An Empire State of Mind

New York - Sunday 5 June to Friday 10 June. 

Writing from the always dependable Troubadour.


Arrived: By bus from Montreal, it was a 10 hour journey but there was wifi, power points and a list of rules as long as your arm on appropriate behaviour on board.  This was followed by our first New York cab ride - quick, cheap and with google maps and the news on tv in the back to show you where you are and what's going on.

Stayed: West Side YMCA - recommended only for the desperate.  If we were cashed up enough to pay for real accommodation during a New York summer we would have stayed at The Jane or The Pod.  But we were in a great location, with Central Park at the end of the street, shops and cafes at the other end of the street, free access to the gym and pool, and right near some good Metro stops.

I met a guy in the subway who was doing a cracking trade - this particular station didn't have a ticket booth or office and I ran down the stairs ready to jump on the next train only to discover I'd run out of credit on my ticket.  This guy swooped in with his topped up ticket to let me through the gates and I paid him my fare plus a premium.  Good business for when you're in a hurry.

Ate: 
Matt's Grill  - for meatloaf and martinis.
Death & Co - for Crispy Pork Belly, Goat Cheese Profiteroles and a whole lot of cocktails.
Katz's - for and 'I'll have what she's having' pastrami sandwich with a side of pickles.  It's not just a sandwich bar, it's an institution.  Don't miss the opportunity to send a salami to a boy in the army!

Saw: Central Park, the Guggenheim, Little Italy, China Town, Soho, Tribeca, Broadway, the Financial District Bull, the Statue of Liberty, a giant blow up koala in an outside bar, Starbucks on every corner (which is a good thing when you need free wifi and public toilets) the outside of The Late Show, Brooklyn for a pit stop after we missed our actual stop, the Meat Packing District, a very popular kebab stand and lots of very unpopular kebab stands, 1970s Playboy magazines at an outdoor book stall,  bananas for 5 for $1, a turtle in Central Park and the Hangover II when I could no longer beat the hot weather with a frappucino.

Departed: In a Yellow Cab to JFK for the flat rate of $45 and onwards to Heathrow.

More photos to come, these are just the ones taken on my phone.

No Moleste indeed!

I saw this and thought of Gags.

The Statue of Liberty is in this picture.

Good iced coffee and intriguing use of champagne corks for miniature furniture. 

This building has a horses head on it.

Thank you Matt's Grill, we had some great times

And thank you barman John for making us feel so welcome!  This is a place where you can sit at the bar with a friend to enjoy dinner and a drink, sit by yourself to read the paper, or catch up on the local sporting teams' successes and failures.

Death & Co pork belly...
i think.

While I manned the table Jono got a snack platter of pastrami as he waited for our jumbo sandwiches to arrive.

I'm pretty sure I did.  It was amazing!

Before

After

Riding the subway.

Riding the Staten Island Ferry.

Our last night in NYC.

And then the heavens opened.

So we hid from the weather in a French bistro and simultaneously stepped back in time to the 1960s (I don't think they'd updated the decor since then).

Columbus Circle