chinatown

I love New York. For those that don’t know, I was born in New York City and lived there until my parents moved up to Albany where I grew up before living in Boston, and eventually where I am now – Cleveland.

I always talk about “going home” when I go to back to New York. But when people ask me where “home” is, I say Cleveland. It sometimes seems like I don’t know where home is – but I’m fine with that. Having multiple homes makes it easy to feel at home at a few different places. And this weekend I had booked tickets to spend Mother’s Day with my mom at home – in New York City and Albany. Unlike my last impromptu trip home a few weeks ago, this time B was joining me!

Thursday night, B and I left Cleveland and flew into NYC. Right from the airport, we took a taxi to meet up with B’s friend Jared (who says he reads this blog … Hi Jared!) who was out with his coworkers and girlfriend, celebrating his last day of work. Jared has been working as a high-powered NYC lawyer pretty much since he finished law school, and his coworkers threw him a goodbye bash at a whiskey bar in Hell’s Kitchen, On The Rocks. The lawyers had been there for quite some time and were having a good time when we arrived, suitcases in hands. We stayed, had some drinks, and joined in the celebration before calling it a night and heading back uptown to Jared’s place.

On to Friday. B and I spent Friday sightseeing It was great! Jared lives on Central Park West and I was able to start the day with a 3.7ish mile run (per my MapMyRun App as seen below) through Central Park, which was beautiful, as you can see. I knew that as soon as I laced up my sneakers and went outside that it was going to be a good day – days starting with runs are always better.

central park mapmyrun

Post-run, B and I walked downtown to Rockefeller Center to meet my best friend Jane for lunch. Jane is pretty awesome (obviously, she was my maid of honor) and after getting a degree in city planning/urban development, she moved to NYC to find a job – she’s now living in Brooklyn and temping downtown. We enjoyed some delicious sandwiches, walked around a bit, and then B and I left Jane to do some more exploring.

brian and me rockefeller

one of my bffs who lives WAY too far away – jane!

From Rockefeller Center, we walked to one of my favorite places in NY, Eataly. We didn’t buy anything this time (too full from lunch), but I loved seeing all the people enjoying the gelato and smelling all the delicious food.

From there, we headed to One World Trade Center. I had been by there after 9/11 but before the memorial was being built so it was my first time seeing what had become of the area. We didn’t check out the memorial though – I don’t think I’m ready for that.

one world trade center

From there, we walked to South Street Seaport to get a view of the Brooklyn Bridge. It was a beautiful day and we sat for a little bit (my feet were tired!) and I bought a bag of candy to help enjoy the view (candy makes everything, even existing gorgeous views, better).

Pretty sure he doesn’t like posing for photos but humors me

Then, we headed to the Financial District so B could check out Wall Street. B had never been to Wall Street and enjoyed checking out where the original wall used to be (isn’t it crazy to think that NYC used to end all the way down there?!) and the Stock Exchange Building.

Look, it’s a map of Ohio!

After that, we hit up Chinatown. I was tempted to buy a bag of strange dried stuff (ginger, scallops, plums, unnamed fish) from a shop we stopped in, but we were on our way to dinner and I had just bought a bag of candy. It was such a gorgeous day and walking around was exactly what we wanted to do.

Chinatown

By then, it was time to meet my brother in the West Village. We headed back up the island and getting to the area a little early, sat down for afternoon drinks at Bobo. My brother joined us, bringing with him flowers! He had brought me tulips. How sweet, huh? Anyway, I had a lovely ginger mojito and my brother had a lemon-rosemary gin beverage. It’s still weird having my brother order drinks in bars – he just turned 21 and I’m not used to it.

siblings!

After drinks, we headed to dinner, and B headed back uptown to meet up with Jared again. Greg and I had a great meal at a BYOB French restaurant, Tartine, in the West Village where we ate outside. We shared two salads – one warm kale with butternut squash, the other fennel and asparagus with avocado and ricotta salata – and then the special entree – an almond encrusted halibut with a creamy polenta and asparagus. And of course, since it was BYOB, we enjoyed a bottle of a French wine that B and I had picked up along the way.

As we were leaving dinner, I had one of my first celebrity sightings – we saw Hugh Jackman! It was awesome. We actually were about to head to the train and ended up following Hugh for a few blocks. I was literally one foot behind him and could’ve touched him at one point. It was surreal! I wish I had taken a picture … but you would’ve just seen the back of a guy in a white polo shirt and a blonde woman and a small pug dog, so you’ll just have to trust me. And instead, enjoy this photo that I did NOT take:

I did not take this photo. 😦

To Be Continued …

And in the meantime, some thoughts to ponder:

Do you enjoy impromptu runs? Or do you prefer to plan a route ahead of time?
Have you ever had a celebrity sighting? What did you do?
Where do you call home? Do you have two homes?
Have you tried any of the dried scallops or other fishes from Chinatown?

(Continued from Part One: Montreal)

Toronto

We got into Toronto around dinnertime and decided to do some exploring of the Distillery District, just a mile or so from our hotel in the Harbourfront area. What a cute area! They’ve converted what used to be an old large distillery into a whole pedestrian only cobblestone section with bars, shops and restaurants. We found a local brewery to enjoy dinner and a sampling of the local beers before heading back to our hotel.

A sampling of Canadian beers

SNOW! Again!

The next day Toronto somehow ended up being a similar experience to Montreal. No, it wasn’t the biggest snow storm they’d ever had, but we got into town on a clear evening, and woke up to a snow storm the next day. The weather wasn’t nearly as bad (they probably got like 4 inches … however many cm that is) and we were able to walk a few miles to get around the city, just by foot. We first walked to Casa Loma, about 4 mi from our hotel and took a tour of the huge castle-like estate that sits on a hill at the most northern point of the city. It’s a beautiful old house that was owned by a Toronto millionaire back in the day – but now is a tourist destination that has been restored to as it was nearly 100 years ago.

inside Eaton Centre

Casa Loma!

After Casa Loma, B and I decided to check out Toronto’s Asiatown. It was not disappointing! We strolled around the large area of Asian (Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Thai) restaurants and stores, stopped in a few (I bought some ginger coconut candy –yum!) and decided to stop by for a snack at a dumpling restaurant. The snack turned into 15 dumplings – EACH – that we finished completely. Whoops! I guess that’s what happens when you eat “Brunch” at 2 p.m.!

I ate every single one of those dumplings

B and I left Chinatown and walked back to our hotel – but first, a stop at the CN tower! The former tallest standing structure in the world was gorgeous at night – all lit up in green and red for the holidays and bright in the now clear sky (it stopped snowing finally!). We debated going up to the top – but decided against it at the last minute and headed back to our hotel to relax for a little bit before our last night in Toronto. My boots had broken so my feet – socks and boot liners included – had soaked through so the walk back was a slow, trudgering mess. After changing, B and I hit up our hotel’s top floor restaurant – at the 38^th floor, it offered a beautiful view of the city and we were able to relax and have a drink before heading out for the night.

our approximate walking tour - included checking out Easton Centre Mall, Bloor Street shopping, and more along the way

our approximate walking tour – included checking out Eaton Centre Mall, Bloor Street shopping, and more along the way

Not wanting to walk too far after finding a few blisters on my feet and soaking through my boots, I found a bar close to our restaurant that sounded Canadian for us to check out for drinks and dinner – the Loose Moose! (Come on – if that doesn’t sound Canadian …) We found it easily and grabbed a table right in front of one of the many large screen TVs in the bar – and lucky us, within a few minutes the bar became crowded with people there to watch the Dos Santos vs Velasquez UFC fight. We stayed, ordered dinner and enjoyed our last night in Toronto.

Last night in Toronto .. the Loose Moose!

loose moose b

Guess what – the trip wasn’t quite over! After a quick workout, we left the hotel and while driving back into the U.S. we made one more stop – to Niagara Falls! B and I had been there a few years ago, but decided to stop by on our way back. It was just as beautiful with the snow-covered landscape – but way more crowded!

niagara falls