Days 4 and 5 - NYC

After a night of fun, we slept in and woke up to get bagels and coffee.  It was very strange to walk around New York on New Year's Day--the city was dead.  There weren't hoards of people walking on the sidewalks or driving around.  It felt like we had the whole city to ourselves!

We stopped in to Brooklyn's Bagels for a full breakfast {and lunch}.  I had a whole wheat everything bagel with plain cream cheese, lox, tomato, onions, and capers.  It was humongous {so was Rich's bagel} so we ended up eating them for our lunch.

After getting some breakfast, we wandered the city.  We decided to walk through Central Park, and I guess this is where everyone we didn't see walking the streets had gone to.  There were tourists taking pictures and lots of people exercising.  Oh, and tons of people walking their dogs who were all the cutest!  I wanted to pet every single puppy but I don't think Rich would have been very amused.  {My puppy is sitting next to me helping me blog right this second!}

As we were wandering, we looked to our right and noticed The Guggenheim.  Our original plan was to go to The Met, but that was closed so we decided to warm up and admire the art and architecture {mostly the architecture} of this gorgeous museum.  This shot is looking up from the lobby of the museum.

Here we're trying to get the cool spiral ceiling behind us.  Fail. 

The next day we went to the Chelsea Market to check out all of the cool shops.  There was this meat shop.  Mmmmmm meat. :)  There was also an Italian grocery store with meats and cheeses and chocolates and LOTS of espresso.  I had some split pea soup from the soup shop.

The whole place was decorated with really fun art displays and there was a guy who was amazing on cello.  I really liked this column that was covered in Christmas lights.

After checking out the Chelsea Market, we had to run into CVS and OHHHH MYYYY GOSHHH do you see this ceiling?!  It's the prettiest CVS I've ever seen.  I think it used to be an old bank.

Then we went to Rich's friend's office to visit and this is their view.  It's looking North over Chinatown.  What a view!

And then I turned into a tourist.  NYFD Fire Truck!

Here's a look at all the cheap chotchkies for sale in China Town.  

We were heading to Ferrara's for some canoli and coffee.

This is Little Italy.  All of the fire hydrants are painted like the Italian Flag (red, green, and white) and they still had their Christmas decorations covering their businesses.  I loved it!

After getting some delicious sweets in Little Italy, we headed to see Ground Zero and the memorial, except you can only see it with advance passes.  Wamp wamp.  We didn't know that so instead we walked around.  I had no idea how huge this area was.  It's 16 acres, which is HUGE in NYC terms.

This building is The Freedom Tower, and when they put the spire on, it will be 1776 ft tall.

View from another side.

We were freezing after walking around so we stopped in at O'Hara's, except it wasn't.  It was an Indian restaurant with this cool ceiling, so we had a few drinks and warmed up before heading back to the hotel.  The food smelled delicious but we had plans to go to Butter that night.

After dinner at Butter (we love our Iron Chefs!), Rich took me to Washington Square.  The park is really pretty at night.  Can you see the Empire State Building behind the arch?

Couple shot with the arch!

And another shot of the arch.  We need some of these in Dallas.

That night we went to McSorley's Old Ale House to meet up with one of Rich's friends.  That place is so cool!  It's the oldest pub in New York and Abraham Lincoln used to get a drink there.  They even have an original John Wilkes Booth Wanted poster.  We met some nice NYU kids and had such a fun night!  Probably a little too fun...haha!