I traveled right from Washington DC to NYC on the Acela train. You can read about the D.C trip in the blog(s) I posted two weeks ago. I’m starting this one from the moment I got on the train in DC to the moment I got off in Boston at the end.
Day 1
The train was 1 hour late because of a medical emergency on board in Wilmington, DE. I’ve never had the ‘hey is there a doctor on board’ thing happen, but today it did. I was watching a movie on my laptop when suddenly everyone ripped out their earbuds and turned around. There was a commotion and suddenly about 5 people were surrounding someone at the back of the car. Not really sure what happened, but it seemed like someone had passed out / had a stroke / heart attack. Something crazy bad. Luckily the EMS people were at the station when we got there and we happened to have a physician on board. Unfortunately that made us about 45 min late. Not a big deal, glad the person was ok. (I ended up getting 1000 Amtrak points as a reimbursement. That’s a lot thank you Amtrak.)
Once in NYC I went to Phil’s apartment which was much much easier to get to than Bushwick. It is really nice and located in the Financial Sector of NYC. I also didn’t get totally lost in Penn Station trying to find the correct subway.
We didn’t stay long however because we had the Comedy Cellar! We got there a bit early so we got a drink at a local bar then headed over to wait in line. Unfortunately for me I had made a (very rare) trip plan error. I had booked the comedy cellar for Sunday! Grrrr I was so annoyed. Phil had a good laugh though.
We decided to go back to his house after that to go to the apartment speakeasy! A speakeasy is essentially a secret bar with a fun aesthetic vibe, which varies from place to place. I took a shower first and then Phil, Paul, Dave, and I went down. The cocktails took ages to arrive so that was interesting, but other than that it was a wonderful experience. After the bar we all played about an hour of Mario Cart and I lost every time. Philip is actually very good at the game, but I doubt even the combined effort of Phil and his roommates could beat Rico. That’s it for day one!
Day 2
In the past, my NYC trips tire Philip out fast because we do things in quick succession. This time I tried to be a bit more relaxed: nothing scheduled on Saturday until 2pm! Phil enjoyed this immensely. The first thing of the day would be a quick brunch at a local restaurant called Smiths. One of Philip’s apartment mates -Dave- came with us to breakfast. I might’ve mentioned him before, if not he is cool and we aren’t enemies.
At brunch we got mimosas. It was about 10:30am, but you can’t drink all day if you don’t start in the morning! (Haha it’s a joke. Side note for the relatives reading). I got a NY Strip steak and eggs, Phil got a salad, and Dave got french toast. It was spectacular I’d say, although a bit on the pricy side. After breakfast we went to a nearby store to buy Phil an ice tray for his apartment. He had just moved from Bushwick to Manhattan so I was both the first VIP visitor and got the first strong critique: no ice tray for cold drinks.
Once we found what we needed we went back to his apartment to check out the roof deck. It isn’t exactly on the very top roof, but close enough. Every aspiring ice tray needs a selfie from the roof so I helped out a little.
After viewing the views we headed inside where Phil challenged Dave and I to a game of 3v3 billiards. I ended up losing with Dave in second and Phil in first. It was a hard fought battle. I’d say that his new apartment is already leagues ahead of his old one. Anyways, after a tragic loss, we all went downstairs and relaxed.
Up next Phil and I went to the Blue Man Group at Astor Place. It is at the…wait for it….Astor Place subway stop. Before going to the show it was event day in Pokemon Go so we went and battled for the sort of normally impossible to catch “Azelf” at a local gym. Luckily we both caught one and so we were happy when we entered the theater.
I had gotten us the best seats in the house right behind the VIP Experience seats. (I didn’t know those existed or I would’ve gotten them.) We were about 2 ft from the stage in the first row, which was at about eye level. Philip had no idea that these were the seats I got and (I think) he was impressed. That always puts a smile on my face since I’m the trip planner. It sucks to find a cool event and not have the other person/people think so as well.
BIG SPOILERS AHEAD FOR THE BLUE MAN GROUP SHOW!!! NEXT 2 PARAGRAPHS
Anyways, I wasn’t allowed to take pictures during the show so I will walk you through what happened. First there was an intro that was played out on a small electronic billboard on the stage. We had a birthday in the house! Also the VIP people had a surprise and the crowd got to do a bunch of interactive things such as yell at a random person in the audience, say happy birthday (not sing), and a random person got spotlighted to stand and lead us in the national anthem (but they didn’t know it because they were from out of the country I think. It was hilarious). We went through a few acts next.
When the Blue Men came out Phil and I were so close that we could see every small detail of their face. I thought it was all very exciting! The first thing they did was one of them tossed marshmallows at one of the guys and little paint balls at the other. The catcher would catch them in his mouth without missing a beat. It was honestly a bit impressive and I’m not really sure how to explain what happened during that part in detail because I’m nervous I’d ruin the moment. They went out twice and grabbed two random people from the audience which was so funny I thought I’d die of laughter. (You can ask me about those ones directly if you know me because I really don’t want to spoil that stuff). There was also a pretty goofy and gross captain crunch eating segment, along with a lot of drumming, and finally a toilet paper shower w/ strobe lights! The whole performance was really really hilarious and fun. Totally worth it!
End Of Spoilers
After the show Phil and I decided to go back to his apartment to rest before the last performance. When we got back we found that some of Paul’s friends had come to visit the apartment to party. Always nice to meet some of Phil’s friends and friend’s friends. While all the boys played Mario Cart I resigned myself to write part of the Washington Blog. You may have read it already? If so… great! If not… how dare you!
About an hour and a half later it was time to go! Phil and I hopped on the uptown subway and away we went towards the dinner reservation. We were going to the Trattoria Dell’Arte Italian restaurant on 7th Ave. I had called ahead right after the Blue Man Group and managed to secure a table for 2 at 6:15pm. Sadly the subway had a mind of it’s own. The Union Square (14th Street) stop was under construction so all the trains were moving slow! Grrrr! We ended up being 15 minutes late.
If you know me, I hate being late for a timed event. However, Phil wasn’t worried so I tried to match his calm mental state. Once we got there we indeed still had our table, but less time to eat before the Broadway show. Dinner was awesome and so was desert!
The show we were seeing was Leopoldstadt at the Longacre Theater. I had got us middle of the mezzanine in the 2nd row. Not bad! The chairs were a bit tight for 6’2” me and I thought I was going to die from heat stroke in my long pants and sweater. (Nice clothes) The play was about a Jewish family that had married into a Christian family and followed a timeline from 1899 through 1924, 1938, and 1955 in Germany. It was a very powerful play and the 1938 scenes really hit hard right after visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in DC. Whole thing gets a round of applause from me! Well done!
I can’t help but mention that about 40 minutes before the play was over there were some “technical difficulties” that ground everything to a halt for about 10 minutes. It was kind of intriguing because neither I nor Phil had ever seen something of the sort. After the play Phil and I went to a McDonalds to get a late night snack before going to bed.
Day 3
Today was my last day and the plan changed a bit. Originally the idea was to get up bright and early, but Phil was super tired so we extended the wake up time to 10:30am from 9am. For a while I have wanted to take the Roosevelt Island Tram, but there really hasn’t been a good time to go.
Finally today was the day! We took the #4 Uptown Express train all the way to 59th street then walked a few blocks to the tram terminal. We got there right as a tram pulled up and was boarding I kid you not! We got to use our Metro cards to get on for the price of about $2.75 so that was cool. Phil was still a bit skeptical of a good time, but once he was on board with the doors closed he was all for it.
The ride took about 7 minutes and the views were awesome! I could see all the way down the street as we took off into the air. The (Ed Koch) Queensboro Bridge was next to us the whole time and seeing that up close from slightly above was also neat. The original plan was to ride bikes around the island for a few hours, but I guessed that idea wasn’t my finest moment as we passed them by without a second thought.
For lunch we went to a pizza place on the island. On the way we passed a softball game going on. Phil is on his office softball team as a power hitter so he is always interested in a game that is going on. Err, I was about to talk about the pizza though. I thought it was great, but Phil wasn’t impressed. He is still searching for the best slice of buffalo chicken pizza in NYC. It seems like a never ending quest.
This was kind of the last thing that I had on my trip plan so Phil decided to take over. Instead of going back to Manhattan we were now going to Williamsburg to play mini golf! Good idea. It just so happens that there is also a subway off the island in edition to the tram. It is a little more convenient to have a public transportation that can carry a few hundred more people on it I guess. Anyways, we took the F train off the island and got on the incredibly packed L train to Brooklyn.
The mini golf was a place that Phil hadn’t yet been to so he was trying it for the first time with me. The theme was climate change and global warming, which was a first for me. Some of the holes were a bit amusing and made you think a bit. For example: you could pick the strait to the hole route of no emission changes (resulting in a higher atmosphere temp…etc), a hill to the left of much higher emissions because no one cares about the climate, and a hill to the right with lower emissions because people are trying to change.
Overall it was a very interesting course. I’m not sure I’d recommend as it’s a bit run down. The pro of coming is the thought provoking theme, the awesome views of NYC, and the very difficult course layouts (for people that like a challenge). After I lost we headed back to Phil’s house. On the way we grabbed some gelato / ice cream / slush at a very hipster Italian shop. The treats were great!
Once we made it back to Phil’s apartment I played a few rounds of Mario Kart then went up the #2 subway to Penn Station to wait for my North East Regional Amtrak train home to Boston. Before boarding I upgraded to business class to avoid the unpleasant coach class. So far it seems worth it!
This was trip number 4 to NYC and I hope you enjoyed my rendition of it. Thank you for reading and I hope to see you next time!
Trip Stats:
- Miles walked in NYC: 15mi
- Phil’s apartment score: 15/10
- Paul’s air mattress score: 14/10
- Major errors in the Official Plan: 1 🙁
- Amtrak Business Class window seat to Boston
- Acela Business Class window seat to NYC
- Will I make a Train Station Stats list?: Probably 😉
- Phil’s favorite buffalo chicken pizza in NYC: undecided still (Next time we will find it!)
- Money I put on my Metro card this trip: $40
- Never actually used ice from the ice tray
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