Sat Aug 4th

We began our final day in NYC with a plan to spend our time experiencing one of New York’s best attractions—the shopping. We planned on having a little breakfast and then head off to Williamsburg in Brooklyn and back to Manhattan to SOHO. Unfortunately inadequate planning coupled with the incredible heat kept us from completely following our plan.

We got breakfast once again at Zeytinz, the deli down the block from our hotel. Today we were able to eat in Bryant Park and enjoy as much tranquility as you are likely to find in New York. Before we began the rest our adventures, we tried to go to the Library. They were not open until 11, so we decided to check it out later in the day.

After a fairly uneventful trip through the subway we arrived in Williamsburg at Bedford & 7th. This is where the lack of planning on my part began to take its toll on our plans. I had forgotten to print off the list of places I wanted check out so we had to guess which direction to head on Bedford and unfortunately picked wrong.

After a few blocks of semi-residential landscape we came to McCarran Park and decided to cut over to Lorimer, which was recommended by the “Entertainment Director” in our hotel as another great street for shopping. By this point the heat, whether due to lack of shade from skyscrapers or just a location, was beginning to get pretty oppressive and patience began to wear thin. We wandered for several more blocks with nothing to show for our efforts except for one or two boutiques that weren’t open yet (note to others, Saturdays most shops seemed to open at noon).

At this point we were reday to give up and take the subway back to Manhattan and begin part 2 of our day, in SOHO. Later when we checked our email we found that if we had gone in the other direction on Bedford we would have come across practically all of the shops I was interested in. Oh well, gives us something to do next time.

SOHO is a shopper’s paradise with everything from couture and specialty boutiques to the same stores you see in any mall (banana republic, footlocker, etc.). We popped up from the subway at Broadway & Prince right into the heart of all of the craziness—shoppers everywhere fighting for space with tons of street vendors selling everything from jewelry to bootleg movies (should have bought the Simpson’s movie but I thought better of it).

Our first stop was UNIQLO, a kind of Japanese H&M, basics and some trend items fairly inexpensively (Gap should be taking notes). Liane found a belt while she found a nice sweater for me to wear over dress shirts for work. Unfortunately I was not able to find any of the Osamu Tezuka tribute Ts that they have.

We decided this was the perfect time to grab a bite to eat and something to drink, so we tried a place just down the street at Spring St called Café Bari. It’s a Mediterranean influenced café with everything from burgers to wraps and brick oven pizzas. We shared a great chop salad, with green beans and chickpeas thrown in, and a trio of spreads—hummus, babaganoush, and a tomato spread that I cannot remember the name of, though it was really delicious with chunks of jalepeno and slices of garlic. It was a tasty and fairly fresh meal to recharge us for more shopping.

From there we checked out Ben Sherman, Jack Spade (a very cool store set up with the items for sale amongst various “guy” knick knacks and where I got a great wallet), Kate Spade, Nanette Lepore (which Liane loves but not enough to pay the prices even on sale), and a great French store called Pylones that was full of tons of great whimsical items.

Then it was back to the hotel via subway to freshen up and meet up with Liane’s friend Beth. We had a few minutes to spare so we decided to stop into the research library by our hotel. We admired the amazing architecture and design of the building. In one room they even had one of the (less than 100) surviving copies of the Guttenberg Bible on display. It kind of puts things in perspective to see such an important piece of human history. In the first floor display space they also had a show of photographs that originally appeared at the Midtown Y Photography Gallery (1972-1996) which showcased a number of up and coming artists and their works that pushed the boundaries of artistic photography as well as capturing through street scenes the people and places of New York—many of which don’t exist anymore.

After that we wandered down to Morrell, a great wine bar that was all the more a surprise considering it is buried in the heart of the plaza at Rockefeller Center. They apparently focus on many hard to find wines small production wines and have an accompanying wine shop as well . There we met Beth and had great wine (a Willamette Valley unfiltered Pinot Noir), great cheese, and of course fabulous conversation.

And just because we weren’t sure if we had eaten and drunk quite enough, we went to dinner at another fabulous suggestion of Beth’s—Barbes, an amazing restaurant on 36th btwn Madison and Fifth showcasing North African (by way of France) cuisine. I had Couscous Au Poulet, a great dish of chicken and vegetables over a bed of couscous with a Cinnamon Honey sauce, and Liane had a Tagine de Poulet (chicken cooked in a delicious broth with lemon, olive and carrots) as well. A great final meal for our trip.

We were tempted to check out a jazz bar that Beth had recommended (the Jazz Standard) but we had grown weary from all the walking, good food and drink and decided to head back to the hotel. Since we needed to wake up early to get the airport Sunday, we did a little packing and relaxing and then were off early to bed.

NY_2007_Sat_Aug_3

This morning we slept in as late as we could. Good Morning America had a special broadcast from Bryant Park (in front of our hotel) so it was pretty noisy, pretty early.

The bridge collapse was still all over the news. It just is so strange to be watching all of these events unfold just a couple of miles from our home, and yet we are so far removed right now.

We ducked into a little deli/convenience store near our hotel for brunch, Zeytinz (24 W 40th Street). They have everything from salads to exotic olive oils, to ice cream and candy bars. After an expensive dinner last night, it was nice to have a full brunch for about $10.



After brunch we began our journey to Central Park, the Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim. We walked up 40th to 5th street and followed 5th until we hit Central Park.

Central Park is a really amazing expanse of greenway in the midst of skyscrapers. It is absolutely a paradise within chaos. Chris was really interested in all of the huge rock outcroppings within Central Park. I think we are going to try to look up some history on the creation of Central Park to better understand if they were a part of the natural landscape – or developed to enhance the beauty of the park.

There are so many different types of settings in Central Park. You will come across everything from a zoo, to wooden pagodas and of course, expansive lawns. It would be easy to spend an entire day wandering there.



We exited the park around 70th street and walked up 5th to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We were really interested in checking out a fashion exhibit, the Poiret exhibit.

Poiret was a couture designer and self-proclaimed “King of Fashion” during the early 1900’s. He is credited largely with the creation of the chemise and overall was instrumental in deconstructing the clothes that women wore at the time. Poiret moved away from corsets, which were a mainstay of women’s clothing at the time. Instead he pulled from both eastern and Greek history to develop new silhouettes. He was highly concerned with the drape of clothes, working “on model” in three dimensions vs. use of complex patterns to develop his clothes.

What was striking to me when viewing this beautiful collection was how relevant and contemporary so many of his designs appear nearly 100 years after they were initially conceived.

After the Poiret exhibit, we took in some of the modern art at the Met. It has an extensive collection of masterworks by greats such as Klee, Leger, Picasso, Renior, Stuart Davis, Braque and many, many others.

Chris was very taken with a number of the cubist works. It was fun to learn that we share an appreciation for this way of viewing the world.



We also made it up to the rooftop installation of Frank Stella works. These large, abstract sculptures were created fairly recently by Stella, in the 1990’s. I really loved the “Chinese Pavilion” piece, which looks like a big ball of bold brushstrokes, except the strokes are made of carbon fiber instead of paint.

It was also a great place to stop and contemplate the rooftops of NY. We got a little lemonade and found a bit of shade from which to take in the impressive view.

After the met we wandered a bit farther up 5th to the Guggenheim. The façade is being renovated right now, so you don’t get to see much of its brilliant white, sculptural shell however once inside you are still transported via an immense, spiraling interior.

Chris had heard that Frank Lloyd Wright had intended for visitors to take in the gallery from the top down, however the museum had in years since reworked exhibits to unfold from bottom up. With this in mind, we took the elevator up to the top and began our downward circle.

En route we took in so many amazing visions I can hardly remember them all. Our favorite works were by Yuken Teruya and Pipilotti Rist.

Yuken Teruya took every day shopping bags from Tiffany’s, McDonalds, Banana Republic and the like and cut detailed two dimensional trees out of one side that he then folded inward to create incredibly life-like three dimensional sculptures (of trees).

Pipilotti Rist took everyday objects and assembled them into a large installation of an apartment or house. Littered throughout were small to medium scale videos projected on various items from a stack of books to an empty bottle of alcohol. The effect was intended (according to the Guggenheim) to refer to the secret lives of inanimate objects. However for me the effect seemed more about ghost objects, or the life that is burned into the space objects occupy, that exists even when they disappear. The exhibit reminded me a lot of Tom Robbins’ novel, Still Life with Woodpecker. I haven’t read this in years but it made me want to pick it up again.

There is so much to see at the Guggenheim that I began to get pretty visually overloaded. We decided to end our gallery touring (abandoning our initial plan to also check out the Cooper Hewitt museum) and seek out a nice café for lunch.

It took us a while to come across something other than pizza, noodles or bagels. So when we stumbled into Geronimo it was an air-conditioned relief!

Geronimo (at 3rd and 90th street) isn’t a place I’d exactly go out of the way to experience, however they do have great salsa and provide a never-ending basket of homemade chips. This was reason enough for us to stop in, as all the walking had made us ravenous! For entrees, we ordered chicken soup (with rice, Pico de Gallo and avocado) and chicken flautas (with home-made guacamole that was delicious). Both were quite respectable, though nothing you couldn’t find elsewhere.

After leaving Geronimo it started to rain. We decided to abandon our initial plan to walk back to the hotel and instead took the subway. There were times it was raining hard enough that pedestrians simply lined up under awnings to wait out the downpour. Within a few minutes we spotted a street vendor selling umbrellas. You are never far away from some sort of street vendor when wandering NY!

Upon returning to the hotel we took some time to relax and shower. Riding a packed subway with hundreds of sweaty folks like yourself leaves one feeling less than fresh! Then we brought the laptop over to Bryant Park to do a little research in preparation for the evening.

Chris found a number of music events, but most of them were far away or we were too late to get a ticket. We searched our guidebooks (provided by the hotel) and decided to check out The Artisanal (2 Park at West 32nd) as it was supposed to have the best cheese selection in the U.S.

The walk to the restaurant was pleasant, as the temperatures were beginning to drop a bit. We were disappointed when we got there, as the environment and experience overall wasn’t exactly what we had hoped for.

The space was huge and patrons were packed in elbow to elbow. It had more of a suburban vibe vs. something quaint and unique. The waiter knew nothing about the cheese courses. He couldn’t even describe the cheeses I ordered for me, but kept referring me back to the menu. The wine list was respectable, at least. I did enjoy a nice sauvignon blanc with some sheep cheese from the Basque region. Chris had a French pinot noir and chicken cooked under a brick.

I was glad that I had gone with simple, light fare as Chris’ chicken came piled on top an enormous mound of mashed potatoes that were swimming in a moat of salty gravy. It looked like the typical fare you might expect from a chain restaurant like Champs. It was palatable, but it certainly wasn’t unique or special in any way.

We enjoyed the cooler evening and took our time getting back to the hotel. For the first time during our trip we saw a number of homeless folks bedding down for the night under cardboard boxes, or sometimes, simply sprawled out along side a building.

It was surprising to me to see so many homeless folks as in the last decade NY has done so much to clear the homeless folks off the streets. Though the result may be pleasant for visitors to NY, the means of providing this result so has done little to help the homeless problem overall. Homeless folks in NY are simply thrown in jail.

After dinner, Chris would have loved to check out more of the music/nightlife but unfortunately that was not to be. There was lightening in the sky as we walked back to our hotel and by the time we had settled in, thunder began to crackle and then there was the steady patter of rain. Personally, I was relieved to simply fall into bed for the night.

NYC_Aug_2_2007

Woke up early this morning to catch our taxi. We allowed extra time as traffic was predictably backed up due to the collapse of the 35W bridge over the river yesterday. We would have normally taken this bridge en route to the airport. The catastrophe was the lead story nation and worldwide. We feel so lucky to have not been affected but are still waiting to hear all of the details as we are worried about friends and colleagues who may have been driving over the bridge at that time. Our thoughts and prayers are with all of those involved.

We arrived this afternoon in NY and are staying at the Bryant Park Hotel (40 West 40th street NY). It is located in mid-town Manhattan, in the garment district. It’s a lovely place that I have stayed at previously for work and one that I was eager to share with Chris. It’s close to the heart of the city but a little out of the way, so not quite as hectic.



After relaxing a bit in our room we wandered around Bryant Park and then walked the Avenue of the Americas and Times Square. Times Square is so touristy/main-stream it feels much like a neon-powered out door mall. Not a lot of unique stores to check out, but plenty of major brands (MTV, Billabong, Virgin, Elements, etc.) …If that’s your thing.

At the recommendation of Mario, the events planner at the Bryant Lake Hotel, we decided to visit a local restaurant, Salute, for dinner. (Salute, 237 Madison Ave @ 39th street, NY. 212.213.3440) The service was a bit lacking, but the prices were reasonable. The atmosphere was very open/airy and the Tiramisu was to DIE for, so we can’t complain too much.



We started our meal with a salad of greens, caramelized pecans, blue cheese, celery and apple. For our entrees, Chris had gnocchi (with various cheeses) and I had taglliatelle with shrimp, arugula and cherry tomatoes. Both were really good, but not fabulous. For wine, we selected a fahlingina (mellow white wine) to complement our meals, and it was really wonderful.

After relaxing a bit in our room, we decided to check out the bar in the basement of the hotel, the Cellar Bar. It was a really cool space with vaulted, tiled ceilings, lots of candles and wrought iron accents (candle holders, wall hangings etc.). The crowd there was a little bit generic. Not what I had expected given the perceived hip quotient of the hotel. I felt like I could have been in a Midwest bar based on the patrons. We danced to a few tracks and spent a little time people-watching.

We were getting pretty tired so called it a night around 1am and watched cheesy TV shows on the plasma screen TV in our room until we fell asleep.