Category: StewsCatTravels

NYC Day 1

NYC Day 1

So after arriving at JFK from our long overnight flight, we made our way out to curb pickup.  D wanted to make sure we had a good plan for getting to the city and back to the airport at the end of our trip so she had booked a car service.  Since we didn’t check any bags, we were picked up within about 10 minutes of walking off the plane.  The last time I visited the city, the taxi broke down about 10 minutes from the airport and we had to wait for another car to pick us up.  Luckily that didn’t happen this time, however with our arrival time in the morning (8-9 am), there was some terrible traffic.  The ride into the city probably took about 2 hours.  Our driver was what I would characterize as a typica NYC-aggressive driver.  I appreciated his sense of urgency to get us to the city.  He started on the freeway, then decided to take a more local route.  We passed LaGuardia airport, then drove through what I think were Woodside and Astoria and made our way across the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge.  The funny part was that we were sitting in traffic and some guy knocked on our driver’s window.  We had stopped in front of another car service’s garage.  The guy handed our driver his business card and said his number was on the back and our driver should call him (presumably for a job).  I guess that’s one way to recruit drivers – wait for them to stop in front of your business.

We knew that it would be too early to check in (most likely) so the plan was the drop our bags off and then go find breakfast and then maybe explore.  We had booked a good package deal for flight and hotel and stayed at the Lotte New York Palace.  D and I were fans of the show Gossip Girl and this was actually one of the main locations where some of the characters lived.  We were dropped off at the north entrance to the hotel (which is kind of the back entrance so had to find/guide ourselves to the lobby/registration area).  We checked with the front desk and they said a room may be ready early (normal check-in is 3 pm) so we left our bags with the bellman and set off in search of some grub.

D was pretty hungry so we needed to find something close and quick.  I suggested Ess-a-Bagel since I had heard good things about their bagels.  We walked the 3 blocks to the location near us and were a bit shocked to see a line extending to the door (it was by now around 11 am?).  After an approximately 20 minute wait we were at the counter and ordering.  I had an everything bagel with smoked salmon, cream cheese, capers, tomatoes.  D had similar on a plain bagel.  They make their bagels in-house and you can definitely tell.  We also had some iced coffees (and D ordered a large thinking it was going to be a normal large but it was a monster cup of iced coffee).  The crowded seating area provided a small place for us to sit and eat.  The bagel sandwich was delicious and definitely filling.  While we were eating I received a call from the hotel informing us that our room was ready.  Great!  So after finishing our food we walked back to the hotel to check in and get our luggage squared away.  They had us on the 37th floor, which is nice because you don’t get the city street sounds when you’re that high.

We were quite tired once we got to the room but I knew that we had to press on otherwise our internal clocks would be messed up and we would not be able to sleep properly or be up at the right times to see/do things in the city.  After getting the clothes squared away we headed out.  Our first stop was the New York Public Library (Stephen A. Schwarzman Building).  This is the famous library that you see on TV and in some movies.  It has some great architecture.  We walked around the library and explored the various rooms and such.  It was decently crowded with tourists (as would most places we went for this trip).

After the library we stopped in a store called Muji.  It’s a Japanese store that has pretty much everything (from pens to clothes to kitchen and bed supplies).  D knew about the store already so we went to check out their wares.  I learned from D that there are a lot of stores that are only located in NYC and no where else in the US.

Our next stop was the Morgan Library (of JP Morgan fame).  What I learned from the visit is that Pierpont Morgan was a super rich guy who liked fine things.  He has an incredible collection of books.  We were impressed with seeing the Gutenberg Bible at the NY Library only to learn that Morgan has 3 copies of the Gutenberg Bibles.

By the time we were done with the Morgan Library, we were getting a bit tired.  We walked back to the hotel.  On the way we passed by the Empire State Building and the Rock (Rockefeller Center).  D wasn’t interested in doing the super touristy stuff like going to see the building or going up to the observation decks (she has a fear of heights, plus it is super expensive just to go up and look around).

Empire State Building
Rockefeller Center

On reaching the hotel we decided to grab a drink (it was late afternoon at this time).  The hotel has a bar called Trouble’s Trust but no one was there.  They also have a lounge area that seemed like a nice place to sit and have a drink.  We sat, ordered some drinks (which were actually made in Trouble’s Trust) and they provided some bar snacks to gnosh on while we drank.  I had two drinks: The “Queen of the Mean” (Breucklelen NY Wheat Whiskey, Ginger Beer NY, Red Jacket NY Apple Juice, Averell “Damson Gin” NY, elderflower syrup, fresh lemon, baked apple chip garnish) and a Manhattan (your classic NY cocktail).  Both were delicious.

After a nap, we made the short trek to Hide Chan for dinner.  Hide Chan, a ramen place, is upstairs from Totto, another ramen place.  Totto has great reviews and is always busy while Hide Chan is also known to be delicious per my cousin and our friends that live in NY.  We elected to go with Hide Chan since it was less busy and less expensive as well.  I was feeling the effects of the 2 cocktails and not having eaten since our late breakfast.  Nevertheless I ordered the Deluxe Ramen (Sliced pork, half egg, kikurage mushroom, scallion, onion, bean sprouts, and cod roe) that came with a very rich, almost thick, pork broth. You also order the hardness of your noodle, which I hadn’t known about.  I tried the firm noodles and it was good.  We also shared the fried chicken.  Overall it was all delicious except since I wasn’t feeling great, I couldn’t enjoy it as much as I would have liked.

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Nevertheless, after dinner we walked over to Insomnia Cookies.  This brought back memories of my time in Michigan as they had that dessert place while I was there.  Along the way to the cookie place we saw a man urinating on the street, about par for the course for NY.  We returned to the hotel, enjoyed our cookies, watched some TV and turned in for the night.

-StewsCat

Travel thoughts

Just finished a 4 mile run after getting back from NYC last night. I’ll be putting up a full day by day review of the trip but wanted to jot down some thoughts on the whole travel experience.

We had booked a red-eye flight leaving on Monday late evening and arriving in the Big Apple early Tuesday morning.  I have done a few of these flights in the past though honestly I can’t remember the experiences as they were all a very long time ago and my memory doesn’t serve me well on those occasions.  My wife was worried about the red-eye because she historically has not been able to sleep on planes (flights to Europe,Hawaii, Asia) and this would make it tough to get off the plane and go directly to exploring the city.

To maximize the chance of success for sleep, my wife had a few tools in her arsenal.  We picked up some Benadryl (active ingredient diphenhydramine) to help with sleep.  If you look at the “sleeping aid” OTC pills you can purchase, they’re almost all diphenhydramine  except more costly.  So we just picked up some regular ole’ OTC benadryl because it is cheap.  The second tool was a good sleep mask and ear plugs.  Finally a J-pillow travel pillow is something that she had used on a previous trip.

We arrived to Terminal A of the Sacramento International Airport, which is where JetBlue flies out of.  Luckily for us there is a direct flight from Sac to JFK.  They had been doing renovations on Terminal A ever since putting in a new Terminal B a few years back.  This time around they had finished a seating area with desks that had plugs so people could charge their devices.  They also had these cool benches that allowed you to lay down.

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New benches and tables in Terminal A

I laid down and tried to nap before the flight.  However, there was too much going on – overhead announcements, people talking, etc.   I gave up on this and we boarded just before midnight.  Originally I had booked an aisle and middle seat since I like access to the walkway and bathrooms during the flight.  My wife pointed out that since she wanted to sleep, she didn’t want to be asleep next to a stranger.  I gave her the aisle seat and took the middle seat.  JetBlue kindly had a “sleep kit” on each seat that contained an eye mask and earplugs.  I never realized the droning loudness of being on a plane until I put the earplugs in.  Somehow I managed to get about 3 hours of sleep – though I felt like I was constantly waking up here and there.  I’m happy to report that my wife managed to get some sleep as well.  This truly helped out as we were then able to explore the city that first day as opposed to napping/sleeping the day away.

Our return flight last night was delayed for just over an hour because the 1st officer (co-pilot) was running late.  We purposely left the city early because of concerns for traffic as well as security at JFK.  While sitting there waiting for the boarding process, the ticket agent came on and said the 1st officer wasn’t there yet so we couldn’t board yet.  For some reason you’d think that this was his job so he would have planned for traffic.  They announced that he was in a taxi and that he commuted to work.  Um…pretty much we ALL commute to work.  That’s something you’re supposed to take into account, no?  It was just frustrating because we waited an extra hour for this guy to arrive.  In the end we landed about 30 minutes later than the originally scheduled arrival but it was still late (11:30 pm).  As I laid down to sleep last night I had an interesting thought.  I woke up yesterday morning in NYC and walking around these giant high rises and the crazy crowds of the streets and Central Park and last night went to sleep in my own bed in northern California.  I think we sometimes take for granted the advancement in technology and travel.  Back in the day you’d probably take a train that would be multiple days to get across the country.  Now we do it in a matter of hours.

I do enjoy travel by large boat (cruise ship) because you don’t even feel like you’re on a boat yet can travel good distances.  I like that you can go about your day (exercise, eating, sleeping) relatively normally while on a cruise ship and yet still travel from port to port.  I’d consider it for travel across the oceans though I don’t know how long that would take.  I could see getting bored on a ship for longer than a few days.  Still the cramped spaces and dry air of plane travel is not something I’m a huge fan of.  I’ve learned to tolerate it, especially with the extent of flying I did through my many years of schooling, but don’t enjoy it.  I’m definitely a fan of the shorter plane hops (SMF to the PNW and down to SoCal).

NYC recaps up next!

-StewsCat

Portland Vacation – Day 3 and 4

Saturday (Day 3) started with brunch at Imperial located inside the Hotel Lucia.  They’re known for their fried chicken so I ordered it again.  This time it came with a biscuit on the side.

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Yum!

So after we were fed and well-caffeinated, we walked over to the Portland Saturday Market.  We had visited the Market in 2012 but it was fun to walk through again.  When we arrived, there were some street performers doing a combination of acrobatics but showing off their flexibility (and double jointed-ness).  We then walked through looking at the various stalls and the trinkets and the like.  We then jumped onto the public transit (train) and headed over to the Portland Art Museum.  The museum had some interesting exhibits going on, in particular they had Native American fashion and how it intertwined with today’s modern fashion.  We walked through the entire museum and spent a good few hours there.

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Since we were further south in the downtown area, Deborah wanted to see the Portlandia Statue so I set about trying to find it.

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We stopped in at Potbelly Sandwich Shop for lunch.  This was nostalgic for me because I used to go to Potbelly a bunch when I visited/lived in Chicago.  I was introduced to it when I was in undergrad and would eat it regularly when I visited while living in Michigan.  The wife appreciated the tasty sandwich.  After lunch we hung out at the hotel for a little bit then headed out for a drink before dinner.

On the Esquire show Best Bars in America that we watch, the guys go to get Spanish Coffee.  We figured it’d be a nice little drink before dinner.  So off to Huber’s Cafe, which is the originator of this drink that consists of Kahlua, Bacardi 151, Bols Triple Sec & Coffee topped w/ fresh whipped cream & nutmeg, flamed tableside.  The waiters make this drink in front of you and it is fairly impressive.  Because it was warmer out, my wife had it on the rocks and I tried the original.  I must say that it is a tasty beverage and heavy on the alcohol.  It was a good starter as we walked to dinner after having the drink.

 

Spanish Coffee
Huber’s Cafe

Dinner was at Little Bird Bistro, which is also one of Gabriel Rucker’s restaurants.  During our previous visit in 2012, we had dined at Le Pigeon on E Burnside.  That meal was delectable so I had no doubt we were in for a good dinner.  I started the meal with the Roasted Bone Marrow and followed it with the Fried chicken “Coq au Vin”.  The Roasted Bone Marrow came with 3 bones (sliced horizontally to allow easy access to the marrow) along with some pastrami, pickles, and toast slices.  It was very buttery as expected.  The “Coq au Vin” also had a nice crisp to the outside and tender juicy meat.

After dinner we had some more drinks and then turned in so we could catch our flight the following morning.  Sunday morning we had breakfast in our hotel’s other restaurant: Urban Farmer.  We then took the train to the airport and hopped on the flight home.

The weather in Portland held up beautifully while we were there.  It was sunny and a little warm and only hinted at some rain when we were getting on the train back to the airport (light sprinkles).

Overall the trip was extremely fun and as you can see there was a lot of eating/drinking involved.  Portland is definitely a fun recommended city to visit.  We look forward to going back up to visit after our friend moves up there.

-StewsCat

 

Portland Vacation -Day 2

Day 2 started a bit slow.  Since we were out late, we slept in.  I woke up first and decided that I should get in some miles before starting the day.  It was July 1st and I like to run on the first of each month to set the tone for the month in running.  Rather than attempting an outdoor run (also because I didn’t bring my running belt nor my GPS watch), I elected to do a treadmill run.  I haven’t run on a treadmill in many years.

The hotel had a very nice fitness room (available 24/7 with your hotel key card).  There was a combination of treadmills, ellipticals, stationary bike, weight machines and free weights.  I hopped on a LifeFitness Treadmill, which was pretty cool because each one had a screen that showed your progress but also doubled as a TV.  The hotel provided free headphones that you could plug in so you had sound.  At first I started my run with no headphones and just watching TV without sound.  After about 1 mile I hopped off and got me some headphones.  I forget how hard it is to run on a treadmill sometime.  I started with a 5 minute warmup at a speed between 4-5 mi/hr.  I then upped my speed to 6 mi/hr and ventured into the 6.5 mi/hr range to try to average out to 10 min/mile pace (6 mi/hr for the entire run).  My run effort level was higher because I had been drinking and eating a ton the day before.  I ended up putting in a little over 4 miles at an overall just under 10:15 min/mile pace.

After I was all cleaned up, we headed on out in search of brunch.  One place that I wanted to try was Tasty n Sons.  We bought another TriMet day pass and hopped on a bus.  We took it 20 minutes north of city center (east of the river) into the Boise neighborhood.  By the time we arrived (around 11 am), the place was packed and the line of people waiting for a table spilled out the door.  We put our names down and had some coffee while we waited.  An opening at the small bar (it sat 7 total) allowed us to get a table a little earlier than normal (we still waited about 50 minutes).  We split one of their Chocolate Potato Doughnuts, which was fairly light.  I had the Fried Egg and Cheddar Biscuit with Fried Chicken.  A big reason we went to this restaurant was that my wife wanted to try Shakshuka (baked eggs n tomato stew with merguez sausage), which came with some grilled bread slices.  Shakshuka is a dish of North African origin and now is popular in many Middle Eastern countries.  It was rather tasty and I’d definitely have it again given a chance.  I had a bourbon cocktail since I already had my coffee and hey I was on vacation!  We chatted briefly with the bartender and got some ideas on places to check out.

After lunch we walked around the Boise neighborhood some but jumped back onto the bus to visit the Lan Su Chinese Garden in Old Town Chinatown.  I’ve noticed that in almost every city in the US, the Chinatown region is also where a lot of the homeless people live and Portland is no exception.  The Chinese Garden was an interesting experience.  We learned that there is a sister Chinese Garden in China.  There was some other interesting stuff that I learned but have since forgot, I’ll just leave you with some pictures of the place.

From the garden we walked up back towards the Pearl District for a snack.  Back in 2012 when we visited, we made the obligatory stop at Voodoo Donuts.  My friend Tim, who has lived in Portland for a few years now, said that we needed to check out Blue Star Donuts because it was much better than Voodoo.  I will say that Blue Star has some more innovative and intriguing combinations of flavors. We tried two different flavors: 1) Blueberry Bourbon & Basil Donut and 2)  I can’t remember

We finished just in time to walk back to our hotel, The Nines, for happy hour at the rooftop restaurant Departure, helmed by Top Chef Alum Gregory Gourdet.  One of my good friends from San Diego was a college roommate with Gregory and she said he used to cook her awesome food.  Happy Hour is on a few rooftop balconies that overlook the city.

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View from rooftop happy hour

We ordered some cocktails as well as some snack foods (Departure Wings and Vegetarian Maki Roll of the Day).  The Departure Wings were fabulous and even though my wife doesn’t normally eat wings, she loved these.  They were basically like popsicle sticks of tender chicken in a crisp outer shell.

Vegetarian Maki Roll
Departure Wings

After taking a break in our hotel room we headed off to find some dinner.  Another place that we both wanted to try served chicken rice.  So off we went to Nong’s Khao Man Gai off of E Burnside just across Burnside Bridge via Bus.  I guess Khao Man Gai roughly translates to chicken and rice.  The dish is deceptively simple yet yields some good flavors.  It was a nice little meal to cap off our Friday.

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Khao Man Gai

 

Guess I did have enough to separate out Day 2 from Day 3 and 4.

-StewsCat

 

Portland vacation – Day 1

Portland vacation – Day 1

The wife and I took off to PDX the weekend prior to the 4th.  We visited this great town 4 years ago.  Similar to last time, we decided to stay in the city center.  The difference this time was that I elected not to rent a car.  My wife had done some research and found that the city’s public transit system (TriMet) would be a convenient and cost-effective way of traveling around Portland.  I looked up the cost of daily parking (valet only) at our hotel and added it up with the cost of renting a car and realized it was a significant investment.  Since I grew up in CA and love having a car and driving, it took a little bit of convincing myself but I realized she was right (as usual).  TriMet is in charge of their local train system, streetcars and buses.

We arrived at PDX around lunchtime on the Thursday before July 4th.  My wife pointed out that the design on the carpeting at the airport is famous so I decided to take a picture of it with our shoes.  You can even buy drink coasters with that design on it.

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Famous carpet design

The nice thing about TriMet is that you can buy a day pass (only $5/person) and take any of the previously mentioned forms of transportation.  The other nice thing is that there is a train stop at PDX airport that will take you to the city center in 45 minutes (with no worries about traffic, which we did see on our way into the city center).  We arrived at the City Center and luckily our hotel was steps away from the train stop.  We stayed at The Nines, a Luxury Collection hotel with SPG.  For our wedding in San Diego, we stayed at The US Grant, which is another hotel in the Luxury Collection.  I gotta say it was a nice hotel and great location for our needs.

Luckily our room was ready early and we were able to drop off our bags, use the facilities and then head back out for a day of exploring.  Since it was already past lunchtime and we hadn’t eaten yet, we checked out one of the area food cart blocks (example here).  We literally walked around the entire block looking at each food cart and their menu.  There was a preponderance of middle eastern food (lots of kabobs, schwarmas) along with Thai food.  So after we had made it around the block once, we started going back in reverse to actually order something.  One smart vendor was asking people if they wanted a sample of the chicken.  I said “sure” and after tasting it and enjoying it I ordered a chicken schwarma wrap.  Before I even had a chance to pay, they had made one and handed it to me.  This was my first indication that people in Portland are nice and trusting because I could have just walked away with the food.  The chicken wrap had some spices in it that gave me an indication it was not your typical greek fair, but probably more in the Persian persuasion.  After paying, my wife wanted to try a different place and we found her a chicken gyro.  Hers was more the classical type.  We wandered into one of the many little parks in the city and sat on the concrete planter.  There were tons of other people sitting, some eating, some reading, and a group that was playing some sort of city scavenger hunt.

We didn’t have a strict itinerary for this trip but had a list of things we wanted to do and places to eat/drink so after finishing, we started to check stuff off the list.  We wandered into the Pearl District and our first stop was Powell’s Bookstore.  I didn’t realize how extremely large this store was.  It reminded me more of a library because there were also a lot of people loitering around reading books and such.  I liked that the store was organized into specific topics and we perused the various offerings.  Of course we had to stop in the cooking/eating/drinking section.

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Powell’s Books

My wife, who is a huge fan of reading and books, bought me some Library Card socks. We also purchased a Zinester’s guide to Portland for our friend KP who is shortly moving to Portland.  My wife schooled me on the term Zinester.

With Powell’s checked off the list, we next headed further into the Pearl and to the Rogue Distillery and Public House.  We’ve always been a fan of Rogue so stopped in for some brews.  They had a fairly extensive list of their beers along with their spirits (I knew they did dairy products like ice cream and cheese but didn’t realize they also distilled liquor).  Even though we had just eaten, I wanted something to snack on and the wife indulged me and we ordered their charcuterie platter with cheese.  The charcuterie was from Olympia Provisions (known for their cured meats).  Because Olympia Provisions is located a good distance outside the city center area I doubted we would be visiting the actual location because we were car-less.  This was a compromise to try their offerings.  So we ordered each ordered the beer sampler (since we have different tastes in beer) and shared the charcuterie platter.

Food menu
Beer sampler
Olympia Provisions charcuterie and Rogue cheeses

Apparently they have partnered with Chef Morimoto to create some beers with him, which I thought was interesting.  So now that we were truly and fully stuffed, we made our way back to the hotel on foot.  After taking a nap and chilling, we decided to head over to Division street (Southeast neighborhood).  This street houses a ton of hot restaurants.  We landed at Nuestra Cocina.  They were definitely hopping and we grabbed a seat at the bar while waiting for the table.  Of course we had to order some margaritas.  I ordered their house margarita, which at first kinda shocked me but the more I had, the more I enjoyed it.  It was extremely simple with tequila and fresh lemon and lime juice.  I liked the simplicity of it.  My wife had the Margarita De Granada (Ginger infused silver tequila, pomegranate & lime), which was all right.  I enjoyed that their food was old peasant style Mexican cooking.

We ordered:

  • Sopes de Chorizo, Frijoles Y Chile Arbol Con Queso
  • Chile Relleno Con Picadillo
  • Elote Asada Con Chile Limon Y Queso (grilled corn on the cob)
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Nuestra Cocina

Everything was very tasty and I liked that the Chile Relleno was not battered and fried.  This was just enough food since we had already had two lunches within a short amount of time prior to this.  After dinner we hopped back on the bus back to the hotel.  I saw another generous act as the bus driver let a homeless person ride for free so he could get back to the city center (this was repeated in other bus rides).

After arriving back in the city center we weren’t ready to call it a night so headed out to check off more from our list of food/drinking establishments.  We walked back towards the Pearl and hit up Clyde Common.  We luckily managed to snag 2 chairs at the bar and to  our surprise the barman tending us was none other than Jeffrey Morgenthaler, a well-known bartender.  We watch the show “Best Bars in America” on Esquire and saw Jeffrey as the hosts visited Clyde Common.  I had the Cabin Fever and the Bourbon Renewal, while the wife had the Sound + Vision.  These drinks were quite tasty.  In the basement of this place was also a speakeasy called Pépé le Moko.  We weren’t sure if we’d be able to get in but stopped at their hostess station around the corner from Clyde Common.  The host took our name and said she’d have a seat about 20 minutes from when we showed up.  We took this opportunity to walk around the neighborhood and see what it was like at night (~10:30 pm).  Eventually we were texted and made our way back and into this tiny basement space.  It was dimly lit and a bit of a tight squeeze.

By this time I was needing a little snack since we had been drinking.  I ordered some Spicy Shrimp Chips and they had some complimentary corn nut type treats.  My wife ordered a Blue Hawaii and I had an espresso martini.  I have to say the espresso martini was probably one of my favorite drinks of the whole trip.  The spicy shrimp chips were definitely spicy and I didn’t expect myself to have trouble eating them but they definitely caused a burn in my mouth.  To help quench that burn, we decided to share the Grasshopper, which also was amazingly delicious. This cocktail is made with ice cream and is like a shake with booze.  It also has an awesome green color (no pictures of cocktails since my phone doesn’t do low-light pictures at all).

Finally we called it a night and made our way back to the hotel and rolled into bed around midnight.

It was an epic day 1 in Portland for sure.  The rest of the trip was fun but not as action packed so I will probably wrap up the trip in a 2nd post.

-StewsCat