In case you missed it, you can you can see all of our NYC recap posts here: part one | part two | part three | part four
When last we left off, I was sharing photos from our second day in NYC. This was, by far, my favorite day of the trip and this group of pictures perfectly explains why. After we tackled the Empire State Building and delivered all of our cold weather gear at the hotel, we set out on foot with a very loose agenda. We planned to visit The Vessel, The High Line, and the original Shake Shack location (we had a few other areas of town mapped out in case we had extra time), but we weren’t on a schedule and had no times or tickets we had to adhere to.
The Vessel is near Hudson Yards and the northern entrance to the High Line. It wasn’t there the last time we were in the city, so it topped my list of things to see. You don’t have to pay to visit, but there are a fixed number of people allowed on the structure at a given time, so you have to grab a times ticket at a nearby kiosk. You can order tickets in advance for $10, but since we were going during the week and not at a peak time, we decided to risk it.
It’s a series of stairs, elevators, and walkways that allow such a different view of the city than the one you get on the ground. Sophie was a little skeptical because of the height, but we all had a great time and we got my favorite family photo of the trip (the first one in today’s post — thank you, stranger, who knew how to operate a camera!).
At the center of the lowest level, there was a spot you could lay your phone and grab a timed photo of your faces with the Vessel above you. It felt ridiculous taking these with hundreds of people standing nearby, but the girls thought it was so cool.
Note Josh’s missing beanie in the photos above — he dropped his hat on the Subway and Ella didn’t realize it was his, so she ignored it when she saw it. We ran into a gift shop at The Vessel to grab a replacement, but they were all emblazoned with NYC patches, so we ran in to the mall across the street, after our visit. We went into Madewell to grab something we actually loved and saw their men’s hats were thirty ish dollars. I swapped it out at another table near the register because I loved this soft grey color, so when I heard the sales person ring it up for $79, I almost coughed up a lung. Josh reluctantly handed over his card and we laughed for hours about his $80 beanie. WHAT IN THE WORLD?! It turned out to be our most expensive — cashmere — souvenir of the trip.
The High Line is the coolest walking trail in New York, created from an old, elevated train track. We’ve been in the summer months when everything is green and blooming and it’s beautiful, but we still enjoyed the peaceful walk and the girls loved taking pictures at each of the overpasses.
Sophie had an audience of about 15 when she took this photo, but it did not deter her poses in the least!
After working up quite the appetite, we walked east towards Washington Square Park to grab the best burgers in the world. Yes, we have a Shake Shack in Birmingham, but we rarely ever eat there. We consider it a fun travel perk and prefer to have it when we’re vacationing. Josh and the girls grabbed us a table in the sun and I waited in the long line for burgers and shakes. It wasn’t the longest wait we’ve had here, but it might have been the coldest.
Sophie looks so irritated here, but it was mostly the cold. She didn’t love her chicken or her shake (this was her theme of the day), so she was ready to move on.
As we left the park, I snapped a quick picture of the girls in front of the Flatiron Building. It’s undergoing a face lift, so there was scaffolding everywhere. The funniest part of this photo is what happened next. As I was taking their picture, a few women asked Josh to take theirs. They were early twenties and gorgeous and we laughed because he took so many pictures for strangers that weekend. Ella and I were laughing and I was videoing the encounter (Josh loved that I was keeping such a close eye on him!) and when we reconvened to cross the street, we realized that Sophie was nowhere to be seen?! She had managed to cross the street with a huge crowd of people and had just turned around to realize we weren’t behind her, when the light turned red. She stood on the other side of road while traffic whizzed between us, grinning and sucking down her milkshake. Of course, Josh loves to tell people that I lost our nine year old in NYC, but she crossed at the appropriate time and was perfectly content to watch us cross the street to meet her!
After a rest in our hotel room, we headed to the Times Square location of Carmine’s Italian Restaurant. It’s served family style and it was Ella’s time to choose our dinner, so she ordered this insanely delicious chicken dish for us to share. In true Sophie fashion, she hated everything on the menu and refused to even try it, but the rest of us ate ourselves sick.
This could easily feed 4-6 people and we laughed because the table of women next to us ignored their waiter’s suggestion and each ordered a separate dish. I wish I had a picture of their table and their laughter — and their check!
We had about an our before our Broadway theater opened, so we took the girls to Times Square to walk around. They were so cute and so overwhelmed and agreed it’s one of those places you can visit once and check off your list.
Sophie was starving by this point (she skipped lunch and dinner) so we bought her an $8 pretzel, which she also hated. Girlfriend filled up on candy and chips when we finally made it back to our room.
Before we knew the girls could join us on our trip, I bought two tickets to see Hamilton while we were in New York. They were insanely overpriced, but Josh told me he didn’t care what we saw or how much they cost, if that’s what I wanted to do for my birthday. When we decided to take the girls, I couldn’t reasonably buy two more tickets — it would have cost more than our flight & hotel combined for the four of us to go. I called the Broadway office and they happily switched us to four tickets for Aladdin instead, even though the ticket agent laughed with me about our exchange.
We let the girls choose the show and since this is Ella’s favorite Disney movie, they picked it over Lion King or the other options we offered. We were so happily surprised by the show — it was beautifully done and the music was amazing. Our happiest accident was to learn after show that the actor who voiced Jafar in the original movie was on stage that night! By the time we left Broadway, we were exhausted and ready for bed, but so excited about our last day in the big city.
