NYC - Saturday

We didn't get up quite as early as I had planned on Saturday morning, either.  With such a short amount of time in the city, I had big plans for what all I wanted to pack in, but I had to take the opportunity to actually sleep in without dogs or work to get up for!

I finally got around to taking some pictures of Angie and Luke's space before we left for the day.  They have SO much room, especially for a place in the city.  I just love their apartment and the way it's decorated!

Luke had to work Saturday, so Ang, Matt and I got some Jamba Juice to kick start our day, and went to meet up with Denzil.  The plan was 1) walk across the Brooklyn Bridge  2) eat at Grimaldi's Pizza  3) see 9/11 Memorial  4) ice skate at Rockefeller  5) eat dinner and go out for the night.  Several of those actually happened - several didn't. 

We took the subway down to the Brooklyn Bridge stop, and were greeted by lots and lots of Santas as soon as we got off.  Apparently Saturday, December 10th was Santacon day in NYC.  Basically, everyone dresses up like Santas (or elves or reindeer or presents) and drinks all day long!  It was hilarious to see SO many people dressed up - thousands of them, literally.  The entire time we walked across the bridge (which is 1.1 miles long), it was nothing but a solid stream of drunk Santas chanting, "Ho! Ho! Ho!"  It was a pretty cool thing to see and I was glad we had such good timing (unintentionally)!

These Santas were passing out candy canes!

We saw lots of little locks hanging from bridge as we were walking across it.  Angie told us that people write their names on them and lock them on the bridge somewhere.  How cool is that!?  Next time we go back, we'll definitely have to do that, too!

The walk didn't take too long, but it got a little chilly with all the wind in the middle of the bridge.  The view was pretty cool when you turned around and could see all the skyscrapers on Manhattan Island...and the Statue of Liberty!

We were all kind of hungry once we got to Brooklyn, and we really wanted to check out the famous Grimaldi's Pizzeria just under the bridge.  Angie said you had to get there really early if you want to get in, but we thought we'd give it a shot anyways.  Yea, right.  It was around noon if I remember right, and the line was clear down the block.  It's just a little restaurant, and they don't sell pizza by the slice.  It's a sit-down and wait kind of place, so I can't even imagine how long those people were going to have to wait in line for some pizza.  Hours, I bet. 

Inside Grimaldi's

We didn't have time (and were too hungry) for that kind of a wait, so a little disappointed, we hopped on the subway to go back to NYC for some food.  We popped up very close to the 9/11 Memorial, and stumbled across a fantastic little place for some healthy and quick food called Hale and Hearty.  It was empty, which kind of made us second guess going in, but some warm soup sounded really good on a cold day.  They let us taste-test all of the amazing soups they had (which was a lot!), AND they had grilled cheese sandwhiches with three kinds of cheese.  Done deal for me!

Once we had our fill of soup, we decided to walk to the 9/11 Memorial just a few blocks away.  We couldn't find the entrance, and when we stopped to ask how to get in, a street crossing guard told us we had to have tickets.  Which, for the record, I knew and had just forgotten.  We saw the looong line of people waiting for the tickets that would be handed out at the top of the hour, but that was 45 minutes away, and with no guarantee we would even get one, we had better things to do!  We decided we would try to reserve tickets online for the next day, and shopped at Century 21, instead! 

The church and these headstones are directly across the street from whre the twin towers were.  They were untouched when the towers fell, while everything else around them was destroyed.  Gives me goosebumps to think about.

Rebuilding.

 

Century 21 is a giant department store, kind of like Marshalls or TJ Maxx (name brand stuff for cheap).  It was 4 floors and PACKED with people - which was just too much for us to handle.  Needless to say, it was a short-lived shopping trip and no one bought anything.  We walked back to the subway stop and went up to Rockefeller Center for ice skating...so we hoped... 

That whole area was an absolute zoo, too - just shouler to shoulder people.  We really wanted to ice skate, but not bad enough to wait in line for hours, so we just walked around for a few minutes, took a few pictures by the giant tree, and then headed for Bryant Park.  We thought it might be a little less packed, but it still had ice skating AND holiday shops.

Well, it turns out everything in NYC is just packed with people - especially around the holidays - and Bryant Park was no different.  With hot apple cider to warm us up, we cruised around the little shops...and turned down the ridiculously long line to ice skate again. (I did find another super cool watch that I wanted, but I just couldn't justify spending that much  on watches in two days!)

How are you even supposed to ice skate with that many people!?

It was getting close to dinner time, but the restaurant we wanted to eat at wasn't open yet.  We opted for drinks at Bryant Park Grill to hold us over!

After we finished our drinks, we walked across the street to Koi for dinner.  It was seriously the most amazing sushi I've ever had...and it should have been for the price (about $5/bite)!!  I'm pretty tight with my money, but that sushi was totally worth it.

The only downside to Koi was that it was so expensive, we just opted for a few appetizers instead of dinner.  So we hopped in a cab back to the Upper East Side for dinner Part 2.  Keeping with the Asian theme, we went to Lilis Asian Cuisine - something we could actually afford to eat!

I did NOT need that drink.  And I especially did not need to chug it!  I was feeling pretty good as we went back to the apartment.  But then it hit me - and I did NOT want to go out.  Just wanted to stay in bed!  It was Angie's job to keep me awake while Matt showered...  From the picture below, you can see she didn't do a very good job. ;)

On our walk to Denzils's, I made a quick stop at Shake Shack for some peppermint ice cream to wake me up.  It did the trick!

Denzil was making drinks at his apartment when we got there.  Mojitos, actually.  Very minty mojitos.  Everyone was very excited! (see pics, ha)  Matt and I decided to show off our dance moves, too...

  From there, we hopped in a cab to the 230 Fifth Rooftop Bar for more drinks. It was cold, but there were really cool views of the city from up there!  They had lots of red hoodie/rob things that everyone wore to keep warm under the heat lamps.  Unfortunately, the bar on the roof was closed for a Microsoft party (and Luke couldn't get in since he came late), so we didn't stay too long.  Pretty cool experience, though!

After a very long (and cold) walk - and finally a ride on the subway, we ended up at Le Souk Restaurant (or club, really).  It is a hookah bar - with some really cool dance music! I didn't try the hookah, but it actually smelled pretty good.  Denzil, Angie, and Luke loved it!  The music was just too great not to dance the night away to!

Matt loves my long underwear...

"No, you can NOT dance with me!  I have a boyfriend!" ;)

We finally got a cab home and got to bed around 4:30am!  What a day...