Square Diner - 33 Leonard Street (at Varick & West Broadway)
(All images via: NYCDreamin Archives)
July 3rd. Up at 6:00 AM, maybe just a bit before. Out the door about an hour later, walking a few blocks to catch the 1 train down to the Square Diner for breakfast. The place was just opening up when we arrived - we were the first customers of the day. Pancakes for the lady, corned beef hash and potatoes and english muffin for myself. Orange Juice for us both.
The Gorgeous One awaits her blueberry pancakes in the early morning sun light...
The food was delicious and plentiful in portion. We really didn't have time to sit and ponder how good it was though as we needed to jump back on the subway and head down to the southern tip of Manhattan to hop a ferry to go see the lady in the harbor.
Statue of Liberty advance ticket - $12.00
We purchased advanced tickets for this back in March or so. The price is not too bad, maybe one of the better "tourist" deals to be had in the city, and if you go early in the morning it's pretty nice - not really so crowded. We chose the 9:00am ferry out to the statue and arrived with about 10 minutes to spare. A quick walk through security and we were on the boat and on our way.
Looking back at the southern tip of Manhattan at 9:15am on July 3rd, 2010. Destination: Statue of Liberty...
Statue viewed from the ferry boat. There are several more views located in my full set of photos located HERE.
Statue viewed from right underneath the pedestal on the lawn.
Some rock and roll freak and the original New York Doll.
After we spent maybe close to two hours enjoying Liberty Island, we hopped back on the ferry and were off, back to Manhattan after a brief detour to Ellis Island for those who wanted to do that tour...we chose not to. Once back in Battery Park, we departed the boat and began walking north, having in mind as our destination the Ground Zero/Trinity Church area. It didn't take us very long to walk up there, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that for the first time I'd finally be able to walk around in the cemetery at Trinity - it was actually open. So we did that for a while then walked a bit more and checked out the huge cranes doing the work at the One World Trade Center site...good to see something is finally going on down there.
Vinyl advertisement for what will eventually be seen at the Ground Zero reconstruction site.
One World Trade Center is slowly but surely rising in southern Manhattan.
You can always keep track of what's going on down at the One World Trade site by checking out THIS WEBSITE.
We walked up to Park Row and stopped in at J&R Music. I looked at CD's for a bit and decided to not make any purchases until our final full day in the city on Tuesday so I could decide what I REALLY wanted to buy. I just kept finding stuff I wanted and that's never a good thing...I could have spent several hundred dollars in there so we got the hell out of there before I could financially ruin myself.
"Play Me, I'm Yours" Piano seen at Union Square
We decided to head over to St. Marks Place again as I was wanting to stop in at Trash & Vaudeville to get a t-shirt or two. We did some browsing at a few shops along the street and then we happened upon a massage place called "Asian Bodywork Salon" at 96 St. Marks Place and J. says she is gonna get the half-hour massage. So I wander over to "East Village Books" across the street and browse for a bit then come back out on the street and take a few photos of some of the cool artwork to be found on the block...
This is some very cool artwork done by a guy with a shop on St. Marks. He also has some seriously funny and very "UN-P.C." Elmo drawings on his shop windows right now that are worth seeing...
Street art seen on St. Mark's Place.
After J. was finished with her massage, which she said she felt was well worth the $25.00+tip, we walked a bit further east to Tompkins Square Park where we decided we'd sit for a bit and relax. It was getting hot. Did I mention that yet? It was hot out in NYC? No? Well, it was HOT!!! Damn, it was hot. By the time we got to the park it was hovering around 98*. We sat near the south-eastern corner of the park for a good while, relaxing, taking it all in. We decided we would be next walking down to dinner in Little Italy, or what's left of it anyway. But first we wanted to walk around the park a bit more.
Another of the "Play Me, I'm Yours" piano installations, this one in Tompkins Square Park. This trio and a guitar player (who you can't really see) were jamming on a Johnny Cash tune - sounding great.
Then there was the Tompkins Squre Park Dog Run. We're walking by. And we like dogs like anybody, right? We're animal lovers. So we're stopped along the fence, watching these dogs. And out of nowhere comes this rather large dog and he...well, he....does what a dog does. You know. And he trots off and we're kind of laughing it off and watchingthe other dogs. About a minute or two later, here comes this other dog...and before you can say "NO!" he's scarfing down the...gift the other dog had just deposited. Then, to be a glutton, he nosed up another dried-out one and ate that one too. We just laughed in absolute horror at this mutt...who's owner no doubt would demand a big kiss from him any second now. We just couldn't believe it. It was time to walk.
Along our walk from Tompkins Sqaure Park down to Hester Street, we saw a lot of cool street art on the way. By far the coolest was this piece though...
Probably the most impressive piece of artwork we saw while in the city, this rolldown gate mural was spotted someplace on Houston I believe, just west of Avenue A maybe...not sure, didn't write it down unfortunately. It stopped both of us dead in our tracks. Hopefully it winds up in someone's living room or garage or something.
We saw quite a few of these "Rock & Roll Grandma" tags around the East Village.
While we were walking along Houston, we walked past these two guys who were obviously having problems with each other and were yelling "C'mon man, c'mon!" at each other. We stopped a bit up the block to see what might unfold but nothing did as the combatants soon went their individual way. We continued on ours as well. We were both feeling mighty hungry as we'd eaten no lunch to speak of in order to save room for the fabulous dinner we were about to enjoy.
Living the good life at Cafe Di Napoli, 191 Hester Street at Mulberry.
We arrived at the Cafe Di Napoli at around 5:30pm. We were quickly seated and given menus. Within a few more minutes, a basket of bread and olive oil with garlic were brought to our table along with ice cold water. We ordered our food (we each had the chicken fettuccini alfredo) and despite the fact the place was very busy, it arrived in a very reasonable amout of time. The portion size was fair, as always. I've eaten at this place a few times previously and always found it to be very enjoyable. This time was no exception and J. agreed with me that the food was delicious. They definately don't skimp on the chicken either. After digesting for a few minutes, we decided to head back to the hotel to cool off a bit and clean up before heading off to our final destination for the day...the Empire State Building, which was conviently located just a block from our hotel.
(Above) The standard $20.00 admission ticket for the Empire State building 86th floor observation deck. (Below) the $12.00 upgrade ticket for admission to the 102nd floor observation deck.
We left the hotel around 9:15pm to walk over to the Empire State Building. I took the following shot on our way there. Red, white and blue lights in celebration of the upcoming July 4th holiday.
Empire State Building at night - shot from 33rd Street looking east.
So we arrive at the front door of the ESB and walk in and are all impressed with the intricate stone work inside the lobby. A minute later we are on an escalator up to the Observations Deck ticketing and security area. After passing through a secured area, we purchase our tickets. We choose the standard $20 ticket plus the $12 upgrade for access to the 102nd floor. Then we wait, becoming one of hundreds in line in those velvet roped line-maker post thingys we all hate so much. Eventually, after like 45 minutes or so, we make it to the elevators. Yay!! Hold on...not so fast. This elevator takes you to the 80th floor. Your ears pop and then you get out of the elevator and stand in line...some more...for about another 45 minutes, waiting to get to JUST THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HALL to the elevators that go up to 86 and 102. It was a bit of a test of your patience factor...would the view be worth the wait? Finally, mercifully, we were on the elevator up to 86. We took it all the way to 102 first though. Got all the way up there and had a look around the enclosed observation deck. The view was indeed impressive. The overhead announcement was made that current visibility was 26 miles, which I found pretty interesting. After a few minutes we decided it would be much cooler on the 86th floor, outdoors enjoying the fresh air, so back on the elevator and down we went.
Times Square viewed from the 86th floor of the Empire State Building at 10:45pm on July 3rd, 2010.
Another view from the 86th floor of the Empire State Building. The building in the lower right with the squre of lights is Macy's at Herald Square.
One more view from the 86th floor of the Empire State Building.
It WAS cooler on the 86th floor. I found the photos I shot became less blurry without the pane of safety glass between me and the views I was trying to shoot. But even outside on 86 I had rather limited success shooting the views below. We lingered for probably 45 minutes on the 86th floor observation deck and checked out the view from all four sides of the building. It was magnificent. I don't think we'll do it again, due to the incredibly long wait time to get up there, but I do think it was worth it to do it at least once.
After we enjoyed the beautiful views of the city at night from above long enough, we began the rather quick trip down and out of the building. Funny how that works - forever to get up there - really quick getting down. We exited the building and decided we'd step across 5th Avenue, right next to "Papaya Dog" there was this pizza place that looked like they sold a good slice for a good price. We each ordered up a slice of pepperoni and a Sprite. We sat and leisurely enjoyed our pizza and the warm NYC night air. It was now just after 12:00am, it was still about 85* and it had certainly been a long day filled with a whole lot of adventure. We finished up our pizza and went back to the hotel to collapse for a few hours of sleep.
...to be continued.
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