I'll remember this day as the day my mother and sister made me walk the entire length of the island of Manhattan.
I am not a huge walker. Sure, I'll head out and run 20 miles for funsies. But asking me to walk from the couch to the fridge to get a drink, is, like, a huge deal.
Not to mention walking from 125th st on the Upper West Side, through Central Park, down Fifth Avenue and then ALL THE WAY DOWNTOWN.
So what. I'm a little lazy. I'm ok with that.
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| The skating rink on the lower east side of the park |
Anyway, I'm actually glad we did it, because New York is a city - if there ever was one - for walking. And you do get to see so much of it on your feet.
Plus, who could hate walking when you're in Central Park?
Precisely no one.
In mid-town, the smell of some delicious nut-roasting wafted past us, so we decided to try some of the famous roasted chessnuts from a street vendor.
I dunno if we just got a lame batch of these, but they weren't that great. Certainly the
idea of them is much more awesome than reality.
Which is remarkably similar to the grand
idea of going to visit the Empire State Building and taking in the views from the observatory... compared to the reality of paying $75 for all of us to actually do so.
After flipping the proverbial bird to the fat cats making a killing off tourism at Empire State, we continued to wander down Fifth Avenue (midtown) through Korea town.
This is the Michelin-rated Korean restaurant, called Mandoo Bar on 32nd Street. It is well-known for its dumplings and bibimbob, a delicious dish of rice, vegetables and meat with Korean hot pepper paste, served in sizzling bowl. We didn't eat here that day, but I have since been there three times!
We continued on downtown, and walked through Madison Square Park, which housed another of the 158,000 of the beautiful Christmas trees thrown up around New York.
I also started to get a little silly with ye old camera.
We continued walking down to Union Square which had some wonderful holiday markets.
But we didn't stop because we were on a mission...
To get to
Katz's! My brother-in-law's only stipulation regarding my sister's visit, was that she eat a Reuben sandwich at Katz's.
Katz's is a really famous deli, on Ludlow Street, Lower East side. It was apparently established in 1888 by the "Iceland" brothers, who were joined by Willy Katz in 1903. Willy and his cousin Benny bought out the Iceland brothers, and established the restaurant as Katz's Delicatessen in 1910. It was thereafter a congregating point for the huge number of immigrants who moved to the lower East in the early part of the 20th century.
During WWII, the owners' sons were all serving in the armed forces. The website iterates that the company's famous slogan "Send a Salami To Your Boy in the Army" was born out of their family tradition of sending food to the three sons during that time.
The Deli was absolutely bustling, and you can tell they're never short of business. They have a unique payment system; you take a ticket at the door, they write your order on the ticket, as you make it, and then you pay as you leave. No hold up by cash registers before getting your food!
While originally known for their salami, the Deli is now very famous for its original Reuben Sandwich with corned beef.
I only ate a small bite (stupid, crazy girl), but this was really really amazing. I'm definitely going back.
We headed back uptown to meet YBS at the Rockefeller Center, to check out the famous Christmas tree there and all the other festivities.
I loved the huge animation show they played on the side of one of the buildings at the center.
Afterwards, we met my darling cousin and his girlfriend for dinner back in Korea town. Unfortunately there was a long wait for tables at Mandoo Bar, but we got into Miss Korea straight away.
We all enjoyed some really great bibimbob, but the prices were a little high, for my tastes.
And then we finished off the day with a stroll past the Macy's windows, which were really spectacular.
And wandered through the store a little to soak up the Christmas tree (and the heating), before heading home...
on the SUBWAY this time.
