Sheila's travels

A Brooklyn Adventure

27th May 2006
After a leisurely brunch at the beautiful Art Deco Manhattan Diner (amazingly only opened in 2000) across the street from the hotel:











We wandered around Central Park on a beautiful sunny day, and we followed our ears to find someone playing 2 trumpets at once:











Then took the subway south to begin our Brooklyn Adventure (following advice from Melissa at work!). The traditional walk over the bridge took us quite a while - not only is it a very long bridge, but we had to keep stopping to admire the views!














We just loved the feel of DUMBO - lots of urban regeneration going on, warehouses becoming lofts, new small businesses (including a great music store right down by the water), restaurants, and the wonderful Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory in the old firehouse - butter pecan highly recommended! - and the Torres Chocolate Factory.

A short walk up into Brooklyn Heights (I could see myself living here ... if only I could afford it) took us back to the subway; a Circle Line cruise was next on the agenda:














... with a great view of the Statue of Liberty just as the light was starting to fade:














To round off the day, we thought we would do the ultimate tourist thing, and go up the Empire State Building at dusk ... there was no line outside so we went right in at 8 pm - and it took us 2.5 hours to get up to the top!! They haven't quite got queuing to the fine art practised by DisneyWorld ... and of course it was dark by the time we made it to the top. Here's the Chrysler Building ...














We made it back to W 77th by 11.30pm - at which point we decided we should have dinner - thank heavens for the 24-hour Manhattan Diner across the street - and fall into bed.

posted by Sheila T @ 12:54 pm