After a relaxing weekend, we headed into the next week full of energy. Franzi traveled to Madison again, Alex headed to Washington by train. Travelling by train is a fairly comfortable method of travel but pretty expensive, even compared to the Deutsche Bahn. Starting comparisons with Deutsche Bahn – the train left and arrived punctual to the minute.
In Washington, Alex met up with Joern on Tuesday night. We met Joern when our friend and colleague Philipp visited us in New York back in June. They are best friends and he joint us for the weekend back then, after which we stayed in contact.
On Wednesday while we were still both on the road, Nicola arrived in our apartment. She is a very good friend of Franzi and came to New York for almost two weeks to visit us. Back in Madison, Thursday was another travel drama with a three hour flight delay. However, since Franzi and her teammate Sarah knew in advance they decided to make the best of it and slipped in a Hot Yoga session, which was super relaxing and a great use of time.
Nicola visiting from Germany
Once back home, we could finally say “Hi” to Nicola and were excited for the weekend ahead. On Friday, we met Tim and his girlfriend Alexandra. Tim is a colleague and friend from our Vienna office. We showed them the office and had lunch together.
Friday evening, Franzi and Nicola did a girls night and had dinner at Momofuku Noodle Bar. There is always quite a long wait but it was totally worth it. The food was delicious. Franzi had the beef brisket, Nicola the garlic chicken Ramen. As starter they shared the seared shrimp bun. Everything is highly recommended!
In the meantime, Alex had dinner with Jay in Williamsburg and a friend of him at Aurora, which is a lovely Italian place with high-quality pasta and Italian specialties. On Saturday, we spend the day wandering around the East Village, Noho, Little Italy, Chinatown and Soho. Alex ventured out for a “waxing event” at Filson, where he transformed his cotton backpack into a waxed-cotton backpack to make it more durable and last another couple years. Two hours and two packs of wax later, we met back up for a coffee and then headed down Bleecker street, Franzi had a cupcake at Magnolia Bakery and we walked down to the Hudson River.
Next we had a real New York experience. We witnessed a fashion magazine photo shoot with four models, a big crew and a paparazzi they were trying to block from getting any shots of the clothes and models. After we took some pictures ourselves during the sunset, we walked back home through the Meatpacking district.
One-day Roadtrip to the Hamptons
On Sunday we had a day-trip planned. We rented a car to go to the Hampton’s. We left early morning after we picked up some bagels from Tompkins Square Bagels. Our first stop was the Robert Moses State Park Beach, where we had breakfast with the view of the ocean. The weather was wonderful. Crisp and sunny and we felt like the only people around.
We continued our drive to South Hampton, where we had a coffee at Golden Pear café. After the pick-me up we drove to Cooper’s Beach, which was a beautiful mile-long beach. We took a long walk up and down the shoreline and admired some houses. Among others the one of Calvin Klein.
After de-sanding our feet, we drove to Sag Harbor and strolled around the little village. We looked around the shops and enjoyed a Froyo.
Our last stop for the day was at famous Montauk, the most eastern village of Long Island famous for its lighthouse. We walked around the area of the lighthouse and said goodbye to the ocean for the day.
Before heading home, we had the intention of stopping at the Montauk Brewing Company for a beer, but the place was crowded and not brewery-like at all so we made our way home straight away. Back in New York, we returned the car and ended the day with a warm dinner at the Thailand Café in our neighborhood.
