Category Archives: New York City

3 August 2014

by Stacie -

As I've gotten older I've decided that life is about memories, it's up to you to make those memories whenever you can. I decided what better way to make some is to meet my dear uncles for their brief stay in NYC. I took a 6am train from Richmond to NYC on Sunday, met them at Penn station and the fun began!1 Getting to meet up with Jerry, Charmaine & Kevin B was icing on the cake and added to the fun! If there is one thing our family knows how to do right it's food, we love to enjoy new things and places and we surely did that with amazing meals. Taking in the sights we could from the Highline, The Women in Gold and the "old stuff" at The Met we made the most of every minute. Even when I left a 4:45am on Tuesday morning to head home I was sad, but also grateful to spend that amazing time with people I dearly love.

by Kevin -

Food carts, the soul of a city. Forget the big name restaurants (sorry Alex), nothing can compare to the simple street food in this city. Okay, so Seoul is pretty good too..but nothing is really like the NYC experience. We wandered though, if there might not be some sort of Falafel Syndicate that owns and operates most of these carts near the Met in the Upper East Side. Every picture of the food on the outside of the cart was exactly the same. Not a bad business model probably, but not too much creativity either. On an earlier visit, we explored Midtown and the Lower West side….not nearly as homogeneous.

The Day's Itinerary -

Neue Galerie

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Butter (Restaurant by Alex Guaranchelli)

Off-Broadway play - Ruthless

2 August 2015

by Steven (edits by Kevin)

So, just so you know, we haven’t been entirely diligent about getting these posts written. We’re actually on Day 5 (9 August) of the QM2 crossing and I’m just now getting around to writing about our couple of days in New York. It took some time just to get the 100’s of photos collected from our various devices, sorted, selected and edited. And, of course, finalizing the blog setup. All this with limited (and very expensive!) internet service. We’ll try to post more often as we get back on land.

Just to give a preview, here’s my view as I write this.

After flying in-style overnight, we landed at JFK Airport just as the sun is coming up. Beautiful views of the sunrise over Long Island as we make our final approach. Bags out quick and a short ride into Manhattan as we arrive at our hotel for the next couple nights, The Carlyle on the Upper East Side at 76th St and Madison Ave. The room we had reserved wasn’t available – imagine, that at 7:00AM our room wasn’t available! The spa’s not open for a few more hours to take showers but they found us a similar room that was available – whew, we can shower and change!
After a freshen-up and nap, it’s off to Penn Station to get Kevin’s niece, Stacie. Back up to the hotel to drop off her bag and back downtown for lunch with Jerry at The Brindle Room. This is a tiny burger joint that Kevin saw recommended by Anthony Bourdain. Little did we know that is was also featured on Diners, Drive-ins & Dives (uh oh!). Thankfully, we had reservations! The place was full with seating for only about 2 dozen people, if that many.

Fresh donuts to start (as if I needed more donuts after my Krispy Kremes in Penn Station). Then probably the best burgers we’ve had in a long time! Fully chard on the outside but still moist and juicy on the inside – burgers don’t get much better than these! No fancy-pants buns, just good old soft hamburger buns. Kevin’s had blue cheese that melted into the burger...just the right mix of seasoning and the added punch of the blue.

With full bellies we headed across lower Manhattan, (just a couple blocks west Jerry insists) to the Highline. We had missed this last time we were in NYC so glad to get here this time. Lots of people around, but still felt like a nice, peaceful retreat in the middle of the city. Tourist and locals were out for a stroll or just sitting, enjoying the sun. What’s a walk in NY without a stop for an artisan gelato?

We bid farewell to Jerry for the day and head back to the hotel for a nap and get ready to eat again.

Dinner at Morini on Madison north of The Carlyle where Charmaine and Kevin join us after arriving from Dallas earlier in the afternoon. Sorry, no food porn here – which is a shame because I really don’t remember what I had but I recall that we enjoyed it. We ended our first day with a stroll back to our hotel, putting Kevin and Charmaine in a cab back to their’s.