Last Wednesday was the day Jesse and I flew to Boston and started our vacation! We were so sad to leave Levi behind, like really sad about it. The flight wasn’t too bad but it took about five hours, which is too long for us. I get stuck in the middle seat so I’m crammed in between Jesse and whoever else is sitting in the window seat. I’d love to have the window seat but I choose the middle to be close to Jesse since he loves the aisle seat since he’s a bigger human being (haha). I actually got lucky and had a very petite girl sitting next to me which meant I had a bit more room. We flew JetBlue for the first time and holy crap do they spoil you with snacks! Awesome! I probably ate a bit too much on this flight but I kept feeling I was hungry. Anyways, we couldn’t wait to land.
The weather in Boston was cold but it wasn’t too bad. I got an awesome coat from Old Navy that I wore throughout our entire vacation and it was amaaazing with the cold weather. Once we got to the hotel we decided to go out for a walk and see where we could have dinner. We found a cute little bar and restaurant and I kept things a bit light and had a steak salad and fries (ok, not so light). The food was really good! Where we were staying they had a bunch of shops close by so it was nice to walk around and do a little shopping. They have this really cheap clothing store called Primark and seriously, everything is really cheap but cute! Couldn’t pass it up.
The first full day in Boston consisted of us wandering around the city. There’s this brick line around the city called the “Freedom Trail” and it pretty much takes you to certain landmarks. We walked and ubered our way through the city and saw a bunch of stuff like Bunker Hill, old cemeteries, got pastries at the famous Mike’s Pastry, went by Fenway Park, went to the USS Constitution Museum, saw an entire lake that was frozen, and just explored our little hearts out! By the way, Boston is so beautiful! It was really clean there and there were hardly any homeless people on the streets. One thing though, is that everyone crosses the streets when they feel like it. They don’t wait for the sign to tell them to walk at crosswalks. They just go! It was weird to get into that habit while we were there. I read online beforehand that Boston was not a driving city and after being there, there’s no way in hell that I’d ever want to drive there. The roads are all windy and weird and don’t make sense compared to where I live. It kind of gave me anxiety while we were in the Ubers, haha. I’d definitely go back to visit again for sure, though. The food was good and the people weren’t too grumpy.
We actually went back to the airport the next day to rent a car to drive to New York. We didn’t fly there or get a taxi. I wasn’t feeling too good on this particular day. I kept feeling like I was about to get a fever or something, but I never did. Luckily I didn’t have to drive so I was able to sleep for most of the drive. We stopped in Connecticut to get lunch but we didn’t see much. There was a small part where it snowed while we were driving but it was excessive. We left Boston right in time before their storm hit and we escaped the snow! It took about four hours to get to New York and we had to drop the rental car off at JFK and then get picked up by an Uber to take us to our hotel. We almost had that rental car for a couple more days but decided not to. Thank goodness because I have no idea where we would have even parked in the city or how we would have been able to drive without running someone over. Like Boston, people just walk when there aren’t cars driving by even if their light is green. It’s insane!
When we finally got to our hotel and got settled in, we figured we’d walk to Times Square! We got an Uber to take us to a place to eat for dinner and then we walked to Times Square. We ate at this cute Mexican inspired restaurant and I had some bomb sweet potato and black bean tacos and corn esquites! 10/10 would recommend that place if I could remember the name. I actually wish I wrote the names down of restaurants but I didn’t! Arg, oh well. If you want my honest opinion of Times Square, it’s that I actually didn’t think it was that awesome. I mean, yeah, it’s all bright and lit up because of the huge screens but after being there for 10 or so minutes, I was ready to leave. Over it. Next.
Our first full day consisted of us going to the 9/11 Memorial and the museum. It’s incredibly sad and I didn’t take any photo’s inside because I just didn’t feel like it. I actually have no idea how people took photo’s of themselves smiling outside by the waterfall. Like, what?? Insane. I regret not getting the earphones because it would have been nice to have a guided tour. If I ever go back I’ll for sure do that. We then wanted to go check out the Statue of Liberty. Upon approaching the area that we were just going to look at her (not actually visit the statue) we were approached by this man selling tickets for a boat ride that gets you up close and personal. We decided to go for it because, why not? He took us to this sketchy bus which we waited forever for it to actually leave and take us to where we needed to go. Then it took us to New Jersey where we’d board this boat. New Jersey?! So weird, but we went along with it. We got on that bus around 1:50 and we didn’t go on that boat until 3! It was kind of ridiculous but we just went with the flow of things. We were able to get really good photo’s of The Statue of Liberty so I’m appreciative of that. We also got a good look at the Freedom Tower and the Brooklyn Bridge. It was freezing on that boat and it took a chunk out of our day but I’m glad we did it. After all of that and we were back in New York, we stayed in Chinatown and found a cute restaurant to have pasta in Little Italy. I knew I wanted authentic Italian pasta while I was in New York and I’m not sure how authentic it was or not but it was damn good and I have no regrets! I ended that night with a dessert and we then headed back to our hotel for the night.
The second day was supposed to be this big storm and we were supposed to experience a ton of snow. None of it happened! We got pretty lucky. It did rain but it wasn’t anything we couldn’t handle. We got bagels for breakfast and then headed toward Central Park where we walked around and then found a zoo inside! It was really cute and a nice, fun thing to do. We made our way towards Trump Tower (probably the only time a building would make me want to puke just walking by) and headed to Laduree for some macaroons. I’ve seen people post them on Instagram so you know I had to try them out! They were good and the shop was really cute! After all of that I knew we had to get some New York pizza! I’m not a big meat eater so I don’t often get slices of pizza with pepperoni and sausage on it but man oh man, was that pizza bomb digs! Just thinking about it now makes my mouth water. The pizza was the perfect thickness and had the right amount of sauce and cheese on it. Amazing! We went back to the hotel to hangout for a while before we went to see The Book of Mormon on broadway. I got the tickets as a gift for Jesse for Christmas and it just so happened to be on his birthday! It worked out great. He said it was one of the best presents he’s ever had so that made me really happy. It was a great show and made everyone laugh. After the show it was about 10pm and we hadn’t had dinner yet so we went to Shake Shack. It’s hard not to compare it to In n Out but the burger didn’t have anything on In n Out’s burger. The fries were pretty good, though. Jesse ordered their spicy chicken sandwich and that was really tasty and I wish I got that instead of my cheeseburger.
Monday, the day before we had to leave. It was FREEZING. It was 8 degrees outside but felt like -1 (according to the weather app) and it was awful. The wind hurt when it hit our faces so we put on our face masks that we brought (highly recommend). On this day we were home sick and tired from everything we had done in the past several days. We went out to a mall and walked around and did a little shopping, ate lunch, and then decided to head back to the hotel and do absolutely nothing. It was a perfect lazy day. We never left the hotel for the rest of the day. We ordered food to be delivered to the hotel. I was craving a burrito and he was fine with eating one too, so that’s exactly what we did. We watched tv and my phone was able to connect to the tv so we watched some stuff on Netflix, too.
We probably Facetime’d my parents 3-4 times a day to see and talk to Levi. We missed him SO much it was insane. But it was also nice to have time for ourselves and just be selfish for a small amount of time. It was the first time in 8 months that we had full nights of sleep without any interruption of a baby crying. I wouldn’t trade Levi waking us up in the middle of the night for the world, but it was nice to have a small break to get back on our toes. We both agreed that we don’t want to go on a vacation without him for a long while. We talked about him all the time and kept saying how much we loved him and how we wished we could hold him and squeeze him because he’s so dang cute. Ugh! The love for your own child is infinite. What a blessing he is to us! My parents had a good time with him which was awesome. They are great at being grandparents!
This concludes everything we did on our vacation! It already seems like it happened so long ago. Our flight home was 6 long hours and we were so ready to leave New York. It was a nice city and I highly recommend going if you’ve never been. I’m actually glad we went in the winter time because I couldn’t imagine going in the summer when it’s all hot and humid. I hate being hot. I actually wouldn’t mind going back when it’s in the spring or fall because I’d love to see how it is when all the tree’s have leaves on them. If you’re a foodie like me then you’ll love the city. Chinatown and Little Italy was where it was at for me. I ate so good but I’m really happy to be home and have home cooked meals. I’m sure I gained a few pounds but I’m not mad at it. We got lucky and had a gym at the hotel in Boston so I did workout once while we were there. If our hotel in New York had a gym we would have definitely worked out there but I guess the walking makes up for some of it, yeah? I’d also say that New York City is cleaner than San Francisco and the only real nasty thing we saw was a woman throwing up on the sidewalk. I actually ran past her because I didn’t want to listen or smell it. Yuck. Besides that, it was pretty nice.
I’m hoping I didn’t forget anything else to tell you all about. It was a great trip and I’m so happy that Jesse wanted to do this instead of Hawaii (which was what I originally wanted). If you’re debating on whether you want to take a trip with your significant other or a friend, just do it! Even if it’s only a couple hours away. Go! You won’t regret it.
Liz With Type One 