Monday, March 19th

It is HOT in NY today and I hear there has been some snow at home. We have really been fortunate as the weather has been clear and warm other than one day when it drizzled for about an hour.

Last day before heading home tomorrow. I think we're all feeling ready to head home, it's been a busy week. Slept in a little bit today before grabbing the R train at Broadway & 28th heading into Union Square in the Gramercy and the Flatiron District. Union Sauare is a park that operates a green market on some week days. Tables set up selling homemade preserves, artwork and fresh fruits and vegetables.

Explored the area some more, again seeing some amazing buildings. Including stumbling upon the birthplace of Theodore Roosevelt. He was born here in 1848 and lived in this brownstone that was typical of the era until he was 15 years old.

Quick stop at Nordstrom Rack (had to, just could not resist) did find a pair of Merrells. More exploring the streets and taking in the sights.

Whats a trip to New York without coming upon some demonstration....

Started walking towards the Redhead Restaurant, found it but then learned they are only open for dinner. The fellow there recommended a few places for us including the Momofuku and the Milk Bar for dessert. Found them both but decided to keep walking and find something else. Ended up right on the border of Gramercy/East Village and ate at The Meatball Factory. While reading the menu outside a fellow came up to us and share a bit of history. The building used to be a pharmacy and was frequented by Margaret Hamilton who played the wicked witch of the west in The Wizard of Oz. This fellows Dad used to speak with her quite a bit. He also told us that Babe Ruth and Carey Grant lived in the area and would come to the pharmacy. Again, another great experience talking with a local and learning some history.

The Meatball Factory was an excellent choice. The place was opened by Top Chef Dave Martin in late 2011. Serves gourmet meatballs, sauces, pizzas and some pastas. Check put the article I found later: The Meatball Factory article

Went into the East Village and walked around some more heading toward the The Big Gay Ice Cream Shop. Another place recommended to us. Cole enjoyed the American Glob cone, Ian the Cococone (curried coconut) on the Icecream cone and Kyar a bowl of vanilla/chocolate twist. All said it was VERY good. Can you believe I forgot a picture...argh.

Big Gay Ice Cream Shop

Back to The Village for some more walking around. Came across an outdoor court where there were many people playing Basketball and Handball in the sun. Also found the real Gray Papaya....Cole and I shared the "recession special"' 2 dogs and a Papaya drink for $4.95. I can see why they are a favourite, cheap and pretty good.

Back on the 1 train to the hotel.....think about what to do this evening. It may involve just sleeping. LOL

Pizza for dinner...New York Style. Grimaldi's has been a favourite on the other side of the Brooklyn Bridge. Not sure why but they relocated that restaurant to Chelsea. Lucky for us! Was only a short walk at 20th Street and 6th Avenue. It was delicious!

Walking back to the hotel, I noticed again how much garbage is piled on the streets at night. It is gross. Bags and bags of garbage piled up ready for a night time pick up. I can't even begin to imagine how much garbage is produced on a week in NY. There doesn't seem to be any effort to recycle.

See what I mean.......ugly...

 

 

Sunday, March 18th

Started the day off with some bagels and a lox/cream cheese spread....Yum! NBC studio tour booked for 11:00AM so on to the subway again to get down to Rockefeller Center. Tour was fun, toured the Dr. Oz, Jimmy Fallon and Saturday Night Studios. Was fun to see where they film SNL as well as some of the costumes and photos taken over the years. It really isn't a big studio. A stage for the guest band where they have free rein to do what they want to it. Center stage for opening monologue and skits with simple props and the "wet" stage where more complex skits are done. Hot tubs, water, fake blood...whatever and it is left for next day clean up. All sets, make up and costume changes need to happen within 60 to 90 seconds, during commercial breaks as they are filming live with a zero second delay. Other "live" shows have a 7 second delay. Security screening when entering and no photography. So only a picture in the gift shop, located where you leave the tour of course!

Another stop at the NHL store....boys...argh. Interesting chandelier, all done with hockey sticks.

Spent some more time exploring back around our hotel and decided to hit Macy's. The first floor is very ornate and beautiful. The other floors quite ordinary. However the escalators were spectacular. The original wood and some of them still with wood treads instead of the metal we are used to. You could see the worn and patina wood along the side where thousands of people had rubbed along the wood while going up and down between the floors.

Hungry...it was recommended to try Bon Chon Korean restaurant for their chicken wings. They were delicious! Located on the corner of 33rd and 5th Avenue. Would definitely go there again.

Needed to try a Gray Papaya dog but having no luck. yet. This looked close until I can find the real thing. Wasn't that great....will continue the search for the real deal as they are very popular in NY.

Kitty corner was the Empire State Building. As I'm eating wings I'm looking at the map getting oriented and trying to figure out where it was thought it must be close. Once outside we realized it was across the street. It is very tall but fairly plane so unless looking closely it could be missed. Or maybe just by me. LOL

Back to the room to relax. On the go every day, was nice just to sit back and relax for a bit and figure out what to do on our last day tomorrow before heading out to dinner. Decided to explore Union Square tomorrow and head to Redhead Restaurant that was featured on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives. Then another walk to The Big Gay Ice Cream shop that was recommended by the receptionist when we were on the office tower of CollegeHumor. We get lots of advise of where to go and have found it to be very helpful. Should be a good day tomorrow.

Trip Advisor had great reviews for The Flying Puck restaurant (on 7th btw 30th & 31st) so that became our dinner choice. Was not disappointed, large portions and a great atmosphere. TV screens everywhere playing different NHL games. Different for the boys to be able to sit in a pub, so far we have found that minors are able to go to most pubs.

 

Saturday, March 17th - St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day is big in New York. Heading down to the parade this morning there were people everywhere all decked out in their St. Patrick's day gear. Really a day for wearing green and drinking! Decide to watch some of the parade up on 63rd area and get away from the crowds of Times Square. We found a good spot on 5th Avenue at 64th. What a nice area! Very close to Park Avenue.

The parade is all marching, no floats. We only stayed for a little bit. It starts at 11:00AM on 44th Ave and marches up 5th Ave to about 83rd and will end at about 4:00PM. We're all good to take in a parade but 5 hours?....not so much.

Park avenue....very lovely...mostly residential. Cool vine twisted through the balcony...

Quick stop in Times Squre to pick up a book Cole had on hold then back to the room to regroup. Our hotel has been great, on a fairly quiet street and close to Subway stations. In the day it is busy with wholesale and retail fresh and dried flower shops. At night they all close up and the street is quiet.

Craving another great deli sandwich. Decided Katz's in the Lower Eastside would be a great place for a late lunch. Back on the subway, maps ready to go...it was worth the trip. Food was delicious, however I still have to get used to paying $16 dollars for a sandwich. This deli is quite well known and has been around a very long time. When you enter you are given a ticket. You then have to line up at the counter and order what you want. The counter is crazy busy. They cut the meat and make the sandwich then mark your ticket with your total. You need to pay on the way out. If you don't have a ticket when you leave you will be charged $50. Every adult that comes in gets a ticket.

After lunch we finally found a bagel place where they sold the type of Bagel has been looking for. Very small little bakery that sold traditional Jewish sweets, spreads and lox.

Another beautiful sunny day, we decided to take advantage of the weather and do some more exploring. We ended up walking through Soho before moving into Little Italy. It is not as big as it apparently was in the past as Chinatown has been moving in more and more. It now mostly consists of restaurants, most of them with outdoor seating along Mott Street. Nonetheless, a very historic area with so much character. The old buildings are amazing, so much detail and history.

Little Italy becomes Chinatown along Mott street. Some interesting shops here but really a lot of shops selling cheap souvenirs. Thought maybe we might see a hanging duck or something...but nothing.

We hadn't walked enough today so thought walking across the Brooklyn Bridge would be a great idea. It was a good walk, we went to the middle and then came back as I had heard there isn't much directly on the other side other than a good pizza place. And we were stilled stuffed from lunch.

Making our way back to our hotel, we made another stop at Franklin to visit the Firehall again to buy the shirt Cole wanted.

They were there and we ended up staying for awhile and chatting. The fellow, Craig, we were speaking to was retired from this Firehall. He told us that he had seen many things in his career. The plane that went down in the Hudson river, a parachuter that got stuck in a building, the small plane that flew into a building and he was also there for Tower 1 and Tower 2 going down. He said that "who would have thought that in my career I would have seen Tower 1 and 2 come down." Also in this firehouse is a memorial to the Lieutenant that was one of the first responders. Quite an experince to meet someone and be in a place so connected to 9/11.

Got some great tips of what to do during our stay. Advice we got was to get off the island and visit other less expensive but beautiful parts of the city. Williamsborough, Astoria and taking the L train at 14th to Brooklyn to eat was recommended. It is always great talking to locals and maybe we can get to Brooklyn. Being our first trip we are doing the "touristy" things but we have balanced that with a lot of exploring. Another trip and we'll explore the other parts of NY.

Finished the day off with dinner at Mustang Harry's. Just around the corner from us on 7th. The front was a bar; full and loud with many people celebrating St. Patrick's Day. At the back the restaurant. Food was good. Had been wanting to try a vodka sauce as we had been seeing it on a lot of menus. So we had the "penne a la vodka". It was a tomato sauce with vodka and very good!

Kylar enjoying a lamb lollipop.

Mustang Harry's

 

Green for St. Patrick's Day:

 

 

Friday, March 16th

Back to the room for a rest, a beer and thinking about where to go for dinner. Wondering how far we walked today...how many kms can a person walk in 9 hours? Thinking a pedometer would have been a good idea, lots experienced today.......

 

Headed out just after 9AM as we had tickets reserved to see the 9/11 Memorial. Rode the subway, short walk to the site. There is still lots of construction going on and lots of security checks before you enter into the memorial. Looking into both pools was very surreal. Seeing the names engraved of all those that died was something I don't think I will ever forget. It is really hard to put Into words what it feels like being there. Looking around the site and thinking that the very same was happening that day on September 11th, 2001, people working, walking, just going about their lives and within an instant all that was known and familiar changed so tragically.

There is a Callery Pear tree there that is quite amazing. We read that after the attacks it was left behind, a 8ft stump. It was moved to another park and nursed back to health where it grew to be 30ft. In 2010 it was uprooted in a storm, but managed to survive. It was moved to WTC site in December 2010 and now "embodies the story of survival and resilience that is so important to the history of 9/11". Truly an amazing thing to see.

Spent some time walking around the Financial District, spoke to an officer outside the NYSE. It was surrounded with fencing and I was curious as to why. He told us that it has been that was since 9/11 and that it the way it is all around the Financial District. The public an no longer allowed to go into the important buildings. People that work there are checked and enter though security gates.

 

Cole was able to get to a collector's store and bought some stuff for his collections. Then back on the subway over to Hooks and Ladder Company #8...to buy a t-shirt, they must have been out on a call so will need to head back before going home. Next stop the Village. Loved this area, a lot quieter, great old buildings, small shops. Looked around Washington Square Park, a beautiful space, tables set up for those wanting to play a game of chess, places to sit and relax and just take a moment.

 

 

 

 

 

Two places we wanted to check out was Rocco's Italian Pastries and Joe's Pizza. Found them both and both were worth the trip. Pizza was true NY style and the cannoli's along with an Americano coffee......delicious!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figured out on the map we could walk to the High Line Park. We do lots of looking at maps and have done very well getting ourselves around and figuring out the Subway lines. High Line is a park that was developed from an abandoned elevated train. It is a great space to walk and take in the views of the city.

 

 

 

While on this walk Kylar recognized a building he had seen watching College Humour videos on YouTube (probably not age appropriate hahaha). We went down to check it out and confirmed this is their office space. Spoke with security and reception was kind enough to email an executive assistant she knew as typically no one is allowed upstairs unless you work there. If you know someone working there they need to come to the lobby and get you. Well, Jeff came down and took us for a tour of their office space. Kylar was thrilled. They were filming while we were there as well. He got to meet Kevin, Patrick, Jeff, Dave and Murphy. They were all so very kind and gracious taking the time to speak with Kylar and pose for pictures. Kylar said it was the highlight of his day.

 

So many things to see when walking around, most of the time walking forward we are looking up.

 

The Village..