Friday, October 5, 2012

New York City

Well, it’s been a while hasn’t it?
Wife and I had a fantastic time in New York.  No Rox, we didn’t get to see Fallon, but we were pretty occupied.  Here’s a quick rundown:

Seton Hotel – Nice, cheap, clean.  Shared bathroom, but otherwise perfect.
The Moth: “Grudge story-slam”  - Competitive storytelling?  AWESOME.
Breakfast at Bloom’s Diner – adequate breakfast
Escorted bike-ride through Central Park – Beautiful park, lots of history, a great time.
Museum of Arts & Design – Crappy art and no design.  Waste of time.
Lunch in Central Park - Relaxing
Guggenheim Museum – A letdown.  The rotunda was closed, and the rest of the exhibits were artists we didn’t particularly like.
FAO Schwartz/ FAO Schweetz – Giant toy store and candy shop?  Cool.
Broadway: “The Book Of Mormon”  - Hilarious
Connolly’s Pub – Pub dinner.  Beer and meat. What else would you expect?
Observation Deck of The Rockefeller Center after dark. - No lineups at 11pm, beautiful views of Manhattan and Central Park.
Breakfast at Cipriani’s – cheap diner breakfast, okay.
Museum of Modern Art – Not bad, but I really expected more from the MoMA, I’m just not sure what.
OldCastle Irish Pub – crap food, but the beer was good.
Museum of Sex – Boring.  I don’t care about the American “shock value.” I live in urban Toronto, Canada, where most of this stuff is pretty commonplace.  The political and historical significance of sex would have made for a much more interesting afternoon.
Show: “Sleep No More,” McKittrick Hotel – Not bad.  Not as creepy as I’d expected, but a great endeavor nonetheless.
Metropolitan Museum of Art – My favourite.  Next time we go to NYC, we’re spending a full day here.
The American Museum of Natural History.  - Not bad.  The gallery of musical instruments was really entertaining.
Walk the "High Line" elevated park.  – Nice.  It’s a park.
Tortilla Flats – Crap food.  I’ve never had BAKED beans and no cheese with a burrito.  Beer was good.
Shearwater Cruise through New York Harbour – Fun, we got great views of the city and the Statue of Liberty.  Big waves too.  My sailor geekness kicked in when they started the motor instead of trimming the sails properly…
Observation Deck at the Empire State Building – was foggy, we didn’t get to see anything.
Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge – Beautiful day, beautiful views.
Lunch at reBar in DUMBO – Great pub, and the neighbourhood has really gentrified since I worked there 11 years ago.
Walk across the Manhattan Bridge – Nice views, but not as nice as the Brooklyn Bridge – the subway trains raced by a couple of feet from our heads so it was really loud.
New Museum of Contemporary Art – had a great exhibit on Bowery artists from 1969-1989, when the artists were really synched with the punk bands from the scene. LOVED it.
Broadway: “Grace” – Hilarous:  Ed Asner, Paul Rudd, Michael Shannon, and Kate Arrington
Broadway Joe’s Steakhouse – was okay.  We were surprised that so many of the restaurants around Times Square shut down at 11 on a Friday night.
Breakfast at Smitty’s Diner – greasy diner breakfast.  Yum.

All that in 5 days!  And here’s a pic of the Upper East Side, from across the Reservoir in Central Park.  So peaceful…

2 comments:

  1. I'm still stuck on the shared bathroom! LOL!

    Sounds like you had a jam-packed visit! I can't wait to go someday go there. I'll make sure to double check this post before I make my plans.

    Glad you're back!

    ReplyDelete
  2. The shared bathroom was a worry for me, i'm pretty squeamish about things like that. It was surprisingly clean, and realistically is no less hygienic than any "in-room" washroom at a hotel.

    ReplyDelete