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.