Tourist playing tour guide: NYC
This trip was fairly impromptu-- I was going down to spend time with Kevin while he had liberty. He sailed from Salem to NYC, and was apparently at the helm for most of it.
The crew of Hamilton, as Alexander Hamilton created the Coast Guard back in the day, and the Eagle arrived in NYC just in time to celebrate the Eagle's and the USCG's birthday.
The USS Intrepid-- a now retired aircraft carrier docked on the west side of Manhattan.
Had to make a pit stop in Grand Central. Figured it would be a decent lunch stop. (In hindsight probably could have eaten at a lot of other places.) However, it was really easy to hop on a train to go anywhere from here :)
Now they didn't have liberty for the whole time, so I spent the rest of Thursday wandering around Manhattan. I made it up to the Cooper Hewitt-- a museum I been meaning to go to for a while. This is north of most of the museums on 5th Ave-- and is fairly small in comparison. However, it happens to be the house of Andrew Carnegie, and many of the interiors are still intact. Fantastic art collection!
This is 3D printed glass, which was made at the MIT Media Lab. Stunning.
I decided it was fitting to go to Central Park and spend some time at the Kennedy-Onassis reflecting pool. I forgot how wide Central Park was! It's really nice to have this in the middle of bustling NYC.
Notes about what else was new that I stumbled across here:
- Kinokuniya-- hands down, one of my favorite book/stationery stores, I thought they only existed in Asia, but I found one two blocks away from my hostel||1073 Ave of the Americas-- 41st and 6th.
- Eataly -- new to me (I found out about it when I was in Chicago). ||200 5th Ave, New York, NY
Friday
I noticed on my walk around town the night before that there was an actual Parisian bakery in town (which later I found out there were quite a few). Maison Kayser has spectacular desserts, like crisp apple tarts and eclairs, and great bread. I stopped here on the way to see Kevin to grab some breakfast for the two of us. It's located across the street from Bryant Park on 40th, east of 6th Ave.
The 9/11 memorial. (Ended up meeting Kevin and his friends here-- they came from the intrepid via Uber and I took the metro from Times Square. Pretty sure it took about the same amount of time.)
I took them on a journey through NYC. One of our stops was Di Palo's, a great little deli with exquisite cheeses and meats. Unfortunately it was above our price range and no one was willing to eat a quarter pound of charchuterie. Ah, next time.... (I've heard they have fantastic porchetta!)
And of course, we had to go to the top of the Empire State Building. Helpful hint: if you buy tickets online, you can skip the long ticket counter line (which is after the long security line). Also, US military in uniform get in for free.
I found the Bennett!