A bite of the Big Apple

Bright lights, big city. Time Square, New York, NY.

Trips are great, even if they're just quick one-nighters for business. This week, I got the opportunity to go to one of the most facinating cities in the United States - New York, specifically, Manhattan near 5th Ave. and 40th St. Despite the short stay, my travel companion and I decided to make the most of our time in the Big Apple and as soon as we landed at LaGuardia and hopped a taxi to our Marriott 5th Avenue, we dropped the bags and started walking around town.

It was a bit chilly, and it got dark quickly, but we strolled around town and ran into a couple fun "touristy" sites like Time Square and Rockafeller Center. We walked into St. Patrick's Cathedral, which was very pretty, and perused the hallways of the NY Public Library. That was kind of awesome. We browsed the NBC store (in which I'm pretty sure I could bankrupt myself), popped our heads in a few boutique shops selling everything from homemade soap (don't wanna know what they make it out of) to cute scarves and hats (I had to be dragged out of there). We had reservations at a restaurant called Dos Caminos - you guessed it: Mexican - and enjoyed a lovely, expensive meal, including some kind of cactus-fruit martini to complement the homemade guacamole, shrimp quesadillas, empanadas, and other gastronomical wonders. I'm fairly sure I have never eaten so much in one night in my life.

After dinner, we walked down the street to a little hole-in-the-wall Irish pub (just my style) for a few drinks. Don't worry, the amount of food we ate sucked up most of that alcohol - it was a beautiful thing. We had some kind of cucumber and pear martini that was absolutely phenomenal! But, alas, our night had to end at some point, so we hoofed it back to the hotel around 2 a.m. so we could get our beauty rest before a full-day seminar beginning at 8:30 the next morning.

The seminar was very good, and extremely relevant to our business. Since that's really all we did the rest of the time, and I'm sure that is not at all interesting to you, we'll leave it at that. I would love to someday go to New York for two weeks and see everything I want to see. Though this was my second visit to the city, I still have yet to go in the Empire State Building, really appreciate and explore Central Park, visit Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, or really even get lost in Manhattan and find fun restaurants and shops (what I'd really like to do!). Ah well, next time. Until then, I'm pleased with my mini-trip, my snack-sized bite of the Big Apple, if you will.