Prolix Travels: NYC Recap Part III

AKA “More Walking & Then Snow Comes in Droves”

Sunday & Monday, March 1 & 2

I combined Sunday & Monday for a couple reasons. First, because I’m lazy and I also don’t think it’s wise to break the “trilogy” formula that is going on here. Because no one likes a fourth part unless it’s followed by 2 more parts and I don’t have material for 2 more parts. Secondly, there is a combined theme for these two days and that is SNOW OMG SNOW! :D :D Thirdly, we didn’t do too much on Sunday, plus there wasn’t much we did on the day we went back to our homelands (Tuesday). Oh wait, did I inadvertently make that four parts??? FORMULA. SHATTERED.

Ok, enough of this nonsense. So, yeah like I said on Sunday we didn’t do too much. I think we were still recovering from Saturday’s walk-a-thon and the dance party at the Ritz. We also had to wait for the one bathroom in the hostel so we kind of got a late start. When we left the hostel it wasn’t snowing yet, but it was overcast and cold. And really windy, as usual. We met up with Romain at the subway and then went over our plan: we were planning on taking it easy today by just walking around Soho, The Village and Chelsea. We also planned to visit the Strand bookstore before heading back to Brooklyn because Romain had to pick up his laundry.

So, we got off at our stop and wandered around looking for a place to eat brunch. We ended up at a diner called “California Diner” (original) and it was Hollywood themed. It seemed not too touristy though – it was good food too (we were also really hungry at this point). We really were in the mood for waffles so we were just happy to find that it was on the menu (after trying Whole Foods and another random café near the Union Square stop). I got the Belgian WAFL with bacon. Because everything is better with bacon (sorry vegetarians). Even Emily, who is normally a vegetarian, had some of my bacon. xD You cannot resist the power of bacon.

After eating, we noticed that it was starting to snow in little flurries. It was very pretty. We walked around SoHo (I think it was this day we went into the Catherine Malandrino store and French Connection) and then walked through the Village, where I saw lots of pretty buildings and where it had become eerily quiet. I really liked it though, and it would be nice to live there if I was super rich. LOL. This is when we went into the FABULOUS cheese shop there and Romain bought Emily her cheese for her birthday present. She picked out like 5 cheese – I don’t remember them all, but there was a Tomey (my favorite I think), a goat cheese covered in ash, some Raclette (that was SUPER stinky) and a blue cheese that was REALLY strong. Gosh what was the other one – oh! It was a brie. Yeah, brie. And that was good too. When we got back to Brooklyn we tried them at Romain’s place.

I think it must have taken us awhile to walk around, because we were hungry again LOL. Oh, I know, we decided to have a light dinner in order to have time to get back to Brooklyn for Romain to get his laundry. So, we walked over to the meat district (which was cool) on our way to Chelsea where we were headed to VYNL. Great place, that. Our servers were so hot. LOL. We got this lad named Timmy who immediately fanboyed over Emily’s accent because he had lived in England for a couple years. Romain desperately wanted to know him more intimately, but was too shy to give Timmy (who we called TIMMEH because of the South Park reference) his phone number. We ended up not having a light dinner at all because the veggie burger they serve there is quite big. Oh and the fries were DELICIOUS. Love their fries. Emily ordered Watermelon lemonade and I had a sip – DELICIOUS. Yes, I write with caps a lot. I will have to curb this way of showing emphasis when I start writing more professional stuff in grad school. xD At the workshops, everyone’s going to be all “could you stop with the caps please? Thanks.”

After Chelsea, we went to Strand real quick and I was a little overwhelmed by all the books. We decided to just go up to the rare book collection and look around there. They had a great selection and there were so many things to look at here as well! Lots of old Milton books and a huge old Bible that had all the names of family members written down as it had been passed down through the family. It made me wonder when it had ended up in the store and who wanted to give it away. Maybe an estate sale? I have no idea.

That night, it was really low key, like I said. We tried the cheese and pretty much just had that for our “later evening snack”. Then we played games and when we saw that the snow was starting to fall more heavily, we packed it up and went back to the hostel to get a early night in since we had a big day on Monday.

And what do you know, Monday morning comes and it’s SNOW EVERYWHERE OMG SNOW! Apparently it was the biggest storm NY had gotten in awhile. Schools were closed for the first time in 5 years or something crazy like that. No wonder, because it was a BITCH to walk in. We didn’t exactly bring snow gear with us on the plane (no room in my suitcase quite frankly and there’s not much need for snow gear in central California LOL). So we carefully trekked outside to the subway, trying not to get snow in our eyes as it was pelted towards us. You know, snowflakes are really delicate things, but when they come at you at speeds of 15 mph+, those little fuckers sting!

On the subway, we went on a different line to go up to where the Natural History Museum is (close to Central Park). I should mention here that the people who designed the subway stop at this area are fantastic. There were a bunch of mosaic murals in the walls depicting various animals, and there were small little ones placed in the concrete on the stop itself. It was beautiful and certainly took a long time to create. Once outside, we looked for a place to eat breakfast, and finding the area surprisingly barren, we ended up at Starbucks. It was good to get out of the cold for awhile and while we sat and ate, I was amazed at the dexterity and speed by which the snow crews of NY made the streets clear. Those guys were on it! By 11, the asphalt on the road was entirely visible. And we were ready to go in the museum.

I could go on and on about the museum, but I won’t. I’ll just say that the Hayden Planetarium is the best I’ve seen and everyone should go there if they can. It was great to be inside and we ended up being there like 5 hours or something because there’s just so much to see. The view from the floors is great as well – to see Central Park and the surrounding areas blanketed with snow was just beautiful. And more warm looking at it from the inside out. ;-)

After the museum, we walked through Central Park and saw all the kids sledding on their snow day and were very jealous. If only I had waterproof gloves! No matter. It was great seeing all the familiar looking bridges in the park. We found one that we swore was featured in the movie Enchanted so I did a reenactment of Edward doing his song right before he gets plastered by a group of cyclists. Whattup? Nerds have more fun. xD
Across the park we went to the Park Avenue Armory, because Romain wanted to show us where he worked. This place is fantastic. It’s a giant huge old wood building with a ton of space that the Armory lends out to various groups. They have wanted to get involved in the arts, so that’s what Romain’s internship does – works with various vendors to lend out the space. The actual room where he works was very cool and looked like it was from the Elizabethan age of architecture.

By this time, we were really hungry, so we went to a place that Romain recommended for really good scones. Fairly inexpensive too, which was remarkable for that area (Park & 5th avenue region). It was called “Alice’s Tea Cup” and themed with Alice in Wonderland type stuff. It was the cutest tea shop I have seen and the scones were such a good deal for what you got! 2 huge scones for $6 and they were SO GOOD. They definitely filled us up and we had more to save for later. The tea was all right. I ordered Irish Breakfast but I don’t think that’s what I got. It was really watered down. Oh well. Finally, before we headed back to home sweet Brooklyn, Romain took us to this Chocolatier called “Pierre Marccolini” and bought me some truffles that were SO GOOD OMG. This one had a mix of four spices in it that was just so divine! Very light and refreshing, but still rich enough where you didn’t need to eat a whole lot of them. Good thing too because they are expensive! But so worth it.

At this point, the camera in my battery had run out so I didn’t get to take any pictures after Central Park. Oh well, I still fondly remember the good times.

Back in Brooklyn, we changed, relaxed and then prepared to head out again in the cold in order to go to a place for cheese fondue for Emily’s birthday dinner. It was great – we ordered a bottle of Pinot Grigio with the cheese and I drank my glasses too quickly I’m afraid. I was TIPSY MMM HMMM. It was a little hard to walk back. ROFL. But still, quite a great finish to a fabulous day and an even more amazing trip!! I was sad to the prospect of going home the next day. ☹

Pictures are here now: