New York City, USA (Day Four)
More ticks on the must-see list of NYC, most of which I would consider B-grade but Lonely Planet considered them worthy of visiting. This included:
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Hudson River park. Empty, plain, not much to see.
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The narrowest house in NYC. I had no idea why that was even in the guidebooks.
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Jefferson Market Library. An old, castle-like building that was originally a courthouse.
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Grace church. Completely empty, relatively understated, great stained-glass windows.
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Con Edison building. I didn't know enough about architecture to be inspired by this tower.
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Washington square park. A pleasant reprieve from the hectic city streets. It was here I caught up with Danny.
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Greenwich Village. We wandered the streets looking for something cheap for lunch. Greek food was the answer, followed by a wine bar, followed by a slice of the famous New York pizza. The pizza clearly won the "taste" and "bargain" awards.
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Union Square. Fairly quiet, nothing noteworthy. Split up from Danny again.
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Shopping (ugh). We had a dinner coming up that required clothing slightly more formal than our usual attire. Both of us (separately) headed into cheaper department stores to find something suitable. Thankfully this was quick and painless.
After all this I headed back to the hotel, where I had planned to meet Danny. On arriving I found a message saying he had gone to the laundromat around the corner to put our washing on. I walked down there to see if he needed help, but he was nowhere to be found. I saw a bottle shop nearby and mentally made a bet with myself that he would be in there. Of course he was, admiring all the fine wines and craft beers we hadn't seen for months. After I dragged him out of that bottle shop he told me about another he had found earlier with free wine tastings. Well, I couldn't say no to that. It was all South African wine, not a country I usually look to when choosing wine but happy to give it a go. We both liked the Cabernet Sauvignon on offer, so we forked out for a bottle to have with dinner.
What I loved about NYC was that every block seemed to have a small supermarket, and every supermarket seemed to have a build-your-own salad bar, both pre-made and individual ingredients. I love salad bar. I love being able to get exactly what I want in my salad without having to say "more of this" or "less of that". Dinner tonight was salad bar. With both picked out our own, grabbed a loaf of bread and walked over to Central Park. We chose a secluded spot on a hill, sat down in the grass, drank our wine out of plastic cups, ate our cheap meal out of plastic containers, and watched the runners and cyclists go by. It was a beautiful place to unwind after a full day of inner city sightseeing.
