New York City

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Emmanuel and I slipped away from the kids for a couple days to visit NYC. It's only about 2 hours away, but leaving the kids always takes loads of planning! Many thanks to Mom, Grandma, John, Katie and Amy for their help.

Wednesday:

Arrive via Megabus to Manhattan.

Take Subway to Brooklyn to our super-chic Park Slope apartment. (The smell of pizza intoxicates me getting off the Subway.)

First we dropped the gear off at apartment, and then we went to the Food Co-op for a tour of the place. These food co-ops are pretty popular in NYC. The whole organic/natural/grass-fed/local foods movement was very established and booming in NYC - I found much hope in this - perhaps a window into 10 years later in the rest of the US?

After the co-op, we went back to eat some of that Subway pizza!

Back to Manhattan to pick up Daily Show tickets.

We have 2 hours to spare, so we quick take a

taxi see the LDS temple, then peek at Central Park.

Then back to Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

Next on our way to

dinner we get sucked into a random massage by a Chinese couple and then enjoy dinner in Chinatown.

Last we return to apartment with intent to go back to neighboring Little Italy for cannoli. As I told Emmanuel...all of the activities are just to fill the time up in-between meals...the food is really why we're here!

Thursday:

Sleep in! No kids to wake us up!

For brunch we drank some fresh vegetable juice at local juice bar in Park Slope (Brooklyn), and then took the Subway to L

ittle Italy for lunch at the infamous Lombardi's.

Afterward we found those cannolis in Little Italy in pastry shop...and wow were they worth the walk.

Next we spent a few hours in the Natural History Museum. We really enjoyed the section about the human body and evolution. We agreed we could spend the whole day in this museum.

Next we walked (width-wise) through Central Park (see photo) to get to the Guggenheim Museum. Too bad we didn't have time to go in. Awesome place.

And our last stop for Thursday was of course dinner. We ate at this Turkish restaurant called Beyoglu. We ha

d the best hummus I've ever tasted with the best flat bread I've ever tasted (more like focaccia).

On the way home this night we did a little shopping at Urban Outfitters and tried on some funky glasses (see FB pics) and I bought a cool dress.

Friday

Sad to wake up because we are sad we are leaving! But I really miss the kids, so it's okay with me :)

We headed off to Blue Sky Bakery and picked up some muffins to bring home to our kind babysitters. Then we took the Subway to Chelsea in Manhattan and walked the streets from there to Penn Station. Chelsea is a pretty cool neighborhood - I mean any neioghborhood with a Whole Foods Market is going to have a progressive vibe to it - but we found a grass-fed burger joint!? Is this earth? So yes, we had to stop and eat lunch there. Here is the evidence that a grass-fed burger joint exists <<

We got a lot accomplished in the 2 -1/2 days we were there and we quite satisfied with what we got to see and eat. Emmanuel is a super-talented city boy with unprecedented map and people skills. What a great person to travel with! But I must say, it was a lot of walking! Wow did I sleep like a baby those 3 nights. But I'd do it again in a heartbeat!