When we got up this morning, we faced the eternal question: what are we going to do today? It's a question with which we'd begun grappling last night. Normally, we have our NYC trips planned out pretty well. But this time, we've been playing it by ear.
One idea had been to go see another Broadway show, particularly a matinee. I'd been wanting to see An American in Paris (even more so since we were Americans in Paris last summer), which is a new musical based on the Gene Kelly movie. And since we could get last minute tickets for a pretty good price, we decided to do it. Thank heavens for technology.
By the time we were ready to head out, we only had two hours before the show. Marsha had the excellent idea of going to the Cosmic Diner (one of our long-time favorites, which I've covered before) for breakfast. We had a table and food inside of ten minutes. Can't beat that.
Afterwards, we walked down to the theater and picked up our tickets at Will Call. Since we still had some time before the show started, we walked back to Times Square. Popped into the Disney Store for a minute and then went to pay our respects to the sadly departed Toys R Us.
Show time! Our seats were in the middle of the mezzanine and they were great. We had a fantastic view of the stage. What's more, the three rows in front of us went unsold, we we got to move down a few rows after intermission. The theater was great, too. It's playing at the Palace, which was built in 1913 as a Vaudeville venue, so the seating was a little tight.
The show was fantastic (it won the Tony in 2015 for Best Musical). The music is by the Gershwins and, since it's based on the movie, has Gene Kelly's fingerprints all over it. I bought the soundtrack at dinner when I could connect to wifi.
After the show, we walked down to Bryant Park (another favorite spot) and relaxed for a bit. About that time we noticed a slight change in the weather. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, but the coming drizzle had clearly shifted a bit.
I also had my second celebrity sighting. While I was walking around in the park, I passed by Candice Cuoco (the goth designer) from the latest season of Project Runway. Sadly, Madison and Marsha missed her. I would never have recognized her myself (situationally famous), but Marsha and Madison are both hooked on the show.
We felt a few drops, but they didn't last long. Dinner reservations tonight were at Amada, our first time at the NYC location (you should know that Amada in Philly is Madison's favorite restaurant), which is all the way down at the World Trade Center. We decided to walk most of the way and then take the subway.
We hiked as far as 7th and Christopher, then made one quick little sightseeing stop in front of Village Cigars. It's a small mosaic on the sidewalk called Hess' Triangle. Back in 1910, the city claimed a number of buildings by eminent domain to widen 7th Avenue. A landlord named David Hess fought the city to keep from losing his apartment building, the Voorhis. Hess lost, but in 1922, his family discovered that the city had goofed on their survey and they still owned this tiny 26-inch triangle. The city asked them to gift it, but the Hess family refused and put in the plaque instead. In 1938, Village Cigars purchased it for $1000 dollars.
From there we got on the subway, which unfortunately stopped a few times thanks to issues on the line. We'd been ahead of schedule, but now time was getting tight. As soon as we got back up to the street, it started sprinkling again. Thanks to our lunch yesterday, we knew that we could get there via the basement level of the World Trade Center all the way to Brookfield Place.
The NYC Amada is just as great as the Philly location, but slightly different. It's much larger and the tables are closer together. It's also a bit noisier. There are fewer tapas selections (a couple of our favorites were missing) and more large plate items. It was still a fantastic meal and the service was excellent.
Afterwards, we walked out to the water again, where an outdoor concert was getting started. The esplanade along the Hudson is really one of the most beautiful areas in the city. You could easily forget that you're even in Manhattan, except that both the Freedom Tower and the Statue of Liberty are both in view.
We decided to walk the esplanade all the way up to the High Line. It was a bit of a walk, but we'd never done the High Line (which I've also covered previously) at night before. Plus, I don't remember the esplanade going anywhere near that far before, so that was a new experience, too.
Walking the High Line at night was just great, except for when we reached the end at 10th Avenue. The closest subway station that would get us back to Midtown is at Penn Station, so we had to walk several more blocks in an area that we weren't exactly sure about. Naturally, we all felt a lot better after we reached Penn Station. Not just for personal safety, but to finally get a break from walking so far.
We were all pretty glad to get back to the room and relax with a little TV. Tomorrow is our last full day in NYC, and this time we have a little more of a schedule.
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