Several weeks after Mr. Science and I returned from NYC, I’m finally getting around to posting about our trip!

We arrived in NYC on Friday December 9 and left on Sunday December 18. It was the perfect length of time to be away. We did everything we wanted to do and saw everything we wanted to see by the end of the day on the Thursday, so that left us two more days to revisit some places and take it easy.

I absolutely adore the Met. So much beautiful art! My favourite was the Roman and Greek section.

Our hostel was just a block away from Central Park, and we were right at the north tip of it, on 106th street. It was quite nice to be out of the super touristy area, but it also meant that we had a whole lot of walking to do! We talked about catching a bus or a taxi a couple times but never ended up getting around to it. Instead we walked everywhere. One day we even walked to Brooklyn and back – it took us about 10 hours in total!

Me on the Brooklyn Bridge.

I really love how pedestrian-friendly New York is. The sidewalks are always really wide and accommodating; it’s easy to walk absolutely everywhere. Here in Winnipeg, there aren’t always sidewalks, or they aren’t very well-kept, or the buildings just aren’t pleasant to walk past. But in New York there is always something beautiful to look at, so it’s a pleasure to walk for several hours. You can easily go for a wander and not realize how much time has passed until it’s four hours later. In Winnipeg it’s much harder to manage that. I expect this is also largely due to city planning: there are often apartments and shops of all kinds located fairly close to each other in NYC, whereas in Winnipeg the living spaces are often kept separate from the shopping districts. Hopefully that will change. Anyways, back to New York! We enjoyed all of the walking we got to do 🙂

The High Line - an old railroad track converted into a walking path.

While we were in NYC, we did all kinds of awesome things – walked across Brooklyn Bridge, wandered through Times Square, went to the top of Rockefeller Centre for a view of the city (both in the night and during the day), explored Central Park, admired the expensive apartments overlooking the park, visited the Natural History Museum and the Met, walked the High Line, explored Chelsea and the West Village, stared in awe at the buildings in the Financial District, saw the off-Broadway show Happy Hour (by Ethan Coen), and enjoyed some absolutely amazing food. Mmmm.

Me and Mr. Science at the top of the Rock! You can see the Empire State Building (or part of it) on the right hand side.

We also did a little bit of shopping. Last time I was in NYC I bought myself an Hermes scarf – this time around, I bought myself a pair of Prada shoes, a pair of Jimmy Choos, and some Tiffany earrings! I saved up for a long time so I’d be able to purchase those items 🙂 Luckily the shoes were both on sale, half price, and the earrings were sterling silver rather than covered in diamonds and pearls, like most Tiffany items. Hehe. It was lots of fun to just be completely amazed at all the ridiculously expensive designer stores there. We were offered champagne in the Prada store! I think more shoe stores should offer champagne to their clients 😉

New York has so many tall buildings!

The other thing that I loved in NYC was how there was so much good fresh food everywhere. And Whole Foods! Oh Whole Foods, you’re wonderful.  I think there are only one or two Whole Foods in Canada, and they aren’t anywhere close to Winnipeg.

Isn't Central Park lovely?

To sum up, NYC was a fantastic trip. Mr. Science and I had such a lovely time – it was our first real trip together (I don’t think backcountry camping/hiking trips count, ha) and it was definitely a success 🙂

What did you do for the holidays? Do you have a favourite big city?

All photos courtesy of Mr. Science.