Sasha and I just returned from a long weekend in New York City. She had a break from school, and since she’s in her junior year, it was a perfect time to do some college tours — and enjoy a little mother-daughter getaway. The tours took up a couple of hours each day, so we planned our fun and food around them. We made some good picks, much of the credit going to Sasha, so I thought I’d share a quick recap of our trip.
GETTING THERE & AROUND (& BACK HOME)
Starting at Union Station
We took the Amtrak train from Union Station to Penn Station. It’s such an easy and relaxing way to get to NYC from DC. And if you book far enough in advance, you can get really good fares. I paid $75 round trip for each of us, which included a little extra to get the flex fare that lets you change or cancel for a full refund.
However, it turned out to be a one way trip on the train, due to the weather. We were supposed to leave at 5pm on Sunday, but the impending blizzard thwarted that plan. I received an email from Amtrak Saturday night warning us their schedule might be affected (ie, our train could be canceled). I didn’t want to risk it, so I booked a rental car and canceled our train tickets. We picked up the car Sunday morning in Brooklyn, and drove home before the storm. So, we lost our last day in NYC, but we didn’t get stuck!
As for getting around the city, aside from one Uber ride, we mostly rode the subway and walked. I find the subway system pretty easy to navigate, plus it’s such a good deal at just $3/ride.
ACCOMMODATIONS
A glass of prosecco comes with the room
We stayed at the Hyatt Union Square and really liked it. The room was clean, very comfortable, and a good space for the two of us. The staff was friendly, the amenities nice. The lounge area next to the lobby was perfect for hanging after a day out/pre-dinner, there’s also a restaurant (though we didn’t eat there), and the gym had everything needed for a good workout. And the location was prime. Just off Union Square, it was within walking distance to one of the college tours, good food, good shopping, and a subway station to get uptown easily.
WHAT WE DID
As mentioned, we went on a couple of college tours, one Thursday afternoon shortly after we arrived, the other Friday afternoon. Besides that we ate some great meals (details below), shopped, did a spontaneous head spa, and saw a show.
Head Spa
This one surely sounds random, and it actually was for us. We hadn’t planned on getting our heads massaged, but after a college tour in the freezing cold wind and rain, we wanted to do something warm and relaxing. I thought about going to a bath house that a friend recommended, but we didn’t have bathing suits with us. Then I recalled the Head Spa ads (go here for reference) that keep popping up on my IG and started looking them up. I checked Groupon for deals, and found one in Tribeca that could accommodate us, so we hopped on the subway and made our way there.
It wasn’t the same treatment that I’d seen in all the ads — essentially, it was like getting your hair washed at the salon with the massage part lasting a really long time — and it wasn’t as ticklish (for lack of a better description) as I’d hoped, but it was fine. After, they blow dried our hair… I just got a rough dry while Sasha got hers styled. (Now, I want to go to a fancy head spa for the real deal!)
Strolling & Shopping SoHo
The Evolution Store was neat pop-in between clothes shops
Of course, a trip to NYC with my teen daughter is going to include shopping, so we planned that for Saturday. She knew exactly what area she wanted to shop and what stores she wanted to hit — the stretch of shops in Soho on Broadway between Broome and Spring Streets. Allll of the teen stores are there — Brandy Melville, Edikted, Pacsun, Princess Polly, Garage. And, yes, just about all of them are here in DC, but in NYC, they are much larger with much more inventory. We browsed other stores, and one that was really fun to pop into was The Evolution Store with all kinds of fossils to check out and buy. We also just enjoyed walking around the area… it was a fun vibe with a lot of people out and about since it was a relatively nice day (ie, not raining or snowing and some sun). Btw, I didn’t get any pics of the shopping, but the fossils are probably more interesting!
Broadway Show
I wanted to see a show while we in New York, and had a few in mind, but didn’t book anything before we went. Because there were several we would have loved to see, I decided to try for half-price tickets at the TKTS booth in Times Square. We really lucked out! We got there around 6:15pm and scored the last two seats together for Maybe Happy Ending (our first choice) at 7pm. The show was fantastic! The story is unique and moving, and the performances so good — Darren Criss (from Glee) and Helen Shen were stellar. Even Sasha, who had claimed she wasn’t keen on musicals, thought it was excellent.
WHERE WE ATE
This gets its own section because the food options are so vast and good in NYC! And because we really planned a lot of this out.
We first went to Mama’s Too in the West Village last year, and it was so, so good, we made a point to go back again. Last time, there was a long line out the door around lunchtime, but this trip we went at an off hour and walked right up to the counter. It’s not typical New York style, but it is delicious. Get the bruschetta pizza.
Haha (zoom in to see)
We went to The Waverly Inn for our first dinner and it was a wonderful experience all around. Sasha and I both heard/saw great things about the restaurant in the West Village. It’s very pretty and cozy inside, and had a warm, relaxed atmosphere that was perfect for a cold winter night. It’s on the pricey side, but the food and service were worth it.
One of the best bagels I’ve ever had in New York, so you know that’s saying a lot (because NY has the best bagels). The menu at Apollo Bagels is fairly simple — they only offer six things — but what they serve is outstanding. There are a few locations, and there was no seating at ours, and I read very limited indoor seating at any of them. It’s designed for takeout, but we ate standing at a counter.
As soon as IG realized I was going to NYC, I started to see loads of reels about where to eat, including several about good, relatively inexpensive Omakase. That’s how I found out about KYUUBI. They offer 13 courses for $68, a good deal for Omakase, in a small counter seating only spot in the East Village. The meal was excellent, very fresh and inventive, and it was fun to watch the chef prepare everthing There were only 10 of us dining, so we had a front row view of it all.
Sasha found out about Los Tacos No. 1 through social media as a must-eat if you like tacos, so we put it on the list. There are several locations in NYC, and we went to the one in NoHo before our Saturday shopping in SoHo. It’s a fast casual spot, with no seating, just long bars where you can stand and devour your food — which is exactly what we did. The street-style tacos were muy bueno, the ingredients really fresh with the perfect toppings.
So, this was the place that Sasha had realllly wanted to go to. There is a lot of hype about the dumpling spot near Times Square, and reservations are practically impossible to get in advance. It was completely booked up when we checked ahead of our trip. However, Sash heard you can get on the walk-in waitlist and try to get in that way. So after we got our tickets for the show, we walked over to Din Tai Fung and waited in a very short line to get on the list. We were told we’d receive a text in a couple of hours when a table was ready, and we did. We hurried back over after the show ended, checked in, and were seated within minutes.
The big question: Did it live up to the hype? While the food was very good — we had two kinds of dumplings, plus the chocolate-filled and a cucumber salad — I’ve actually had better dumplings without all the hoopla. But it was a cool experience. And maybe I would have enjoyed it all more if I wasn’t stressing about how we’d get home the next day (this was before I thought to book the car). All in all, I would recommend trying Din Tai Fung.
MORE INSIGHTS
* If we’d spent Sunday there as planned, we would have gone to a museum, either the Tenement Museum or The Whitney. (And I should note that on past visits we’ve been to other museums, Central Park, Empire State Building, Times Square, etc.)
* We also would have walked The High Line (if weather allowed), which Sasha hasn’t done yet.
* We may have tried to do some secondhand shopping, too.
* If you’re going to be in NYC long enough for it to be worth it, you can get an OMNY pass, a 7-day unlimited pass after 12 paid subway rides within a week.
* If you can’t get a reservation at a restaurant, it doesn’t hurt to try walking up. There could be a cancellation, or you could get on a waitlist, then find something fun to do nearby in the meantime.
Have you been to NYC recently? What are your favorite things to do and places to go?
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