This weekend 2 of my college friends and I decided to head up to New York to visit our other college friend who currently lives and works in Manhattan.
Since getting there requires a 4 and a half hour bus ride from DC and all of my other friends live in Baltimore, I decided to have Mr. A tag along with me as well. The idea of sitting next to a complete stranger on the bus for that long totally creeped me out.
We left for New York right after work on Friday. Luckily enough for us, Megabus operates a bus from Union Station here in DC to New York, which is super convenient to our office. So with our Subway dinner in tow, we squeezed next to each other for the next 5 hours. Unfortunately because we left after work, we ended up hitting traffic in both DC and Baltimore, so we didn’t end up getting into New York until closer to 10.
When we finally arrived at my friend’s apartment around close to 11, I was totally ready to crash. Until I saw all my friends that is.
It was the first time that the 4 of us had been together since our other college friend’s wedding in December. While I get to see my Baltimore friends a lot (which is definitely a good thing), I don’t get to see Lisa very much. She’s a fancy attorney in New York so she doesn’t have a lot of free time to come visit. Luckily, she is a super gracious host and let’s us crash at her apartment whenever we like.
We spent the rest of the night chatting and catching up until we were literally falling asleep in place. We manage to talk about Twilight, True Blood, 50 Shades of Grey, Hunger Games, Magic Mike, etc. for 3 hours. I guess we miss our girly talks.
Around 2 we finally decided to call it a night since we had a long day plan for Saturday.
The next morning we didn’t get moving out of apartment until 11ish, which was perfect timing for a fabulous New York brunch. We stopped in at a local restaurant called Fred’s, which was absolutely delicious.
I forgot to take pictures (I blame it on the delayed coffee intake) but the food was great. I had a Spanish omelet with black beans and Mr. A had some chocolate chip pancakes. Perfect fuel for the shopping that was ahead.
My favorite part about this restaurant was that it was named after the owner’s service dog. In tribute to the dog, the owners allow patrons to put up pictures of their own dogs on the restaurant walls. Lisa happens to hate animals so it was pretty hilarious that we randomly picked the one restaurant in New York with dogs plastered all over the walls (love you Lisa).
After brunch, the boy and girls headed their separate ways. Mr. A was not to hip to the idea of shopping all afternoon, so he headed over to the Natural History Museum.
His pictures looked pretty cool. But I was glad to be shopping instead of staring at dead animals.
The girls and I headed down to shopper’s row for a little retail therapy. We hit up Lohemann’s, Centrury 21, Aria, and The Loft.
I managed to pick up these adorable Tahari flats at Lohemann’s for $44. Quite a steal considering how comfortable they are.
After hours of shopping, we had worked up quite an appetite so we asked Mr. A to meet us a Shake Shack for a late lunch.
Mr. A fell in love with this place the last time we were in New York. Although milk shakes, fries, and burgers are his favorite things so I’m not surprised he loves it. Just look at that smile.
Once lunch was over, we headed back to Lisa’s apartment for a little catnap on her rooftop deck.
I’m so jealous that she gets to see this view everyday.
Once our catnap was over, we went back downstairs to start getting ready for dinner, which with 4 girls and 1 bathroom was pretty interesting but also not very different from college. I guess some things never really change.
Once we got a photo op squeezed in (don’t they look so pretty), it was off to dinner at Gabriela’s.
This super bustling Mexican restaurant was a great beginning to our night out. There was tons of energy in the air.
And lots of sangria.
And margaritas.
So how could you possibly go wrong?
A few quesadillas, some margaritas, and a little guacamole later, we were perfectly fueled for our night on the town. We picked up a cab and headed down to Hell’s Kitchen and ended up at Traffic.
We spent the rest of the night there reminiscing about old times.
And taking a zillion pictures.
Through our conversation, we realized that this year we’ve been out of college for as long as we were in college, which is so odd because it literally seems like yesterday I was sitting with these girls in 12 Frat Row.
Talking about all those old stories brought back so many good memories. We really had an amazing time in college together.
While we may have grown up a little, some of us have still not grown out of photo bombing. Thanks Rach.
Since no night in New York is complete without some New York style pizza, we headed to the pizza joint next door for some delicious midnight grub.
Pizza at 1 am never tasted so good.
One illegal taxi ride later (apparently taxi cabs are only authorized to take 4 people but we squeezed in 5) we ended our night back at Lisa’s apartment in the wee hours of the morning.
The next morning we got up bright and early to catch our 10am bus back to DC. Even though it was painful to get up even earlier, we made sure to leave enough time to grab a New York bagel before we high tailed it to the bus.
We managed to make it to the bus with about 10 minutes to spare. Luckily, we had plenty of time to enjoy our bagels. No one does bagels like New York.
Cinnamon raisin bagel with walnut raisin cream cheese is the best thing since sliced bread.
And with that, our New York trip was over just as quickly as it started. But I’m hoping we will get to squeeze in another one soon.
Because I love hanging out with this crazy crew.
Thanks again Lisa for hosting us all!
