Thursday- Day 1
The train ride was pretty nice-- we went through Amish Country so we got to see tractors being pulled by horses on the farms. We arrived in NYC around 1pm at Penn Station, so we did some quick research on the train with all our maps and found that we just need to take this red subway and will drop us off a block from our hotel. So we jump on this red train that says it's going "downtown." Well 3 stops later we realize we are going in the wrong direction, so we hop off....exit the subway....walk across the street and figure this will get us on the other side of the tracks and we are all set heading the right direction now! Get back on the train and we are going in the same flippin direction as before! Note to self: the subway stations are MUCH bigger than St. Louis so there are multiple entrances to each side! So finally we are able to get on the subway going the right way...make it to the hotel to check-in....then head out to explore!
We walked over to the Ed Sullivan theater where David Letterman films. We went to Hello Deli to pick up a late lunch which is occasionally shown on Letterman and features Rupert the deli owner. We were amazed cause Rupert was there and took our order and the place was SO small-- only 3 tables to sit at with little stools-- something you'd see in a kindergarten room! The food was awesome-- it was like $8 and I got a huge sub that had fresh carved turvey with salami and pickle and cheese-- was like a Turkey Cuban sammy.
We then just walked around Times Square, the Broadway area, down to Macy's and checked out some stores. We then went to "Restaurant Row" which was just a cute street near all the theaters that has a bunch of non-chain restuarants. We went to House of Brews so Dustin could try a local beer and I could take advantage of their $5 happy hour for martinis and margaritas! Next, we headed up to the Bronx on the subway (and yes, rode it in the right direction this time!) to go to the Yankees-Rays game. We went early so we could check out the bars around the stadium, but it was very disappointing. I think we were envisioning something like Wrigleyville and it was more on par with St. Louis or worse. There was a big pit basically where the old stadium was and then less than 5 bars there. Stan's seemed to be the happening place, but was $10 beers, so we just went next door to this bowling alley which was just a tad less crowded and had $5 beers. The stadium also was not very exciting, especially for the Yankees. There just wasn't anything special about it....and the worst part was that I couldn't even find nachos! Who creates a ballpark without nachos?!?! I seriously thought those were standard at all games- ugh! We then headed back to Times Square and got some pizza by the slice at Ray's. Dusin had one with chicken fingers, pepperoni, and sausage I think.....it was AWESOME! I thought I'd try something different....but was not near as good. It was some sort of white pizza with no sauce and topped with just cheese and then big hunks of ricotta. It was good, but nothing like Dustin's. Then it was bed time!
