Saturday & Sunday, September 14/15 Getting there and being there
What a trip! It’s the first time I’ve flown in 7 years. We chose Virgin Airlines which was a wise decision once we got past the angst of paying $50 per checked bag both ways. But we crunched in all our shoes, layers of clothing and weighed the bags on our bathroom scale. (The bags weighed about as much as Dave and I together would like to lose.) Dave brought his camera and the laptop so his carryon bag weighed a ton.
The flight was as pleasant as flying in coach can be. Virgin’s seats are comfortable and there seemed to be a little more leg space than I remembered on my last United flight. Dave had window, I was in the middle. A plump young woman sat next to me but exchanged her seat with a slender man, which gave me more space to deploy my elbows. Between my ebook and games of Mahjongg on the plane’s entertainment system, the trip passed fairly quickly.
Figuring out the AirTrain system at JFK was a little confusing, but we hooked up with Mary & Rick who flew on JetBlue and began hauling our luggage up and down the New York subway system. It seems like stairs predominate over escalators in most stations. We found our hotel, near Central Park, and settled into a quiet air-conditioned room that overlooked an inner terrace surrounded by other hotels and apartment buildings, kind of like Rear Window except the windows didn’t open. This hotel had a wonderful happy hour and we were very happy tasting lavender-scented filo pastries filled with figs and other goodies.
Rick & Mary were staying in the Union Square area in a funky apartment rented out by a jazz musician. Two striking features were a baby grand piano and a plaster ceiling that undulated with 18-inch-deep waves. There was a fire escape where you could lounge in a hammock and watch the street action. We wandered through the balmy evening into the Chelsea area and found El Cocotero, a tiny, rustic Venezuelan restaurant. Nice. Mary then led us to the Magnolia Bakery. We were too full to eat the chocolate cupcakes we bought, but we munched them later in the room. Oh – my—God!! This bakery knows what’s important in a cupcake – a ton of rich chocolate buttercream. Amazing!
On Sunday we went down to the Empire State Building and up to the Observation Deck on Floor 102. What a view! There were clouds that made the sky more interesting.
We dallied in Bryant Park on our way to the Theatre District. What a lovely place to spend a sunny Sunday afternoon.
We met up with Mary and Rick later in the afternoon to see “Once”, a musical about a Dublin street musician who is down on his luck when a Czech woman hears his music and encourages him to follow his dreams. It was a lovely production with great songs and good acting. While in line to get in, an elderly gentleman walked by us exclaiming “In California, we don’t have to wait in lines.” As he talked, he pulled a little bit of a red handkerchief out of his closed hand, then tamped it back down in his hand and opened his hand to show the handkerchief had disappeared. I told him he should be on stage. His reply as he headed away: “I’m 90 year old. I should be on stage?”
After the show, the four of us repaired to Connelly’s Pub & Restaurant for some beer and appetizers. The weather was absolutely perfect for sitting out on their patio, looking up to the skyscrapers surrounding us.
We made one more stop at Rockefeller Center because it’s close to our hotel. It was a balmy evening, romantic with all the lights in the trees.
We got back to our room later in the evening and were a little hungry. We found a nice little Italian place and had a good thin-crust pizza and salad.
Monday, September 16 MoMA and Greenwich Village
Monday was another gorgeous day. We took a short walk over to the Museum of Modern Art and saw their exhibit “American Modern – Hopper to O’Keeffe”. Small exhibit, but nice. It’s always fun to see works from old favorites that we haven’t seen before as well as artists new to us. The watercolors of Charles Burchfield entranced both of us. We had a pleasant lunch on a museum patio, finished off by sharing an ice cream sundae. If dessert seems to be an ongoing theme of this blog – well, it is. It’s more fun eating ice cream in warm weather. Going through a few more galleries there, we found Van Gogh’s “Starry Night”, my favorite piece of art.
After lunch we returned to the Empire State Building to take a ride. I expected it to be like Star Tours, a ride at Disneyland. You’re in a seat on a platform that moves as the images on the screen twist and turn. But this New York ride must have been created in the 90’s. It was bumpy and jumpy, narrated by Kevin Bacon who refers to his own six degrees of separation, with a grainy video screen. The video still displays the Twin Towers, so it’s at least 12 years old. Not worth it! Luckily, it was only one of the many entrance fees covered by our New York City Pass. That evening, we met Mary and Rick for dinner at the Spotted Pig, a funky little restaurant in Greenwich Village. Good burgers – great fries.
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