Cheers mate, I found FRA got a bit boring after 2 days. Would have loved to go to Munich, but didn't factor enough time. Am thinking about doing the Europe thing this year, but will have to wait and see what happens at work.
First Long Haul in J/F: PER-SIN-FRA-JFK-LAX-SFO-LAS-JFK-FRA-SIN-PER
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Cheers mate, I found FRA got a bit boring after 2 days. Would have loved to go to Munich, but didn't factor enough time. Am thinking about doing the Europe thing this year, but will have to wait and see what happens at work.
parsonstrish
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+1, look forward to hearing more, like your writing style and enthusiasm
jukebox333
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+1 from me to hear the end of the story!
OK, time to continue the trip report. Its funny, even through 6 months has passed since the trip, any time I think back to parts of the holiday, it brings a smile to my face. It was simply the best time of my life. Its nice to have such a great memory to look back upon. Anyways enough with that, the report continues!
Thursday 13th October
I woke up early to plan the itinerary for the next few days. My GF slept peacefully while I was busy at work. We have quite a good understanding when it comes to travel, I plan everything, and she's happy to go with the flow
. With my trusty iphone and free WiFi in the room, I plotted all the food places I wanted to visit on a map of NYC provided by the concierge. I'll upload a photo if anyone is interested. The plan was when we felt hungry, we'd just go to the closest place on the map. The food places were obtained from friends, masterchef australia and trip advisor mainly.
My GF eventually woke up and we both got ready and were uber excited to tackle the big apple! We left the hotel and walked towards the Gray line Downtown Loop Tour. It didn't go very far until I wanted to get off and explore a bit of the city. We stopped at Madisons where we walked around/outside the stadium and took a whole heap of photos. I found a Chase bank on our travels and we changed a few $100s to $20s. I found it quite hard braking $100 notes in the US. And when I was able to, they ran the notes under a UV machine. I guess there must be lots of issues with counterfeiting!
We made our way to Macys where we did some shopping. One thing about america that is awesome: They let you stack coupons! In Macy's we purchased a few jackets that were currently 50% off. When we went to pay, the very nice shop assistant told us they she had a 20% coupon we could stack on as well. Long story short, we got 3 really nice/warm jackets that were discounted down by nearly 65%! The only problem now that I didn't forsee was we had to lugg these bulky jackets around for the rest of the day!
We decided to have lunch/snack down the basement of Macys. There was a chicken pot pie that is supposed to be famous. We quickly found out why it was so highly regarded. Its HUGE. We shared the pie with some juice and we literally stuffed until dinner time. Cost - $12. Talk about enjoying USA on a budget
After leaving Macy's full and with two bulk bags holding our jackets we ventured forward only to find Eatay cafe. OMG amazing, we really wanted to go and eat something, but we were completely stuffed from that pie. Disappointed we vowed to come back to eat there (sadly we never got around to it, but will hope to do it on our next visit!) They had everything italian. The cafes inside looked amazing and so did the food. I think the establishment had an extremely high score on urbanspoon so it was sad that we didn't get it try it!
We did jumped back on the bus and it did the rest of the loop. It drove past SOHO, China Town, Little Italy, Tribeca, Meatpacker’s district. We stopped and visited Ground Zero and the new Freedom towers. We then visited battery park but didn't make it to the Statue of Liberty. We were more than happy just to see it from a distance. We then drove past Rockafella center, 5[SUP]th[/SUP] Avenue, Madison’s avenue and Central Park. The GF wanted to get off and do a bit of shopping, but somehow I managed to convince her to save it for another day
Once we got close to Times Square, the bus guide mentioned that Carnegie deli was close by. Alarm bells in my head started to ring. Is this the place with the HUGE pastrami sandwich? I checked my iphone and YES we were in walking distance! I begged the GF and we got off and went in search on Carnegie deli for dinner. Before I talk about Carnegie deli, I just wanted to say that the tour guides on the Grayline tours are great. They are so knowledgable and give you really good tips about NYC. Some were better than others, and some were a bit crude/racist, but all in all, they made the bus ride so much more enjoyable. The bus tours in LA were so cough in comparison. But I will get on to that later.
We ate dinner at Carnegies. I ordered the Rueaban, my GF got a coffee and I had a lemonade to help wash it all down. We managed to eat ¾ of the sandwich. What is meant was I ate 1/2 and my GF ate a quarter. We could not finish. There was just no chance at all! Cost $42 inclusive of tip. Had to pay $3 for sharing a sandwich. 20% tip due to excellent service. A person sitting next to us strongly recommended that we took our leftovers and gave it to a homeless person. We thought it was best not to annoy him and take his suggestion on board. But we threw the leftovers in the bin when we were out of sight. I don't know how I feel about giving scraps to the needly. If I wanted to give them something, I'd just buy them a full sandwich. I wonder how other people feel about that? We walked back to the hotel hoping to burn off a little of what we just ate. We planned to have a quick nap and go out that night, but I think some jet lag settled in and unfortunately slept through until the next morning.
Me with the chicken pot pie. I hope you can see the size of the pie. Its as wide as half my tummy!
A not so clear photo of the sweets on offer at Eataly. They looked AMAZING!
I really like these photos. It shows the initial excitement of trying the famous Rueben for the first time. It is basically two slices of bread at the bottom, piled high with pastrami, and covered with melted cheese. The first few bites were heavenly, and as I ate and got fuller, the pain started to set in. It felt like I was on Man Vs Food, but sadly food won
Thursday 13th October
I woke up early to plan the itinerary for the next few days. My GF slept peacefully while I was busy at work. We have quite a good understanding when it comes to travel, I plan everything, and she's happy to go with the flow
. With my trusty iphone and free WiFi in the room, I plotted all the food places I wanted to visit on a map of NYC provided by the concierge. I'll upload a photo if anyone is interested. The plan was when we felt hungry, we'd just go to the closest place on the map. The food places were obtained from friends, masterchef australia and trip advisor mainly. My GF eventually woke up and we both got ready and were uber excited to tackle the big apple! We left the hotel and walked towards the Gray line Downtown Loop Tour. It didn't go very far until I wanted to get off and explore a bit of the city. We stopped at Madisons where we walked around/outside the stadium and took a whole heap of photos. I found a Chase bank on our travels and we changed a few $100s to $20s. I found it quite hard braking $100 notes in the US. And when I was able to, they ran the notes under a UV machine. I guess there must be lots of issues with counterfeiting!
We made our way to Macys where we did some shopping. One thing about america that is awesome: They let you stack coupons! In Macy's we purchased a few jackets that were currently 50% off. When we went to pay, the very nice shop assistant told us they she had a 20% coupon we could stack on as well. Long story short, we got 3 really nice/warm jackets that were discounted down by nearly 65%! The only problem now that I didn't forsee was we had to lugg these bulky jackets around for the rest of the day!
We decided to have lunch/snack down the basement of Macys. There was a chicken pot pie that is supposed to be famous. We quickly found out why it was so highly regarded. Its HUGE. We shared the pie with some juice and we literally stuffed until dinner time. Cost - $12. Talk about enjoying USA on a budget
After leaving Macy's full and with two bulk bags holding our jackets we ventured forward only to find Eatay cafe. OMG amazing, we really wanted to go and eat something, but we were completely stuffed from that pie. Disappointed we vowed to come back to eat there (sadly we never got around to it, but will hope to do it on our next visit!) They had everything italian. The cafes inside looked amazing and so did the food. I think the establishment had an extremely high score on urbanspoon so it was sad that we didn't get it try it!
We did jumped back on the bus and it did the rest of the loop. It drove past SOHO, China Town, Little Italy, Tribeca, Meatpacker’s district. We stopped and visited Ground Zero and the new Freedom towers. We then visited battery park but didn't make it to the Statue of Liberty. We were more than happy just to see it from a distance. We then drove past Rockafella center, 5[SUP]th[/SUP] Avenue, Madison’s avenue and Central Park. The GF wanted to get off and do a bit of shopping, but somehow I managed to convince her to save it for another day
Once we got close to Times Square, the bus guide mentioned that Carnegie deli was close by. Alarm bells in my head started to ring. Is this the place with the HUGE pastrami sandwich? I checked my iphone and YES we were in walking distance! I begged the GF and we got off and went in search on Carnegie deli for dinner. Before I talk about Carnegie deli, I just wanted to say that the tour guides on the Grayline tours are great. They are so knowledgable and give you really good tips about NYC. Some were better than others, and some were a bit crude/racist, but all in all, they made the bus ride so much more enjoyable. The bus tours in LA were so cough in comparison. But I will get on to that later.
We ate dinner at Carnegies. I ordered the Rueaban, my GF got a coffee and I had a lemonade to help wash it all down. We managed to eat ¾ of the sandwich. What is meant was I ate 1/2 and my GF ate a quarter. We could not finish. There was just no chance at all! Cost $42 inclusive of tip. Had to pay $3 for sharing a sandwich. 20% tip due to excellent service. A person sitting next to us strongly recommended that we took our leftovers and gave it to a homeless person. We thought it was best not to annoy him and take his suggestion on board. But we threw the leftovers in the bin when we were out of sight. I don't know how I feel about giving scraps to the needly. If I wanted to give them something, I'd just buy them a full sandwich. I wonder how other people feel about that? We walked back to the hotel hoping to burn off a little of what we just ate. We planned to have a quick nap and go out that night, but I think some jet lag settled in and unfortunately slept through until the next morning.
Me with the chicken pot pie. I hope you can see the size of the pie. Its as wide as half my tummy!
A not so clear photo of the sweets on offer at Eataly. They looked AMAZING!
I really like these photos. It shows the initial excitement of trying the famous Rueben for the first time. It is basically two slices of bread at the bottom, piled high with pastrami, and covered with melted cheese. The first few bites were heavenly, and as I ate and got fuller, the pain started to set in. It felt like I was on Man Vs Food, but sadly food won
Friday 14th October
Strangely enough we woke up really early today. I think it was because we over slept the night before! We decided that we had to get bagels this morning as its what people do in America. Or so from what we read and saw on US sitcoms
We walked to a bagel place that was really close to our hotel. It was called Time Square Bagels and I ordered a double egg and sausage bagel. The GF ordered a strawberry cream cheese bagel. We got a juice as well, total cost $12. We really just couldn't get over how good value food in america was. We get so ripped off in Perth! We took our bagels back to the hotel and ate them in our room while enjoying awesome american TV and commercials.
We jumped back on our Grayline bus as we purchased a 2 day pass. It took us close to the Soup naz_ where we HAD to try his soup. We were looking forward to a busy place where we had to order a certain way - as per the Seinfeld episode. We were unfortunately a bit disappointed. The place was empty and we could just casually order what we wanted. No matter, we were there for the soup and it didn't disappoint. We only ordered the small size because we didn't want to make the same mistake yesterday and get too full and not be able to enjoy other great food. I had the spicy chicken and my GF ordered the shrimp chowder. In our soup bag, they gave us some extra goodies! The soup came with a plum, bread and a lindt chocolate. A very nice touch The soup was excellent and we then jumped back on the bus.
We did the rest of the loop that we missed the day before and got off at Central Park where we were in search of Papaya King. This place was pumping and boy were we in for a treat. We ordered 2 chilli and cheese dogs and a fresh papaya juice and it only cost $10! It was a very satisfying meal. By this time I couldn't hold my GF back and we spent the rest of the afternoon shopping. I say we, but what I really meant was her and me holding her bags. But you know what they say, happy GF happy life, or is it happy wife, happy life. Either way, my GF loves the shopping more than she loves me so off we went. We spent most of the time in 5th avenue. She got a bag from Mulberry (She spent over $1000 for a bag, but she *saved $300* compared to buying it in Australia). Shes funny like that, I think its girl logic, she never thinks about how much something costs, more on how much she saves when buying it. Either way she was happy as happy could be, so I was happy too! We then walked to Abercrombie and Fitch where we had to line up before getting in. I really didn't know what all the fuss was about, until we got to the front and I saw a very well built topless man pretty enough to be a model. It all made sense. Shopping in Abercrombie was a big eye opener. I loved the concept. Dark room, pumping music, pretty staff - boys and girls, and reasonable RRP pricing. I liked it so much I ended up picking up a few t shirts and a few pairs of jeans. I don't usually like shopping, but loved the experience in Abercrombie!
Now that we were carry one too many shopping bags we decided to go back to the hotel. Unfortunately for us, it started raining and we both got drenched. We made it back to the hotel eventually, and because my GF was exhausted from all the shopping we decided to have a nap. This time we set all our alarms because we wanted to go to the empire state building that night. Our alarms went off and we got ready to go out. We ended up walking to the Empire State Building as the rain stopped and it was a nice night. The line to the empire state building was quite long, and there were a few too many security checks. We eventually got up there, only to be absolutely freezing! Some advice to anyone that visits the empire state - bring a jacket or a few! We did our photos thing and shared a kiss up on the building. Corny I know but something I always wanted to do after watching How I Met Your Mother!
We can back to Time's Square and ordered some Pizzas's from John's Pizzeria and took them back to the room to eat. I ordered a pepperoni and the GF ordered the margarita. Those pizzas were AMAZING. OMG best pizza's ever. We loved it so much! Total cost = $35. Totally worth it! We had to pack after dinner and sleep early because we had a really early flight to LAX. Stay tuned for the next updates. LA and Disneyland. I won't talk too much about LA because we both didn't really enjoy it. Happy we went and saw it, but we won't be going back. Disneyland on the other hand was probably one of the highlights of the trip. It is truly the happiest place on earth. But more on that later
Awesome bagels
Me and my soup from the Soup naz_!
Papaya King - Awesome!
A photo from the top of the Empire State Building
Strangely enough we woke up really early today. I think it was because we over slept the night before! We decided that we had to get bagels this morning as its what people do in America. Or so from what we read and saw on US sitcoms
We walked to a bagel place that was really close to our hotel. It was called Time Square Bagels and I ordered a double egg and sausage bagel. The GF ordered a strawberry cream cheese bagel. We got a juice as well, total cost $12. We really just couldn't get over how good value food in america was. We get so ripped off in Perth! We took our bagels back to the hotel and ate them in our room while enjoying awesome american TV and commercials.
We jumped back on our Grayline bus as we purchased a 2 day pass. It took us close to the Soup naz_ where we HAD to try his soup. We were looking forward to a busy place where we had to order a certain way - as per the Seinfeld episode. We were unfortunately a bit disappointed. The place was empty and we could just casually order what we wanted. No matter, we were there for the soup and it didn't disappoint. We only ordered the small size because we didn't want to make the same mistake yesterday and get too full and not be able to enjoy other great food. I had the spicy chicken and my GF ordered the shrimp chowder. In our soup bag, they gave us some extra goodies! The soup came with a plum, bread and a lindt chocolate. A very nice touch
The soup was excellent and we then jumped back on the bus.We did the rest of the loop that we missed the day before and got off at Central Park where we were in search of Papaya King. This place was pumping and boy were we in for a treat. We ordered 2 chilli and cheese dogs and a fresh papaya juice and it only cost $10! It was a very satisfying meal. By this time I couldn't hold my GF back and we spent the rest of the afternoon shopping. I say we, but what I really meant was her and me holding her bags. But you know what they say, happy GF happy life, or is it happy wife, happy life. Either way, my GF loves the shopping more than she loves me so off we went. We spent most of the time in 5th avenue. She got a bag from Mulberry (She spent over $1000 for a bag, but she *saved $300* compared to buying it in Australia). Shes funny like that, I think its girl logic, she never thinks about how much something costs, more on how much she saves when buying it. Either way she was happy as happy could be, so I was happy too! We then walked to Abercrombie and Fitch where we had to line up before getting in. I really didn't know what all the fuss was about, until we got to the front and I saw a very well built topless man pretty enough to be a model. It all made sense. Shopping in Abercrombie was a big eye opener. I loved the concept. Dark room, pumping music, pretty staff - boys and girls, and reasonable RRP pricing. I liked it so much I ended up picking up a few t shirts and a few pairs of jeans. I don't usually like shopping, but loved the experience in Abercrombie!
Now that we were carry one too many shopping bags we decided to go back to the hotel. Unfortunately for us, it started raining and we both got drenched. We made it back to the hotel eventually, and because my GF was exhausted from all the shopping we decided to have a nap. This time we set all our alarms because we wanted to go to the empire state building that night. Our alarms went off and we got ready to go out. We ended up walking to the Empire State Building as the rain stopped and it was a nice night. The line to the empire state building was quite long, and there were a few too many security checks. We eventually got up there, only to be absolutely freezing! Some advice to anyone that visits the empire state - bring a jacket or a few! We did our photos thing and shared a kiss up on the building. Corny I know but something I always wanted to do after watching How I Met Your Mother!
We can back to Time's Square and ordered some Pizzas's from John's Pizzeria and took them back to the room to eat. I ordered a pepperoni and the GF ordered the margarita. Those pizzas were AMAZING. OMG best pizza's ever. We loved it so much! Total cost = $35. Totally worth it! We had to pack after dinner and sleep early because we had a really early flight to LAX. Stay tuned for the next updates. LA and Disneyland. I won't talk too much about LA because we both didn't really enjoy it. Happy we went and saw it, but we won't be going back. Disneyland on the other hand was probably one of the highlights of the trip. It is truly the happiest place on earth. But more on that later
Awesome bagels
Me and my soup from the Soup naz_!
Papaya King - Awesome!
A photo from the top of the Empire State Building
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