6 Hours in NYC!

A few weeks ago, my husband and I took off for a weekend adventures to the east coast.  We actually went to Washington D.C. first and got to spend the weekend bouncing around town.  As he had to head to a conference, and since I was purely on vacation, one of my best friends, Katie, who lives there, and I escaped on the Amtrak to NYC for a short girls trip.  We spent the first afternoon after arriving in Brooklyn (and you can see how we spent our 6 hours in Brooklyn here!).
That night, we stayed at the James Hotel in NY, NY - which was awesome, by the way! Super central to tons of great NYC shopping, restaurants and more, and it had a pretty big room for NYC (I mean, there was a King size bed WITH a sitting area and small table, and bar station).  The real draw of this place originally was the roof top and view!  They have a great bar/lounge, pool and deck atop the room and the views were magnificent. 
So anyways, after our one night sleep and the 2nd day of our super quick trip to the NY area - we hit the pavement to do and see as much as possible on the Manhattan side of the harbor!  And boy did we have our work cut out for us, as our list was growing by the moment!  But we were up and at 'em around 9am and our train left to go back to Washington D.C. around 3pm - so we put 6 hours to good use!
We were extra lucky to have Sarah (a now-friend and awesome photographer) along with us for the day. She took all these pictures of our girls day in NYC, so I didn't have worry about capturing photos and I could just live it!  If you are visiting NYC and interested in having her take some photos, you can schedule a travel or portrait session with Sarah by contacting her via her website.
We first started (by walking) to the Chelsea Market, which is an enclosed food hall, which is situated in the old National Biscuit Company's factory and beneath the Food Network's offices (among others).  We spent about a 45 minutes here getting breakfast and coffee, scoping out all the amazing food options and even doing a little shopping. We could of spent all day here just eating every meal and snacks in between from one end to the other.

 When in Chelsea - or anywhere near by - you must check out the High Line! So, we headed straight there after shopping, and got there early enough before it was too crowded!  The High Line is a path and park built on a historic train track that hasn't been in use since running it's last course in 1980. And in June 2009, the first section opened and they've been adding and renovating since.  It's super plant dense and there are event great spaces to sit back and relax!  

You can even grab coffee and do a little shopping up there - which if you follow me on Snapchat (ChasingDavies), you might have seen that I bought some cute NYC-themed kitchen tea-towels!

After walking the High Line, we headed to the Flatiron District to hit up a couple unique to NYC shops I'd heard about.  We made sure to stop at other little quirky and fun places along the way that caught our eye - like this hallway of antique mirrors that lead back to a small house (!!) located in some open space between tall buildings, that was filled with more antiques.  This is a little gem that Sarah knew about and we loved seeing it! 

Once to the Flatiron District, we hit up Fishs Eddy, which is a super colorful and unique kitchenware store that is affordable! If I lived in or near this place, I'd have my whole kitchen stocked with their goods!

After this, we popped over to Flying Tiger, which is a kitchy and funny store full of all sorts of things for your office, home, travel, kids, etc. It's SUPER inexpensive and worth walking through for gifts or little things for your own spaces.

 From the Flatiron district we walked to the Upper East Side for lunch at Seamore's, which I was really excited about.  This place is so freaking cute (as you might have seen on my insta post) and DELISH! I had white flounder fish on a kale salad and some wine to boot.  I HIGHLY recommend you put this place on your 'must-do in NYC list'.

 And finally, who can leave NYC without ice cream?  Sarah took us to Big Gay Ice Cream, and if you are any sort of fan of ice cream AND the Golden Girls, this.is.the.place.for. you.

 Again, HUGE thank you to Sarah for not only hanging out with us this day and taking pictures, but being such a great tour guide!  She had some fun commentary along the way, which I love to hear about things from a local's POV when I'm traveling! :)

{Oh, and in case you're interested - some outfit deets: my dress (super comfy for traveling and walking all around town), white birks, Madewell cross-body bucket bag (more options here!), necklace}

You can see my last trip to NYC with some different activities here!

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