So, way back at the beginning of November Dan and I had the lucky chance to go to Maryland and New York. (The Maryland pictures are all on the camera and will have to wait til a later date) It was a "business trip" naturally. Ok, it was a business trip. There was a huge Born to Run/barefoot running convention/meeting/gathering right before the New York Marathon and all the big "barefooters" were going to be there, Christopher McDougall (who wrote the book), Daniel Lieberman (the Harvard evolutionary biologist) . This was a big deal and our friend, Barefoot Ted said Dan had to be there! Naturally, I said I HAD to be there too! For support reasons ;) My cousin, Karen, is a nanny working for a family that lives right outside of New York and her family was nice enough to say we could come stay with them, so it was on. I got to come too. So, for the trip, we decided it would be best if we tried to do mostly free things in the city, so Karen suggested that we go explore Central Park. Both Dan and I had been to New York before but only really walked by Central Park before so we decided that we would do it in-depth. We'd go see the ice-skating rink, the castle, the Boat House, that bridge where Macaulay Culkin blows up the fireworks in Home Alone 2... Yes, all the important sites. For some reason, the two opportunities I've had to visit Karen in New York we have spent our time trying to find cool places where they have filmed some of our favorite movie scenes. Last time we spent the majority of our time going through the list of notable locations for You're Got Mail. Is this the best way to use your time while in New York? No....no, not really, BUT the Zabar's, where Meg Ryan goes shopping and tries to avoid Tom Hanks, and he ends up paying for her groceries? Yeah, it's a pretty cool, and stuffed of interesting pots and pans and has yummy French cheese and pastries and pain au chocolat and when there is yummy food and chocolate, time is never truly wasted, right? I digress though, Central Park? Yes.
Our first stop was the Central Park Zoo. Yes, we might have gone because of Madagascar (which is a TOTAL LIE-no zebras, no lions, no giraffes, no hippos-there are penguins though), I mean, we went because it is a historical and cultural landmark of the city...It was really fun though, this is a picture of the snow monkeys. The two on top of the rock are cuddling, which we thought was cute, SO we took a picture, BUT you can't tell.
We then visited the Boat House because of 27 Dresses. I thought that it was really cute and romantic and saw why she wanted to have her wedding there. We tried to eat lunch there but it was closed for the winter. So we had to hang our heads in sadness and continue our search for lunch options. We ended up eating hot-dogs from a vendor in the park. I hung my head in sadness again.
These guys were more cheerful though. We found these giant bubble blowers by the pretty bridge thing that's in Home Alone 2 ;) I know you were all wondering why we were there ;)
Do you remember this? Or have I seen that movie more times than I should have.
Here is Karen, our lovely host and tour guide. Thanks for putting up with us Karen. She's on top of Belvedere Castle in Central Park and has apparently been in a lot of movies that I haven't seen. I'm glad we went though, the view from the top was sweet.
And for the best part of the trip!!! Sadly, I couldn't get tickets to go the Born to Run things with Dan so Karen and I had to find something else to do. Karen suggested we go see the Radio City Hall Christmas Spectacular. Best suggestion ever because....
I got to see the Rockettes!!! After watching them on the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade for every year of my life that I can remember I got to see them in person...and it was awesome!!!
This is a short version of the Nutcracker that they did. We all know how obsessed I've always been with that.
March of the Wooden Soldiers
And to my great surprise they ended with a full on nativity. It was beautifully done and I was quite impressed that after the Santa Claus number, and the toy shop number, and the nutcracker number that they still remembered what Christmas was really about. And I might have cried a little bit.Karen and I ended the night by waiting an hour and a half to eat at the Serendipity because...well yes, because of the movie.
We shared their famous frozen hot chocolate and one of their sundaes which was totally worth the whopping $15 DOLLARS that it cost (that's just the sundae, not including the hot chocolate). It really was some of the best hot fudge I have ever eaten and the ice cream and the whipped cream...it was soooo good! Fun fact about the Serendipity, they hold the world record for the most expensive dessert, it costs $10,000 and you have to give them at least 24 hour notice that you are going to order it. After seeing that on the menu I felt like we got out of there for pretty cheap.
This is not us eating, but it gives you an idea for how crazy it looks inside.Overall, we had a great time! Dan's convention went amazingly well, he got to meet a lot of really influential people in the running (esp. barefoot running world) and I got to live my childhood dream of seeing the Rockettes and eating the most expensive dessert that I'VE ever had.
