Travel: New York City

I usually reserve my travel adventures for Travel Thursdays, but since this is a two part-er I’m going to share Day 1 of our New York adventure today on Wednesday. (Mixing things up today! hah) Day 2 will be tomorrow on an actual Thursday.

Last month Dave and I went to a wedding in New York. We have a few friends in New York so it was perfect. This was our first time going to New York in the spring and it was gorgeous! We fell in love with the city this time. Last time it was a little overwhelming and freezing in the winter. But this time it was so lively, pulsing with undeniable energy, and so inviting.

We flew in late Thursday night, stayed at our friends Katy and JJ’s place. Dave and I have both worked with JJ and have kept in touch through the years, and the two times we’ve been to New York they always invite us to stay with them. They’re fantastic hosts and so fun to be around.

This is the view from their awesome balcony.

In the morning we walked to breakfast at the Rabbit Hole. It was a cute little bar with good food.

We walked around the neighborhood, stopped in a shop or two, grabbed coffee at Devocion. It was a really cool looking coffeehouse. The live plant wall was so pretty and the skylight was beautiful. It was very trendy.

Then we met up with JJ and headed into the city. We met our good friend Jared and Marlee, their baby Luna, and Jared’s mama. We ate in the basement of the Plaza Hotel (from Home Alone 2! One of my favorite movies ever.) They have a bunch of options to choose from and was super cute. A little pricey but that’s to be expected in NYC, right?

Here is where I ate at the food court under the Plaza.

We took our food to go and walked across the street to beautiful, Central Park. It was a lovely, sunny day out. We were soaking up the sun and went for a nice little stroll through the park. It was really peaceful. And the flowers were all in bloom, it was so dreamy! Everyone is so active in New York running, walking, and biking all over the city, I love it.

This little love bug is Luna, our good friend Jared and Marlee’s baby. I am totally in love with her, as seen in this picture. 🙂

Luna was all tuckered out. New York is exhausting! 😉

After our friends had to take off for the rehearsal dinner, JJ, Dave, and I went on the subway to High Line Park. JJ showed us the park last time we were in town and I fell in love.

After High Line Park, we went home for some down time and watched a rough cut of a documentary JJ and I worked on (more on that later this year!) and waited for Katy to get home from work.

For dinner we met our good friend Supriya who I absolutely adore and love! We used to all hang out when we lived in DC together. Those were great times and Dave and I miss living in DC all the time! We made really great friends while we were there that we are lucky to still have.

After dinner we headed to Queens to go to a cocktail hour with the bride and groom before their big day on Saturday. Because life gets so busy and time flies, it’s really, really nice to all get together from all over the place and be together even if it’s just for a weekend.

Our first full day in New York, was just that, full. Full of sight seeing, great friends, lots of walking, and delicious food.

Tomorrow I’ll cover our second and last day in New York.

What are your favorite places to go in New York? It’s such an amazingly large, vibrant city with so many cool hole in wall places and neighborhoods. I was smitten with New York after this trip.