King's Corner: NYC!

We took our first big trip as parents minus child this past weekend to NYC! I have never been before, and David has been once, so we squeezed in a lot of activity in four days. Little Boo stayed with Grandmother and Granddaddy and had a great time. (Next blog entry will be for her vacation.) David had to go for "work" - a conference to present a book chapter. Luckily for me, it was only scheduled for Friday until 4:00. Even better for me, due to low numbers, they decided to get through the papers quickly and they were done by noon. Woo-hoo - fun times!

Lots of folks asked what we did and our advice about what to do or skip during their trips, so here goes... (feel free to breeze through, if it's too much information.)

Day 1: Thursday afternoon/evening: Planned to do night boat cruise but two tornadoes touched down that night, so thankfully, we were eating pizza at Lombardi's in Little Italy instead. Great pizza - fresh mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil - yum. Walked around Soho, Greenwich Village, Union Square and NYU that evening. Interesting folks.

Day 2: Friday
David went to his conference, so I set off on my own. I went down to the South Street Seaport to get half price tickets for a Broadway show. I would HIGHLY suggest going to this TKTS location in the morning which opens at 11:00 AM versus going to the Times Square location which opens mid afternoon. I arrived about 10:00 AM and there was no line. It's pleasant to walk around the shops and I made a sweet friend in line. Turns out she's from Atlanta as well, so we had a lot to talk about while we waited for tickets.

Afternoon: Gray Line Bus tour, hop on and hop off. Great way to see the island quickly, though you hope to have a good guide. Our first one was great, our second one not so much. The good news is you can always get off and find another one. We saw the lower end of Manhattan first: Ground Zero, Wall Street, etc.

Friday night: Joe Allen's for dinner near Times Square. Good food, nice atmosphere and close to all theaters. Memphis Broadway show - amazing!! Loved the music and dancing. It just won 4 Tony awards, including best musical. It's set in the 1950s, Memphis and about the relationship between a black female singer and white DJ. Great soul and rock music. Then, walked through Times Square afterwards. I can't imagine being there for New Year's Eve - a little too crowded for my soul.

Saturday morning: Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We did reserve tickets for the ferry over, but I would suggest getting the flex tickets instead. (Their lines were shorter for security.) I felt a bit like an immigrant getting on and off the boats because they were so crowded, but I thought it was worth it. I would definitely suggest buying the audio tour to give you an idea of what you are seeing.

Saturday afternoon: Took subway to Brooklyn to eat at Calexico. They have a food cart in Soho, but there is generally a 30-40 minute wait (for a taco!) I heard about these guys on Martha Stewart and Yelp. We have high Mexican food standards after living in LA and Dallas, and it was worth the trip to Brooklyn. Yummy! Small restaurant, but we went mid afternoon, so it wasn't bad. We walked back over the Brooklyn Bridge - interesting. It was pretty warm and really crowded - watch out for the bikes!

Saturday night: exhausted, watched the Auburn game at night.

Sunday morning: Brunch at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill - yummy and worth going, if only for the bread basket.

Went back to Gray Line tour for Midtown and Upper Loop. We also moved hotels from Soho to Midtown, which was much better. It was much quieter up near the NY library and 5th avenue. We walked past all the major stores, including FAO Schwartz, which I loved!

Sunday night: 2 hour night boat cruise with Circle Line. Really nice and pretty - a little chilly on the water but it gives a great view from the water of Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Monday morning: Today show - a highlight. Anne and Al were really sweet and chatty. We also met an actress from the new NBC show, Chase, Kelly Giddish who's super cute and from Georgia!
Back up north of Central Park for David to see Columbia University and Riverside church.

Morning afternoon: flew home to our sweet baby girl!