Arrival

We arrived in Manhattan yesterday and checked in to our hotel early. We stayed at the Blakely on W55th St. No issues with the flight. We left Toronto on time, landed early and our driver, Jose, was waiting. The drive from Newark to the hotel was around 30 minutes, even with the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel down to one lane.

I forgot how nice it smells here! I am not kidding. While I find Toronto blasts me with the scent of sewage here and there, Manhattan smells like food everywhere. It must be all the street vendors (and not just hot dogs).

We walked down 7th Ave and then Broadway and crossed paths with Joe Lieberman at a crosswalk. We then stopped for a slice of pizza and a beer. Afterwards, we walked into Macy's and Terry spent some time looking at shoes until I coaxed her back to the street.

We then stopped in at Eataly to look around before our dinner reservations at Birreria on the roof top. We still had a couple hours to kill before dinner after some wine and shrimp so we walked down 23rd St and checked out the Chelsea Hotel and walked a portion of the High Line.

Made it back to Birreria for dinner, cheese, wine and a flight of cask ales. Nice view of the Flatiron Building from our table. We bought some treats for the hotel and for our colleagues back home and then had a macchiato and a cannoli before taking the subway back to the hotel for the night.



It was Terry's birthday yesterday. Here is a shot of Terry and some strange mannequin at Eataly.

Bummer

I received an e-mail today saying Aretha Franklin at Radio City Music Hall on Jan 18 is postponed to June (a special shout-out to our recent weather for that!). This is both disappointing and a logistics issue for our NYC trip next week.

A refund is being processed and tickets to see "Stomp" at the venue where it has been showing since it premiered in 1994 have been purchased to compensate. That should be pretty cool.

We may get tickets for Aretha at Roy Thompson Hall in April to make up for this but it will not quite restore the excitement of seeing her at Radio City.

Looking forward to Monday's flight!

Less than a week to go...

Terry and I are getting ready for NYC. I have been filling in our "itinerary" this week. In addition to the shows we have tickets for, we have now also booked VIP skating at Rockefeller Center, the 9-11 Memorial and the Tenement Museum.

Thinking about booking "Stomp" and the Intrepid Museum to see the shuttle but we may just play these by ear and do a walk up. We have lots booked already.

We will be going into Hoboken as well to visit Carlo's Bake Shop sometime during the week.

First up, we have dinner reservations at La Birreria in Eataly the day we arrive. We should be able to visit Macy's and the High Line that day too.