Ahh… what a GREAT day! I did a couple more hours of work after our bonfire (which was so perfect) and then crashed hard in the princess bed (Amelia’s bed when she comes to stay with Auntie Jennifer). We woke up at 6:30 to get on the road by 7, but unfortunately, Dan couldn’t find the keys (oh ya and I wasn’t ready) so we didn’t leave until 7:30. Fortunately, we were lucky and there wasn’t any traffic anyway, so we headed north to New York. Jennifer packed us a to-go bag with all of the roadtrip necessities (candy from all of the candy food groups, Chex mix, vitamin water, and an assortment of other nifty snacks and goodies).

The drive to New York City was pretty uneventful. We were both too excited to get there and I was not feeling well, so other than sick stops in Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, we really didn’t pay much attention to the in between states (oh, except to yell profanities at the Philly Flyer’s rink).

We crossed into NY from Staten Island and found our way to Lauren’s place in Brooklyn quite easily. We parked the car nearby (for FREE, I might add!) and hopped on the train to Central Park to meet up with some of Dan’s friends. After meeting up with Natalia and Jamie at the Plaza Hotel, we began our super exciting Seinfeld tour! As Dan and I are both huge Seinfeld fans, I felt it appropriate to put a little list of famous spots from the show and check them out since we didn’t have much daylight left. We walked to the Soup Nazi Soup Kitchen, to Monk’s (which is actually called “Tom’s Restaurant”), down in the neighborhood where Jerry is said to have lived on the show, and finally to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. We got to the Bronx late (and had an interesting walk through a seedy area of the borough just after dark) so we decided to head back to Manhattan quickly and grab some food and Lauren’s house keys so we could go back to the apartment and chill.

We stopped for dinner in Little Italy at the first place which seemed reasonably priced and where the staff spoke as little English as possible. I had the Gorgonzola Gnocchi (go figure) and a Peroni and we had a quick dinner before heading back to the flat.

Lauren’s place is… it’s just… I can’t do it justice. The place is huge. It’s exactly what you would expect from Brooklyn; a large exposed brick, high ceiling and open floor plan kind of place that even housed its own freight elevator (which opened into one of the rommie’s bedrooms!). One of the bedrooms was larger than my entire apartment in Los Angeles! Lauren got home shortly after us and we all headed down to the bar underneath her apartment (yes… directly underneath) for a beer (that naturally turned into three). I love this neighborhood. It’s such a great place to live and having spent a night here, I really feel like I could live here. I’ll make another judgment before I leave, but for now, I can’t imagine liking another neighborhood in the city better.

Tomorrow is filled with a lot of sightseeing so retirement is necessary at this point. Should have LOTS of good photos and stories to share tomorrow!

XOXO