New York – Arrival and Day 1

It was months ago when I first got the invitation to fly to New York, and I was over the moon; For some reason New York is always on my list of places I plan to travel again… but never at the top… and a friend’s wedding had pushed The City right to the top of the list. Jen and I are both lucky enough to know the same friend, and had both been invited to the wedding, it was time to start planning! New York can be expensive, and with all the food plans, museums, and tourist things that we wanted to do we were going to need a good amount of time and freedom. We got a reservation right away for late June (on the weekend of the wedding, of course) and found a pretty reasonable rate for a hotel right in the middle of Midtown. If you aren’t familiar with the layout of New York, you can find a good map of the “district” names here.

Midtown is right in the middle of everything from a tourism perspective, which makes it easy to get to things like Time Square and Central Park, the New York Public Library, and many other places of interest. I figured this was a good place to start, and Jen ended up picking the Roosevelt Hotel. The room was basic, beds,  four walls, a bathroom that was pretty tiny and a television set, but we weren’t here to stay in the room too much, so this worked just fine for us! With the reservation booked, all we had to do was wait for the time to come!

 

 

I left on a Thursday night, arriving just about as most of the city was closing down at LaGuardia Airport. It’s one of the few airports in the nation still that checks baggage claim tickets against what’s stuck to the luggage… and this caused some delay getting out of the airport as most did not keep their slip of paper (I do compulsively after having run into this check once. It either goes right in my wallet or into my carry-on), so that’s travel tip #1 for this adventure… always keep your baggage slip at least until you’ve gotten your luggage back! It’s invaluable, especially if a bag gets misplaced! There were signs and notices everywhere around the baggage claim warning of “fake” taxi drivers and services, saying things like “If someone is offering you a ride, they should not be! Stay safe!”, but shortly out the exit doors was the taxi station (with about a 30 minute wait) where a variety of private car services were attempting to drum up business by soliciting in the taxi line and pulling passengers out as they negotiated rates. It goes to show that this isn’t really a big problem… or the police would be controlling this or throwing out the offenders. Instead, the inefficiencies of the LaGuardia taxi agencies has created a sub-economy of private rides that the airport does nothing about because it eases their economic need. (For those keeping track, it’s also about twice as expensive… but it depends on how much your time is worth!)

 

I elected for a cab, and my trip into Midtown ended up being around $40. I had planned on taking cabs or Uber for most of the trip this time around (take the subway once while you’re in New York, I’m actually remiss because we didn’t end up doing this and I know Jen wanted to, but most people get enough experience with just one ride… so I planned taxi/Uber fare in the budget). Once at the hotel, check-in was a breeze and I headed down to the bar to wait for Jen. I knew I was in New York when my first shot of scotch cost $20, a price that would have bought me the entire bottle in Colorado (it wasn’t a ‘nice’ scotch after all!). I got some water to replace the salty tears my wallet was crying, and read a book that completely enthralled me entitled Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Soon Jen arrived (She flew into JFK airport, or we could have saved the cab fare together. I typically fly United and she flies Delta, competing airlines in the big city lead to competing airports). We shared a drink and caught up on the trip in, and our plans for the week. I begged off being tired, and we set an alarm for nice and early the next morning to get going!

 

I kept telling random strangers in the elevator that the Arcade button wasn’t as exiting as it sounded.

 

 

 

In case I haven’t mentioned it yet, it’s hot in New York, especially in Mid-June. A friend told me on the way in  “Welcome! It’s not stuffy here, that’s just New York.”, but I wasn’t at all prepared for the blast of heat and humidity that followed. The first night, we fiddled with the air conditioner and left it running but not set to “ice box”, and upon nearly a full night of no sleep I realized this probably wasn’t the best idea. I’m not sure if I was hot, or just anxious to get up and around… but either way the hours ticked by on the clock and I was awake for most of them. The next morning, the first thing on the list was coffee, and then a visit to Times Square. Midtown makes nearly everything accessible by foot if you want (about a half-mile to Time Square). I should mention here that Jen has never been to New York, and I’ve been before in the past and have done most of the touristy things, but I’m always glad to play tour guide and head around again! Time Square never changes much, though individual shops come and go, and we took our picture in the square before deciding to head up to Central Park. I was already sweaty from the heat, humidity, and a poor choice of clothing in heavy jeans and button-down shirts.

 

 

We continued on our self-driven sightseeing tour by heading up Broadway until we hit Central Park, and began to meander in and around the area… leaving the noise and bustle of the city behind us. Before I talk too much about it, a map may be beneficial here if you’re not familiar with the park!

 

We entered at the bottom-left circle on the map above, and walked by the Heckscher ball fields, Sheep Meadow, and ended up walking toward the center of the park and taking frequent bench breaks to just sit and take in the city, the people, the pets, and good conversation. Every time Jen and I get together we find new things to discuss, old things to revisit, and always pick up right where left off no matter how long it has been. It was good to take it slow! We stopped by “The Mall”, the wide-pathed iconic walkway from most movies in New York, and then walked to Bethesda Fountain to take some pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

We continued on our way up past Hans Christian Andersen’s statue, and spent some time by the Alice In Wonderland statues before exiting the park at 5th Avenue and 79th.

 

 

We had been meandering for quite a while now, and Jen very astutely pointed out we were now only blocks from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Not to be confused with MoMA, which is different!). I don’t know if she knew this at the time, but The Met is my favorite museum in the entire world. We first started heading the wrong way (Hey, it’s been 10 years since I’ve been there!), but we turned around and headed back to the road along the park, and got in line after taking in the fountains outside the Met and the food trucks for later perusal.

 

 

We spent hours in the Met, and I told stories about reading “From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler” (I have a weird history with New York, and insider knowledge about a few things from relationships and friends in my past), and falling in love with the museum for a number of reasons. The themes that accompany the art are part of why I love it so much… but the expanse of the exhibits helps, as does the atmosphere. The Met is oddly one of the most respectful museums I’ve ever been in, if that makes sense. Its prestige lends to the enjoyment of the entire experience, and every time I’m in New York this will always be a “must do” on my list, though I’ve learned that as of a few years ago they stopped giving metal pins as the entry tokens. This was extremely disappointing to me, even though I understand the reason and the expense.

 

 

After hours of walking around and enjoying the exhibits, we stopped at the cafe inside of The Met for coffee and then decided it was time for some street food on the way to the Natural History Museum, just across Central Park. After saying goodbye to the museum (and a quick jaunt through their tremendous gift shop), we headed out.

 

We’d grab lunch at the food carts, we decided, and then picnic in the park on the way. Jen grabbed a gyro, which was really the best choice, my chicken shish kebab was okay but tasted mostly like it was covered in barbecue sauce and was placed in a hotdog bun which made absolutely no sense to me. In the end, it was good to soak up the extra sauce though, so I’ll give them that!

 

 

We made our way back through the park, taking in the scenes and walking by Belvedere Castle before making our way into the museum. We bought tickets for the museum’s general admission, as well as the Planetarium section, and enjoyed the show “Dark Universe” about dark matter and its importance in the universe. We also saw the Titanosaur, which makes every other dinosaur skeleton I have ever seen seem small (Why does New York always do this to me?). Much like how New York made me realize how theater productions can be (I saw The Nutcracker, it has ruined all other performances of The Nutcracker for me), the museums show me how museums can and should be… New York does it right!

 

 

After another few hours of walking through the exhibits (that were actually somewhat similar to Denver, Colorado’s from a “big diorama” feel), we left the Natural History Museum, and decided we weren’t quite full and needed some refreshments to get through the rest of the day (I think I was getting grouchy, Jen always puts up with me though!). Our solution to this was to walk down Columbus Avenue until we found something interesting, and we ended up at a nearly-empty Italian restaurant called Pappardella where we refreshed with sangria and a meat/cheese plate. We’d done a lot on the list of “Must see” for New York that Jen had brought (she met a local on the plane ride in who suggested a great deal of things)… but we still have some good hours left in the day! We decided on seeing Charging Bull, and grabbed an Uber to the Financial District, and Wall Street.

The Uber driver dropped us off about a quarter-mile from the bull (my choice), and we walked through the lower Financial District enjoying the architecture and more “business-y” feel of Manhattan. Before long, we saw the statue in the distance, mobbed by people. Save for early morning, there is hardly a moment when Charging Bull is not surrounded by a crowd either just looking to lay their hand on the beast for luck, posing in front of the bull, or laying hands on its testicles (this is lucky, or so the lore goes). Jen and I worked out way to the front of the group and grabbed a few pictures, and then headed over to the recently-installed statue Defiant Girl so that Jen could get a picture with her as well. This was also a stop on my bucket list, I’d never been to Charging Bull before!

 

 

Given our presence on Wall Street, Jen mentioned we were near Freedom Tower and the the National September 11th Memorial at ground zero. We spent some time walking the streets and I had the first arepa I have ever eaten (definitely not the last, why can’t I find these on every street corner!?!). An arepa is two sweet corn patties with mozzarella cheese sandwiched between them. It was amazing!

 

 

 

We made our way to the 9/11 National Memorial, and it’s a moment I’ll treasure. I was nowhere near the attacks in 2001, but being a teenager at the time it was a defining time not only for the country but for my generation. Jen pointed out that we didn’t all lose someone on September 11th, but we’ve all lost since then. People from our schools, families, friends, all made life decisions based on that day. Some signing up for the armed forces… and some never coming home. The memorial is a fitting tribute a day that changed my world, and the future of my country forever. We did skip the museum though, somehow it just didn’t feel right to me.

 

 

 

For today we had one more thing from the “must see” list to do, and that was to get cannolis at what we’d been told was the best place for them, Veniero’s. We both ended up ordering three desserts (hey, we’d been walking all day!) and filled up on what would likely be a sugar-filled “dinner” replacement for the evening. The staff was friendly and the food was amazing (they really do have amazing cannolis!), and it was approaching eight o’clock when we left. Jen said the last thing she wanted to do was turn in early, and we briefly considered a movie, heading back to Time Square, and a few other options before ending up at Bar None, and enjoying some people watching and drinks. For the first time in years I was approached by someone of the same gender who wanted to know what I was doing later that night (Did I mention it is Pride weekend?)  and I lost all grace in an attempt to both thank him and tell him I’m not interested in that particular market, and ended up being more rude than I meant to! By that time, Jen and I were both getting ready to head out the door, and we returned to the hotel around 10:00 to rest up for the next day. We still had a lot more city to see!