We arrived in NYC around 4 pm Friday afternoon. The crazy thing was, it was already dark by 4:30. So what was really 5pm felt like 8pm. I'm guessing it's because of all of the tall skyscrapers and such. Anyway, it was breathtaking. All of it. I've been to New York twice before and stayed on Times Square both times, and still the sights/sounds/smells never cease to amaze me. You truly feel like you're in a whole different world. Anyway, with all of the traveling we were hungry, so needless to say, we found a local burger joint in a side street off of Times Square and had a drink while munching on buffalo wings. Afterwards, we were ready to explore. We ended up walking. We did A LOT of walking. I have finally figured out how Gisele, Miranda, Alessandra, and the other Victoria Secret baby mamas are able to shed the baby pounds in enough time to fit into a diamond-encrusted bra and panty set for the Christmas Fashion Show: they live in NYC and walk everywhere! Geez. If I lived there I'd be a freakin' size 4. Well, maybe not, but I'd definitely be a size 6! (wink!)
Anyway, we walked over to Rockefeller Center and saw the huge Christmas tree. Breathtaking. Walked all the way to Radio City Music Hall. Beautiful. The Christmas decorations were massive. We ended up stopping at an Irish Pub for dinner, and then headed back to our room to warm up, and take a break before our next outing. It was only 7pm but felt like 10 pm! After gearing up for a second outing with a cup of coffee, we were ready. The plan was to hop on the subway to head further downtown to see the Empire State Building. (As a side note, we didn't take cabs at all. Well, I take that back, we took one cab ride from the airport to our hotel. It was $60. At that point, we decided we'd either walk everywhere, or take a page out of JLo's book and hop "On the 6." Ha!) This is where the planning should have been better. You see, if you don't study a NYC Subway map before hopping on said subway you will be confused. As hell. Adam and I bought MetroCards, then hopped on a random train thinking it would take us to our destination and we ended up in freakin' Brooklyn. Um, no thank you. After an hour spent walking around the Subway station trying to get our bearings, we agreed to start over Saturday, and made the trek back to our hotel.
The next morning we were ready to take on New York. Once we had gotten back to the hotel the night before, we made a plan: wrote down everywhere we wanted to go, the train(s) we needed to take, and the paths we needed to walk. We learned that once you get the hang of the subway system, it becomes A LOT easier. Our fist stop: SoHo/Tribeca. We headed to Bubby's for breakfast per my in-laws recommendation. I'm so glad we did because it was delicious. All organic. All "free-range" this, and "fair-trade" that. We split a breakfast plate of pancakes, eggs, and bacon and we both agreed that the pancakes were better than any IHOP combo we'd ever had. After we left, we walked at least two miles, if not three, to (you guessed it) Dash- the Kardashian baby. Upon hitting Spring Street (their boutique location) I immediately broke out into a sweat, and my heart started thumping like it was going to pop out of my chest. "What if Kimye's in there? What if Kourtney has those presh babes in there? What am I going to do??!" I was freaking out. FYI, as celebrity-obsessed as I am, I'm not the psychotic fan that's going to attack you. I'm the psychotic fan that cries and has a panic attack when I see you. I honestly don't know which is worse.
The doorman (who oddly looked just as excited as I was to be at a Kardashian shop- stalker.) opened the door for us and there we were, in Kardashian territory. And I was unimpressed. The clothes were beautiful; you definitely could tell which sister picked out which piece. The prices were weird, though. You would pick out a dress thinking it was going to be $700 and it'd be $300. On the other hand, I found just a simple white tee with Dash embroidered on the front and it was sixty freakin' bucks. What??! Knowing that it was one wash cycle away from shrinking I put it down and walked out the door. Again, I was not impressed. Not impressed with their super smug employees and not impressed with their weird prices. The one thing I regret is not getting a picture of the store. I was so frazzled! Moving on...
We left from there and made our way to the Financial District in Manhattan. We were both wanting to see the World Trade Center Towers and how much was rebuilt. It is still a very somber place. So much has been rebuilt, yet so much still needs to be done. I just kept on seeing the pictures in my head of these terrified people running down those same streets 11 years ago as I walked in the very same location. We didn't have passes to the World Trade Memorial, but I was glad that I finally got to see the rebuilding of these massive buildings. It truly was extraordinary.
Since we had basically done everything we wanted to do in the SoHo/Tribeca area (which is so utterly cool by the way) we got back on the subway and headed uptown to Fifth Avenue. We went from an area where the locals/celebs live and hang out that's not crowded at all to an area where we were once again shoulder to shoulder with every other person. Major switch-up! We walked past Harry Winston, the St Regis Hotel, the Trump Towers, Bergdorf Goodman, The Plaza. Ahhh.....I felt like I was in a movie. Absolutely amazing. We stopped at FAO Schwarz and picked Aaron up a collector's box of Hot Wheels. Talk about panic attack. FAO is HUGE (2 stories large) and there were no less than a 700 people in the store- no kidding. I totally felt like I was in the Hunger Games arena Adam and I walked out breathless, sweating, and grateful we were still alive. Where's the Xanax when you need it?
At that point we headed straight to Central Park. Ahhh....paradise. It was as beautiful and peaceful as it looks in the movies. As soon as Adam and I got there I started crying. I don't know if it was because we had just escaped the zoo at FAO, or because it was so amazingly gorgeous, or even because I felt so incredibly blessed, probably all three of those things to be honest, but in that moment I felt like the luckiest girl on the planet. It was my favorite part of the trip by far.
Afterwards, Adam and I walked the 10 or so blocks back to our hotel and ended up eating a late 2 pm lunch before heading back to the hotel to rest and watch the SEC Championship game. We were truly exhausted. I'm not kidding when I say we walked at least 5 miles that day.
That night, we went to see The Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. It was my second time seeing it; Adam's first. We were in the very top row of seats, nosebleeds, but the performance was still awesome. And surprisingly, Adam loved it. I wore my leather-coated leggings from Fab'rik and felt very New York chic. I even got a compliment from a local....winning! ;) All in all, a wonderful night with my hubby.
We had to be out of the hotel by 6 AM Sunday morning to make our 9 AM flight. It was excruciating. Then once we got back into town yesterday, we had a family photo shoot late afternoon. Oh my goodness. Between flying, dealing with a wine hangover, and trying to get two toddlers to cooperate on a two hour shoot- it was insane! Needless to say, I'm still recovering today.
I'm so glad Adam and I were able to take this trip. Our official anniversary isn't until next Saturday, and with Adam's work schedule we celebrated a little earlier. I will never forget one second of our trip.
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I heart NY.
~LL
LOVE! I am so glad you had a great time and a wonderful anniversary celebration :)
ReplyDeleteThank you, love! We had an amazing time. Can't wait to do it again. Now we just need to plan a girls trip to NYC! Sometime next year after Jimmy's arrival. ;)
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