top of the page)
At this point the camera had died, so that was the end of the pictures for
the time being.
Dinner:
We ate dinner at Carmine's Time Square, a great Italian restaurant. Damon
joined us again for dinner tonight as we celebrated Shawn's 500th birthday.
Looks great for his age.
Afterwards, I was exhausted and went back to the hotel to sleep while the
others went to the Top of the Rock, an Observation deck at the top of
Rockefeller Center.
07/02/07:
Another crazy day! For breakfast again we started out at the
Times Square Bagel Company. We had to really move it along to see everything we
were going to see within the next 2 days. As the group will tell you, I kept the
pace pretty intense.
So we decided to go to the Empire State Building. That was OK, except 2,000
others decided to do the same. I made an executive decision to skip it, and go
on to the next attraction. We would agree to return at 7:30 the next
morning.
A short subway ride up the Upper East Side, we got out at 86th and Lexington
and walked east to the Guggenheim. Apparently they were renovating it so you
really could not see the outside very well. Frank Lloyd Wright would have been
mad!
At any rate, I didn't think the museum was that great. They did let us take
some pictures on the first floor, but that was about it. Be sure to ask Shawn
about the fat, naked, running, Japanese guy in one of the displays. Makes you
want to burn out your eyes.
At any rate here are a few pictures:
From the Guggenheim we traversed Central Park. I almost got lost, but managed
to find our way again just listening for traffic.
Our next destination was to be the Museum of Natural History.
We left the Museum of Natural history and headed down to Little Italy for
some snacks from Ferrara's.
We got back to the hotel and got cleaned up, as we had to be at the
Ambassador theater for an 8:00 Broadway performance of "Chicago."
Tonight Lisa Rinna played Roxie Hart and her husband Harry Hamlin played Billy
Flynn. What an amazing show. I highly recommend attending a Broadway show
anytime you are in NYC.
Dinner:
We stopped for a late dinner at Lindy's
on 53rd a supposedly great place, but we weren't too impressed. As with just
about anything in the Theater District it was expensive. $18 for a hamburger!
Afterwards, we retired our tired feet to the hotel.
07/03/07:
Feels like you have to leave an old friend behind when you
know you have to leave the city.
At any rate we got up early and headed down to the Empire State Building.
Amazing, no lines, no waiting! 86 stories up we went.
Here are the pictures and one small video:
After we finished at the ESB, we headed down to Kossar's to get
some of their famous Biyali's. They are phenomenal. From here we walked down to
Canal Street, taking the dime tour through Chinatown. We stopped in Little Italy
so that we could grab cappuccinos and then head down to Coney Island again.
We stopped at Nathan's and had some of their tasty Hot Dogs and
Cheese fries, walked a bit of the old boardwalk at Coney Island. At this point
they were setting up the stage for the hot dog eating contest that was to go on
the next day.
We then rode all the way back to Times Sqaure (note, take the D
train to Pacific Station and the N to 47th) as this is the quick way back to
Midtown. Of course we had to get back on the train with luggage in tow since Ana
was going to stay another 2 days and Jessica was taking me to LGA. We said
goodbye to Shawn and Pepper as they were taking the shuttle back to Newark.
As I mentioned, it is always with sorrow I leave the city. Ana
and I did scope out some potential areas we wouldn't mind living in up there, be
it Manhattan, Brooklyn or Westchester.
Hope you enjoyed the pictures and stories as much as I enjoyed
being there.
Shawn, Pepper, Mike, Jessica, thanks for all the fun we had with
you all while we were up there.
