June in NYC

The hotel room we stayed in was nice, clean and simple-- a surprisingly great deal considering I read a review of the hotel on the Net that suggested otherwise. Service there IS a little less than superior, but primarily because it is a hotel that facilitates tourist groups.

The lobby of the Roosevelt is impressive-- much like it looks on the Internet. Once upon time the Oscars were held there. It has a nice bar and an elegant ambiance.

We enjoyed coming home to the Roosevelt, as we walked around the city a lot and basically just wanted to veg in front of the TV with room service. We had a corner room which was nice and the sounds of the city weren't intrusive. All in all, we felt like we were getting good value for our money.

Eamon's has the feel of a British/Irish pub but doesn't really serve pub fare. We happened upon it on our way to Times Square and were presently surprised. I had a pasta/vegetable dish which surpassed my expectations and we also tried their lamb stew which was very good as well. Excellent service and ambiance upstairs. (Downstairs was happy hour.)

Diners in NYC are great. We ate at three of them (including the classic Carnegie Deli), but this one was my favorite. It had the authentic feeling of a local joint-- dishes that looked like they had been purchased when the diner opened in 1950-something. I ordered a bowl of cabbage soup, which was giant and a Roast Beef Manhattan, which was giant and good. The waiters there were classic New York in that they found us amusing as tourists. (I was taking pictures).

They serve blintzes, too, which I would have loved to try, but was too full. Dining at diners feels like a great value and offers a city's true heart. It might not be fancy, but it's real and it's a deal.

Okay, if you love dill pickles, corned beef and matzo ball soup, this is the place! Great ambiance, tons of celeb-autographed photos on the wall, great service. You eat at a long galley-like table and so are likely to strike up a conversation with your neighbors (if you want to). Great place to take children. Several families were dining there and the kids seemed happy to be able to eat burgers and fries. Warning: All sandwiches we ordered in NY were piled with so much meat. For a die-hard carnivore, tis a dream come true, but being a carb-lover, I would have opted for less meat and more bread. Next time, I'll order half the meat. The dill pickles are indelibly marked on my palate as the best-- crispy and salty and YUM!

We purchased our tickets on the Internet way in advance of our trip. We attended the closing weekend of Thoroughly Modern Millie which was amazing, Fiddler on the Roof featuring Alfred Molina, and Jumpers, a play on loan from England written by Tom Stoppard and starring Essie Davis (Girl with a Pearl Earring).

Honestly, I had seen lots of touring company productions in cities like Indianapolis, Miami and even LA, but it was nothing like the Broadway I experienced on Broadway. Overwhelming amounts of talent, excellent staging, and no tinned music could ever replace the sound of a live orchestra. Wonderful! We were inspired by the shows, not just entertained. I recommend going to see one straight play (non-musical). Jumpers was fascinating!

For the frugal, there is a half price ticket booth either on 47th or 42nd near Times Square.

I had not been to New York since I was ten years old, and even then it thrilled me just to see the skyline. My husband was born in Manhattan and had never been there, so we definitely had a positive and excited outlook before the trip. We wanted to see New York!

I thought I would be clever and frugal and figure out a way to take the trains/subways from Newark airport to mid-town Manhattan. It started off all nice and cozy. I had even researched on the net how to use token machines! BUT, I hadn't counted on getting luggage (enough for two people for four days) through turnstiles...Plus we got off at one wrong stop and that was no big deal except that we had to lug all that luggage back down the stairs and through a labyrinth of obstacles and people. YUK!

Once we got there, we were relieved! We walked everywhere for the rest of the trip. We went to the NYC public library (if you smoke occasionally, the Bryant Park Pub is the ONLY place we saw where you could sit and have a beer and a cigarette), St. Patrick's Cathedral (A very dreary mass-- if you are Catholic, I recommend skipping it!), took a Circle Line Cruise, which was great (totally recommend the 45 minute tour as a way to get a feeling of NYC and the Statue of Liberty. We nixed the Empire State Building and if you want to see it, try getting your tickets over the Internet in advance. The lines were loooooooong.

Other highlights included taking the subway to Greenwich Village and the NYU area where we visited Washington Park, saw a free speech rally, and drank Vanilla bean frappacinos. Originally we thought we would visit museums, but since the MOMA was being renovated and since we just wanted to see NY, we opted for walking around.

Times Square (day and night) swarms with life. There is so much to take in it's almost like white noise for the brain somehow, comforting in the post-modern way that malls are (at least for me). We actually ran into P. Diddy as he was carrying the Olympic torch to be lit there one night. That was oddly exciting for me being an E channel groupie and secretly intrigued by the disgusting glamour of it all. Two cynical teenagers scoffed at me for saying, "Look, it's P.Diddy!" Since I teach high schoolers, I was amused.

In our travel journal we wrote the following as tips for our next trip:
Fly into Laguardia or JFK (not Newark!)
Buy any liquor or nicotine at home (very expensive in the city)
Buy a week Metropass for seven bucks (dealing with purchasing tokens is a pain)
Bring tons of underwear, socks.
Check out the half-price ticket booth
Mini-backpack and water bottles a good idea (water is like a buck-fifty everywhere)

Next trip, I want to shop at Macy's, have a drink at the Algonquin in honor of Dorothy Parker and go to Chinatown.

A lot to do and a lot to love about NY! All in all, it was simply a great and exhausting vacation.