Girl's Weekend in the Big Apple!

Tom and I were married on August 3, 1979 and we celebrated our 33rd anniversary this year apart as usual. While Tom was with the Young men on the High Adventure, I decided I would spend the weekend with my girls in NYC. I flew into the Newark, NJ airport and waited for my taxi to pick me up. Sarah P and Whitney rented a car in Richmond and Sara drove up from North Carolina and the three of them headed north to pick me up. It was 2 am before we got checked into our hotel that night, but we were so excited to start our adventure that we were up and ready to go early the next morning. Sarah P (my daughters are so brave) drove us right into NYC and we found a parking garage in Times Square. First thing we did was find "same-day" Broadway tickets to Mary Poppins at the New Amsterdam Theatre for later that night. We then walked and walked, Sarah wanted to go to a famous photography store (B & H Photography) so we left Sarah to shop and Sara, Whitney and I walked to Chelsea Market.

Chelsea Market is an amazing collection of restaurants and specialty food stores. It was so fun shopping in the produce market where the producers of Iron Chef and Chopped buy all their ingredients.(The Food Network's TV studio and offices are located above Chelsea Market.)

After thoroughly checking out Chelsea Market we ventured up to "Highline" Park, an elevated park built above the city on the old elevated railway line. Can you tell it is very HOT and MUGGY!

Again we walked and walked to Tom Colicchio's "Craftbar" restaurant for our 2 pm reservation. It was New York restaurant week, so for $25 you could sample a 3 course tasting menu. This cheese "fundida" was amazing!

Halibut for main course

and chocolate pana cotta for dessert. One word - DELICIOUS!

After lunch, we were all very tired of walking so we took a cab to Sprinkles cupcakes (I really hoped we'd get in the Cash Cab)

We walked over to Central Park for a cupcake tasting party.

We walked to the Museum of Modern Art where on Fridays after 4 you get in FREE! We saw Salvador Dali

Van Gogh

Monet

Frida Kahlo

and Picasso

After all the walking, my feet were starting to blister, so a roll of fashionable duct tape came in quite handy.

Then it was more walking by Rockefeller Center

and the Radio City music hall

and past other notorious Broadway theaters.

Then it was time for our Broadway show! Mary Poppins!

Don't you love the guy beside me climbing out of his seat. I promise I showered that morning! End of Day one. Saturday morning we accidentally slept in (my watch was still set on mountain time so I thought it was 7:20 am and it was actually 9:20 am when we finally woke up. We hurried and got ready and took the subway into NYC. Our first stop was Battery Park

You can see the new World Trade Center with the crane on top.

We took a free ferry over to Governor's Island. I could not believe how hot and humid it was!

After our tour of Governor's Island, we were starving, so we took the Subway up to Canal street and walked to Cafe Habana. It is one of Ami Gabrielsen's favorites and it didn't disappoint. There was a line out the door when we got there and Sarah P somehow got us a table.

The cuban sandwiches and Corn were fantastic!

After lunch I got my first taste of Pinkberry! YUM! Then it was an afternoon of shopping in Chinatown, complete with buying "designer" bags in the back room, and then another subway ride up to midtown for shopping at Bloomingdales, H & M, and Sephora and of course another trip to Sprinkles.

We ended our day with a quiet dinner at an Indian restaurant Aaron and Carina recommended. It was also delicious and nice because we were about the only customers.

Sunday morning, we checked out of our hotel and Sarah drove us up to Harlem where we had breakfast at Amy Ruth's (again recommended by Ami Gabe).

The chicken and waffles are the BEST I've ever had.

We stopped at Zabar's (a Jewish deli) and bought Devin some cheese, and then hit the road. We had to have the rental car back to Richmond by 7 pm and Sara had another 4 hour drive back to North Carolina after that. We had a fabulous trip! Sara was a trooper walking over 13 miles on Friday and another 8 miles on Saturday being 6 months pregnant. Sarah was an amazing chauffeur and we would never have made it without Whitney and her I-phone navigating and "cruise directing" skills. Thanks to Jon and Devin for babysitting the kids. I can't wait for our next Girl's weekend in NYC!