This past weekend, a group of us drove up to the Big Apple itself, NYC, to celebrate Ashley’s 21st birthday (her actual birthday was Thursday, June 23rd). Jay, Sprad, Tessier, Stephanie (Ashley’s friend from home), and Erica joined us, as well as Shelby (Ashley’s friend from home as well – who is in NYC for the summer).
While some thought the trip was going to be a big mess, seeing as it was planned literally up to the day we had to leave, it turned to be a success. Since there were only 7 of us going, we decided to rent a minivan and all ride up together. The minivan was sweet – it was decked out with a DVD player and all. Thursday night Jay and I picked it up, as well as made a pit stop at WalMart. We bought colored car chalk, and chalked up the windows of the van. The back window had a huge “Happy 21st Ashley” with a cheesy smiley face. The side windows included “Honk and we’ll drink”, “We (heart) Soccer Moms”, “Have you Spradded lately?” and “Ch Ch Ch. Bow Chicka Bow Wow (two infamous Ashley phrases)”.
In addition to the cheesy colored chalk car, we made t-shirts for her birthday. Everyone wore a “T-Rex in the City” shirt, which had a picture of a Tyrannosaurus Rex and “21st Birthday Bash” on it. We also got Ashley a nice 5-year-old princess crown.
We all took class/work off Friday, and left cville Friday morning at 6:45am. We picked Sprad up around 8:30 in Herndon, and headed north to NYC.
We stayed in the Crowne Plaza Times Square… right in the heart of it all. The hotel was very nice, classy, and busy.
The first day was a lot of fun. Everyone was excited to be out of the car and into the city, and we went right out. The girls decided to take the shopping route, while the guys hit up a restaurant and various little bars.
Highlight of early day: hanging out with our waitress, who is an aspiring actress and has a small role on General Hospital, telling us all about her stories in NYC… including partying with Dan Akroyd and having a friend tell her that they hooked up with Tom Cruise (and it wasn’t a girl… interesting). This is the same waitress who, when Jay, Sprad, and I all ordered a beer, and Tessier ordered a water on the rocks, asked Tessier if he wanted a Grilled Cheese or Chicken Fingers from the kid’s menu when he ordered food.
After going back to the hotel and taking a nap, we went to a Brazilian restaurant for which I forgot its name. It was very classy, and amazing food. The way it worked was you had a salad/vegetable bar, with all the typical salad bar stuff. Once you were done with that, you flipped over your coaster to green, and they’d bring you all types of meat to your table. They literally would have a huge Prime Rib on a pole, bring it by, and if you wanted some they’d cut you a slice right onto your plate. It was amazing. They had more meat then I’ve ever seen before, and you could eat as much as you wanted. I highly recommend it.
After dinner, we headed to The View, a restaurant at the top floor of the Marriot Marquee. It was a rotating restaurant/bar, where you could see the entire city lit up at night. It was very classy, and we all got a few drinks and checked out the city atop the rooftops.
Saturday morning Sprad and I woke up early to try and buy Broadway tickets to either Monty Python’s Spamalot or Wicked. Unfortunately, trying to buy tickets on the same day is unlikely for these brand new plays, so we went and bought tickets to Beauty and the Beast. Neither Sprad nor Ashley had seen a Broadway before, so the three of us went.
We also visited Ground Zero, which is a sight to see, as well as went to Wall Street and Trinity Church (the huge, gorgeous church in National Treasure). Saturday night we ate at Carmine’s, a famous, very classy Italian restaurant in the Theatre district. The restaurant was family style, and we only ordered 2 appetizers and 3 entrees between the 8 of us, which ended up being plenty! Ashley’s parents treated us to the dinner (for her birthday), which was amazing. After dinner, we walked all around the streets of NYC, and found a cool bar with a younger crowd and hung out for the rest of the night.
Sunday morning we were late to wake up, and didn’t get a chance to do much. We grabbed a quick lunch, and walked around Rockefeller Plaza and 5th street. NYC just so happened to be having its annual Gay Pride Parade, so we witnessed that (and it was a sight to see!).
We got on the road around 1:30, and hit horrendous traffic all the way home until arriving in cville at 11:00pm. Long trip.
We had a fantastic time – especially Ashley, which it was her first time in NYC. We couldn’t believe how expensive everything was in NYC, and quickly realized we’d have gone broke had we been there any longer. Tessier and Jay both took lots of pictures of the trip, and I’m going to post them later on… so definitely check back, they’re pretty entertaining.
