Category: Life

Okay so a bit more about New York.

Dining:
Every year we like to go to a nice restaurant for our big dinner out on the Saturday. Last year we went to Bellavitae. I loved the food there. This year we went to Perilla and the food was also very good. The chef, Harold Dieterle is a Top Chef winner.

I’m usually the one who suggests the restaurant. I scour the internet and talk to friends to get ideas. Usually I book several weeks in advance but this time I didn’t try to make reservations until about 10 days beforehand. I don’t advise this…we had to dine at 5:45 pm. That’s early! Thank goodness Perilla had that time — the other 5 places I contacted had nothing at all. So that was lucky and we had a wonderful meal.

We also had a fantastic lunch in the Meat Packing District (MPD) at Los Dados. There was also a terrific unplanned brunch at the Rocking Horse Cafe. What’s interesting is that the chef at Los Dados was previously the chef at the Rocking Horse Cafe — I just discovered this researching this post.

Theatre:
The entire group sees one play during our trip — this year it was Boeing-Boeing. I’m very fond of plays as is J, so we tend to squeeze another in. This year we saw Good Boys and True as well. We also went to a dance thing at the Joyce Theater. We saw a performance by Momix, a company of dancer-illusionists under the direction of Moses Pendleton.

Neighbourhoods:
We spend an interesting afternoon in the MPD but I could not fully enjoy it as I hurt my knee earlier that morning in DSW. Just how I did this is rather unclear (there was no specific incident —a tripping accident or a fall — that I can point to) but I think it had to do with stomping around for hours and hours on concrete in a shoe lacking support (but not style). I did manage to get a tensor bandage at CVS and I wrapped in around my sore knee later that afternoon in a bathroom at the Guggenheim.

Museums Visited:

• the Guggenheim
• the Metropolitan Museum of Art (with a special visit to the Roof Garden)
• and the New Museum

Okay, so that’s not all we did but those are the highlights. And yes, this is probably my most boring post ever. New York was fun — trying to write about it; not so much.

Okay, so I’m back from New York. I went with 3 friends: A, E and J. J, however has requested I refer to her as Carm in this posting — I think this is in honour of the Sopranos as we flew into Newark Liberty International Airport.

My companions suggested I post all of our activities so that others can get ideas about planning a trip to New York. I strongly suspect that I don’t get many travel research hits but what the hell.

Thursday:

• Carm and I flew out of the Toronto Island Airport on Porter Airlines. Porter is very civilized and the entire check in process was swift and painless. Even the wait was pleasant as Porter provides free coffee and snacks. A variety store (for magazines and a wider variety of snacks) would’ve been a nice addition but I don’t the airport gets enough traffic to make it viable.
• The plane was small — a Q400 turboprop — but quite comfortable as there were only two seats per row instead of the usual three per row, which is a recipe for discomfort.

  

The plan ride was a bit more bumpy than I expected. Just after we began our descent, Carm started to feel nauseated. I think it was because we were playing hangman. (Incidentally, I lost very badly). I offered to give Carm the window seat so she could look at the horizon. (I’m a very thoughtful friend). That helped a little but I then began to feel like I needed some Gravol myself. I steeled myself until we landed in Newark.

There was long wait to get through customs (that happens in New Jersey on Porter flights) but the other members of out travel posse (who arrived quite early in the morning) said they breezed through quickly as the airport was empty.

We were not sure about the best way to get from the airport to New York. Usually we take a cab (when we land at LaGuardia Airport) but we thought we might take the AirTrain-Amtrak service.

Not the best choice. One can travel from from Newark to Penn Station in about 30 minutes but Penn station at the height of rush hour (when we arrived) is no picnic. The line-up for cabs was very long so we decided to walk to our hotel at Lexington and 51st — this took us over an hour. A long, sweaty and unpleasant hour.

Perhaps a better choice (the one A and E opted for) might have been the Newark Liberty Airport Express coach.

So anyway, Carm and I got to our hotel, flopped on our beds and promptly fell asleep…

Nope — we both needed a nap — but we grabbed a snack and got ready to go see a play. We were in New York! We were going out!

We saw Good Boys and True at the Second Stage Theatre — an “Off-Broadway institution dedicated to developing plays, artists and audiences.” I always research what’s playing there when I go to New York.

Second Stage Theater

After the play we walked back to the hotel and checked in with A and E by telephone. They thought we were in the room adjoining theirs (as I had requested) and had knocked a few times to see if we had arrived yet. We were actually one floor above them as the hotel was not able to fulfill my special request. They stopped knocking on the door (much to the relief of the Finnish tourists I imagined were in there) and we made plans to meet up the next day for breakfast.

Then Carm and I went to sleep…