Quest into the north-east USA

Drakecula · Monday at 8:22 AM

Afterwards, I wanted to go visit the Athenaeum, an old public library. Unfortunately it wasn't open! If I had known I would have gone earlier, blast.

Ah well, I continued my wandering walk down more of Benefit St (the half I didn't do the first day) and enjoyed the old houses.

At the end of the street I popped into Trader Joe's to get some brekkie for tomorrow's train ride, then wandered back along the river where I found a Sunday market. Couldn't resist a blind date with a book! (See the what you've been reading thread)

By this stage I was quite hot (30ish today) so headed back to the hotel to cool down and go see how pack up was going in the expo hall. We're off to dinner tonight with everyone. One of the others is off to NYC tomorrow too, so we'll likely meet up with him there at some point.

Drakecula · Monday at 8:23 AM

Also, I'm no bird expert, but I saw this guy and figured he must be lost...

Drakecula · Tuesday at 9:24 PM

We're staying at Library Hotel by Library Hotel Collection while in New York, a bucket list hotel for me. There's ten floors of rooms, each floor a section of the Dewey decimal system. We're in 700.003, Performing Arts. Which is most appropriate as we're cramming in as much Broadway as we can! The room has several shelves of books, all relevant to the subject.

There's also a rooftop bar, and a 24/7 reading room with complimentary snacks and drinks, and lots of books to read.

VPS · Wednesday at 2:27 AM

Drakecula said:
We're staying at Library Hotel by Library Hotel Collection while in New York, a bucket list hotel for me. There's ten floors of rooms, each floor a section of the Dewey decimal system. We're in 700.003, Performing Arts. Which is most appropriate as we're cramming in as much Broadway as we can! The room has several shelves of books, all relevant to the subject.

There's also a rooftop bar, and a 24/7 reading room with complimentary snacks and drinks, and lots of books to read.

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Ok officially jealous of you staying in this hotel

Aeryn · Wednesday at 9:58 AM

As cool as the concept of the Library hotel is it would be a hard no from me due to having a shower/tub combination.

Drakecula · Wednesday at 1:57 PM

I'm having a bit of trouble with wifi here, it'll load 75% of a thing then reset which is a pain. Rest assured there's been lots of NYC exploring. It's hot and sweaty here. Do not recommend visiting in summer if you can avoid it.

But despite that the city is humming and I'm excited to be here.

Might have to do a proper recap when I get home.

Seat0B · Wednesday at 2:13 PM

I can recall very well the first time we visited NYC in July a long long time ago whilst on an RAAF posting to the USA. People warned us it would be hot and human. I shrugged it off - I’m Australian, how hot can it really be? Yep it was hot hot hot.

Much nicer when we visited in December and February.

Drakecula · 2025-07-06T12:52:53+1000

Okay - we're home! We were a little nervous and had resigned ourselves to the fact we may have missed our connection in LAX due to about a two hour delay departing NYC due to weather. Thankfully they held the plane in LAX, and asked that those with connecting flights put our hands up and asked those that didn't have connections to stay seated so those that did could disembark first.

It worked quite well and even though we were right up the back of the plane, we were able to get out quickly and they'd even parked our plane at a nearby gate to the next plane so we didn't have to rush too far to make the connection.

I forgot to take photos of the food on the LAX-SYD leg, but it was the typical Y fare. Edible, not amazing, etc.

I'll start doing a recap of our days in NYC to round out this report.

Drakecula · 2025-07-06T13:04:02+1000

So, Day 1 in NYC was more of a half day, as we left Providence on the train in the morning. Turns out our Flightsim Expo pal's train to NYC was cancelled and he was rebooked onto our train, sitting next to us! A very happy coincidence. The train was Amtrak and we had booked into business class (from memory there were no economy option when I booked) which was fine. There were overhead lockers for bags, as well as space in between seats (if they were back to back) to slide suitcases in.

The train ride was bumpier than I expected, I reckon the commuter rail I'd taken between Providence and Boston was smoother. I don't know if the train was going faster than the commuter would have and therefore was bumpier as a result?

Once in NYC (we arrived at Penn Station) we caught the subway over to our hotel. The subway is pretty easy to navigate. We used google maps to help identify which number or letter train we needed, and then you just have to know which direction you're going. You can tap on using a paywave credit card which we did. Super easy.

After checking in, we did a quick explore of 5th avenue and the Rockefeller centre, before heading to Joe's Pizza for a proper NYC slice of pizza. There was a line out the door, but they moved very efficiently so we were able to get in and get food quick enough.

After dinner we had made plans to meet up with our new NYC pal as he was also a musical theatre fan, and he joined us in seeing Chicago that evening. MrD and I have only ever seen the film with Renee Zellweger and Catherine Zeta-Jones, so it was great to see it on stage. An excellent start to our Broadway show experience.

Also, Times Square is nuts! It's bright, it's noisy, it's packed with people. Worth seeing once I suppose, to say yes I've been there, but that's it. I can't imagine how more crazier it is on New Year's Eve!

After the show all three of us went back to Library hotel to go to the rooftop bar for a drink. A most excellent first (half) day in NYC!