What's the best way to enjoy Manhattan? In my opinion, it is WALKING, STROLLING and PRANCING around town.
To get a little bit of exercise in our lives and to take advantage of a gorgeous hot sunny Sunday, we decided to walk downtown to uptown, from Chinatown to the Met museum to see the 'Schiarapelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations' exhibition. It was in our day's goal to walk more than 100 NY city blocks including zig zagging through avenues i.e. left to right (avenues) as well as up and town (streets). From Chinatown (Mott St) up to the Met (82nd) back down to Rockefeller (47th) ending in the West Village.
Lots of "obstacles" were thrown at us (mostly me) during our walk. Typical of NY, lots of things and events were happening....
Our
day started with a Mother's day family dim sum brunch down on Mott
Street. I charged up by eating plates of shrimp rolls, shrimp dumplings,
whole plate of chicken feet, buns, tofu skin ..you name it, I ate it.
Feeling greased up (literally), drank some tea and water and began our
walk at around 2 p.m. The hot sun was very discouraging but nothing my
SPF 60 sunblock couldn't handle.
Pretty stores in
Nolita were enticing me with sale signs and new Spring/Summer arrivals
but we needed to get to the museum before closing time (around 5:15
p.m.). Passed Houston St., pretty things and buildings started to
emerge...
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| New mural by Retna on Houston and Bowery |
Seeing a new mural by Retna on Houston and Bowery. Garance Dore posted as her weekend inspiration on her
blog.
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| Dave helping a guy turn the cube at Astor place. |
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| We heard music by Union Square and saw an whole event dedicated to promoting Taiwan was taking place |
Union Square 14th street/5th ave
A promotional event for Taiwan tourism was
happening in Union Square which I was surprised not to have heard about
cuz you know, Taiwanese girl should know everything Taiwanese going on.
There was even a concert stage and lots of vendors. This deterred us for
a
dozen minutes as I quickly scanned the site out of curiosity but not for
too long since you know, Taiwan is just much better in
PERSON and so the shaved ice (they put mango jam on shaved ice) and oyster pancakes looked uninteresting to
me *snob knob up.
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| Bubble tea, oyster pancake, shaved ice you name it! |
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| My second favorite building in New York |
Taking
a break at Argo Tea beneath the Flatiron building on 23rd/5 ave to cool down and take a pee break.
Stumbling onto Madison Square Eats. I was still full from dim sum or else I wouldn't have
minded trying a pizza from Roberta's or some focaccia from Eataly.
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| List of food vendors |
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| A Rebekka Minkoff sample sale..taking a peak at the inventory |
Walked by the Rebekka Minkoff sample sale on 5th ave between 28th/29th st and decided to take a peek to see what the big deal was about.
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| Ostrich skin |
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| A nice blue bag for Spring |
Walking by Bryant park/ NY library on 5th Ave/42nd stand, we realized that we had been walking for almost 2 hours and that we had to walk at least 1 minute per block to be able to get the Met (82nd street) on time. We decided to hop on a bus uptown to the Met so that we can have enough time to see the exhibition and planned to stay on track and finish our walk by walking back down to midtown from the Met!
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| 'Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible conversations' exhibit at the Metropolitain museum of Art |
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| Buddha head from Longmen grottoes in LuoYang which I visited during a recent trip to China |
After the Met, we began our walk back down to midtown. The sun was less intense but it was still hot so a rainbow soft serve was necessary for survival.
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| $3 dollah |
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| The Celine bag |
Did some REAL window shopping on Madison Avenue
since stores were actually closed by 5 or 6 p.m.
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| Pretty Ballerinas store in NY (Taken for Viv!) |
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| Taking a break at the Apple store plaza |
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| My first time at the Trump Tower...meh |
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| My first time at Henri Bendel |
Trump Tower, Henri Bendel and all the touristy things I haven't done yet.
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Those movie extras are getting paid alot of money to wait around.
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A new movie directed by and starring Ben Stiller was shooting by Radio City/Rockefeller Center and they blocked off an entire street. I find out later that Ben Stiller and Adam Scott were shooting this
scene. More pics I took of the set
here.
We attained our day's goal when we got to Rockefeller Center on 47th st. Hunger inevitably struck and so we hopped on a train all the way to the West Village by West 4th to have dinner at
Tomoe sushi.
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| Sashimi salad apetizer |
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| A good large portion to feed the hunger |
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| Last stop: Washington Square Park |
With our full belly, we decided to stroll a little bit despite our tired legs around Washingston Square park before going home. Our day finally ended. My feet hated me but my heart and eyes were content. We got home a little past 9 pm ready for a nice shower and sleep.
Next time, LES to UWS..High Line to the Cloisters?!?
What are YOUR weekend plans?
xxx
I love the pretty ballerina store front! So cute, wished my closet looked like that. It makes me wanna go and pick up a pair, but your pic of the Celine bag distracted me. It's actually on my coveting list. Did you pick anything up at the Rebekka Minkoff sale?
ReplyDeleteI don't really like Rebekka Minkoff style bags but some stuff I saw were pretty wearable but I don't need another bag..for now. hehe. Celine on the other hand..too bad it was closed..I want to see the black one or camel one up close.
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