Manhattan with Jackie and Angela - The Hamilton! Tour

Dana did it again! She seems to have an instinct for finding tickets to hard to get to shows. In this case, she grabbed onto tickets for Hamilton! again. Angela said she'd like to go and Jackie is always up for a trip to New York. Dana did have to get them nine months in advance, but who cares? I know New Yorkers who still have not managed to find tickets.

We flew in early on Friday morning and Dana made reservations at her go-to arrive in Manhattan restaurant, Fig and Olive. We checked into the Paramount Hotel, located directly across the street from the Richard Rodgers Theater, left our bags with the bellman, and headed for lunch.

On the way back, we stopped to look at St. Patrick's Cathedral. It has been covered in scaffolding for years, but now they have that removed and the church is beautiful. The inside is quite dramatic with amazing chapels and glass. Angela said when she'd planned better she would like to come back and attend mass there. 

We also had to shop, of course. Dana loves the Manhattan stores. It turns out that Angela has a significant soft spot for them, too! The two of them shopping for Prada bags was horrifying!

After lunch we visited the High Line. It was windy and a little cool, but it's always very pretty there. We walked for awhile, then came down and visited a few more shops. (Do I sense a theme here?) From there we walked to dinner at Untitled, the restaurant outside the Whitney museum at the entrance to the High Line. We ate outdoors and experienced the wonderful weather that weekend.

The next morning I started out early for a photo class with an instructor from the NY School of Photography. He does private lessons on Saturdays. It was very useful and I had a great time roaming around Central Park. We changed some settings on my camera that may really make a difference and played around a lot with exposure settings. I learned to make double exposures with my camera (so easy!) and some tricks with perspective. I would certainly meet with him again.

After my lesson, I met up with everyone else, but Dana and Jackie took off to get Dana's hair blown out. Angela and I haunted the jewelry stores, Cartier and Tiffany's. That was fun. Angela saw some beautiful pieces but said she had about decided it wasn't worth it to buy any more jewelry. I'm not so sure. Some of it was awfully sparkly...

Hamilton was maybe even better the second time. Jackie and I had to climb up to the top of the theater which wasn't any fun for her, but once there, had very good seats. Hamilton is definitely my favorite play this week. It amazes me that they can condense so very much into two hours. It's also a little fascinating to see how the actors mix it up a little so the play isn't exactly the same each time.

We snagged an early dinner at a Brazilian restaurant that Dana had noticed not far from our hotel, then ran back around the corner to see Hello Dolly with Bette Midler. That was an interesting experience. I realized I don't understand the cult that surrounds either Hello Dolly or Midler. Whatever, the crowd wend wild again and again. People simply love that play! I could see that Jackie really liked it. It is far more accessible than Hamilton.

Sunday morning we met Brian and Ella Fahey for breakfast down the street. Ella is quite the active squirmy child with quick hands and the desire to touch everything. She's also fairly quiet and always bright and happy. Breakfast was nice, but then they had to leave. She'd been up for hours and it was nap time.

Angela had always wanted to visit B&H Photo since she has ordered so much from them and her friends had recommended it. We walked down to see what all the fuss was about. OMG! They have a huge store with everything imaginable there! Angela was hunting for a waterproof camera bag that they didn't seem to have, but in the meantime I bought a small bag and a new set of wireless headphones! It's like Christmas in there every single day!

Back to the hotel to pick up our luggage and grab a cab to the airport. Actually, a nice cab driver who picked us up from lunch after B&H volunteered to take his break in front of the hotel and wait for us. Our flights came off without delay. We delivered Angela to her house, sent Jackie her way, and found some ourselves some dinner. It was an outstanding weekend. Perfect scheduling, outstanding weather, and no travel glitches.