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NEW YORK CITY 2022
  • Esmee van Dijk
October 2022

NEW YORK CITY 2022

A 8-day adventure by Esmee Read more
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  • Trip start
    October 17, 2022
  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Travel day

    October 17, 2022 in the Netherlands ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    Exciting day!!

    Traveling to New York.

    Since schiphol told us it was going to be verrry busy we arrived pretty early at schiphol. We decided to meet up at 1pm.

    Well those line were an absolute joke. There was nobody to be seen and with 15 minutes we made it through bagage check in, security and passport control.

    Got a drink at Starbucks and did some games. And some chicken nuggets. Sadly our plane got delayed and we departed at 6pm.

    We had some delicious dinner in the plane, also some coffee, and as we speak we have 3,5 hours to go. I got a bit of WiFi so that was kinda chill, but didn’t really work.

    It’s now 10pm (Dutch time) so I’m getting a bit tired. So will try to do a powernap or smth.

    Excited and super pumped about this trip. Can’t wait to arrive in New York 😍    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Arriving in new york

    October 17, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌧 13 °C

    We arrived in nyc at 8 pm. The flight itself was pretty okay, spend my time playing yatzhee with Lize and watching the Big Ben.

    When we arrived we had to go through security and get our esta checked. This took some time. But after we were through our suitcases were already there. We went straight to the AirTrain, which went quite easily.

    When we arrived at the subway station Jamaica it was hard to buy the subway tickets. We didn't all have a credit card, which led to that Thirza and Anouk had to pay for all our tickets for the AirTrain. After that we had a lot of difficulty to find the unlimited subway card. We gave up and tapped in with our phone. Well, those turnstiles with big suitcases were definitely a problem and we all got stuck lmao.

    It was nearly 10:15pm when we finally sat in the subway.
    It was a 30 min drive and a 13 min walk to our airbnb. I kinda felt weird, not yet knowing the neighborhood and kind of feeling like a target with a really big suitcases. But when we arrived in our airbnb all was good. The room was super small, but big enough to lay all the suitcases on the ground.

    It was clean, thankgod.
    We went to bed straightaway since the dutch time already was like 6am the next morning. I was exhausted. Only to be wide awake the next morning at 5 am.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Walking around times sq, st patricks

    October 18, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 8 °C

    I woke up at 5am and didn't get much sleep after that. We all were awake before 7am. We got showered and dressed up and went straight for breakfast around 8:15am. It was a truly beautiful day and even a little bit sunny.

    We just walked to find breakfast and a place to sit (and wifi, Since we didn't had that much 5G). The best option was Pret a Manager. It costed me $10 for only a croissant and a cup of coffee. And that's when we knew it was definitely going to be an expensive day.

    At the pret we made a planning for the day. We decided to first walk along 5th av towards the st. Patricks (I think it was like a 20 blocks walk or so). We came across the public library (which was still closed because it was still pretty early 9:21am) and so were all the shops at 5th. But it was nice walking there because it was pretty quiet.

    9:40 am After we went in the st. Patricks we went to Rockefeller centre. And after that grabbed a snack at the magnolia bakery (10:08 am). From there we walked towards time square. We went into some shops (Disney store, Old Navy, Hard Rock Cafe) and after that hopped on a subway towards heralds sq around 11:15 ish.

    At heralds sq we finally got to fix 2 out of 4 unlimited cards. The others still weren't working.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Hudson park - The vessel & the edge

    October 18, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☁️ 9 °C

    We arrived at the vessel at 11:38, we took a lot of pictures and discovered that the edge was literally on the other side of the park. So we grabbed some Starbucks (well rip money already) and we reserved some spontaneous tickets for the earliest time slot.

    The ride to the top was stunning and amazing. It was an elevator with all animations and really cool. We were at the top around 1 pm. It was amazing. The looks, the view, the sun, the warmth. Really really enjoyed this. We took a lot of pictures. We almost spent 50 minutes at the top. Because there was also reaaaally good Wi-Fi, we all FaceTimed our relatives and showed the views and made everyone jealous, whoops.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Highline, chelsea market, park

    October 18, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 9 °C

    After we grabbed a well deserved burger at shake shack (damn those are really good), we continued our walking. Like we hadn't walked enough yet. We strolled over the high line. I must say I really thought it would be more. It was great, but there weren't that much art installations as I thought. There were some pretty nice views. Thankfully the sun was shining and it was really peaceful walking over there.

    After that we went down and went through some big shops like apple, samsung, google, Starbucks. I also bought my AirPods :p. The Starbucks was really cool, it was a kind of factory that showed how everything was produced. Very cool.

    At 16:11 we went to Chelsea market, which I still can't pronounce. It was also pretty nice. Since it was still tooo early and we just ate lunch like two hours ago. So we found the park we saw from the highline. I'm not sure how it is called any more but something like little island. We found some random rolling chairs and behaved like children for a bit.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Happy hour & sushi time

    October 18, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    At 6 pm we decided that we had enough of a walk for today and since it was happy hour we grabbed some cocktails. Back at Camden town.

    We really wanted to eat sushi so we found a cute sushi place in Korean Town, which was close to our airbnb. So we hopped on a subway back to our airbnb and went for sushi. The outside looked very weird, but the inside was amazing. Never judge a book on its cover haha. At 7:45 pm we finally had our sushi. After a great dinner (but we were reaaaaly tired) we went straight to the airbnb.

    Before we were in bed it was already 10 am. Dutch time 4 am. So you only can imagine how tired we were. Record by the way: almost 30000 steps in ONE day.

    Sleep tight    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Breakfast at park, flat iron & harry pot

    October 19, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 7 °C

    It’s already been half a year. Or longer, but I still want to update this. Probably not that detailed anymore. But sure, enjoy.

    I remember waking up pretty early, which is kind of nice since we can actually start our day pretty early. This day we looked more into where we wanted to grab breakfast. Since yesterday was a kind of disaster. We found this cute place and by the looks of it it was good, since there was a really long line. I don’t remember how the place was called but I do remember how shocked I was that there were breakfast burgers. I mean???

    Since it was suuuper busy we decided to take out our food and walked to the nearest park (Madison sq park) Which happened to be near flat iron building. We really enjoyed eating our breakfast in the sun.

    After the that we walked around the neighborhood for a little bit, discovered the Harry Potter store (omyyy) and grabbed the subway around 11 am.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Staten island ferry & outlet mall

    October 19, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 10 °C

    We took the subway straight into financial district. On to the Staten Island ferry. In my mind the last time this ferry went to Brooklyn. I don’t know what I thought but I completely remembered it wrong.

    It was pretty windy but the sun was out and it was all good. We stood outside at the back of the ferry and it was stunning. The views are amazing from the water. It just so surreal looking at the skyline. It feels like a dream.

    Do when we arrived what was NOT Brooklyn (lmao) but Staten Island. (Duh, it’s called that way). We discovered a huge outlet center and went straight in. It was weird tho, it was super quiet and not busy at all. We looked around. Did a little bit of shopping. Grabbed some Starbucks (again…) and made our way back to the ferry. It was already 1 pm so we decided to grab some subway before we hopped on the ferry.

    We enjoyed the view again, you really can’t get enough of it. I think I really can sit at the ferry all day and just look. During our supper we made some plans for the rest of the day. They really wanted to go to 9/11 museum/ground zero. But since I already saw that on my last trip I didn’t really feel like it. So I made some other plans and saw that there were some awesome dance classes at a good timing.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Alone in nyc & fridays

    October 19, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 11 °C

    We grabbed the subway together but I had to change to go uptown as the others continued to 9/11. This really was my first time alone in a subway in nyc. Which really felt weird. It was amazing tho, I always like to do things on my own after spending a lot of time with the group. I had to rush to get to the studio in time. But due to some delay of the subway I couldn’t make it in time to Broadway dance center. So I changed my plan to go to steps on Broadway. But when I arrived I couldn’t find the proper entry of the building (turned out I had to just walk in and go in to the elevator). Well that was the moment I found it scary to be alone and didn’t know where to go.

    I decided to go to Central Park since that was a place I knew already. It was a 10 minute walk. In Central Park I walked around for a bit. Got something to drink and just sit down in the grass and enjoyed my view.

    After I while I decided to walk back to the Airbnb since I still had some time to kill. I walked along 5th av. Saw the trump tower, went to the NBA shop. And got on the subway for a view stops because my feet where killing me.

    Back at the apartment I showered, braided my hair and FaceTimed a friend as I waited for the others to return. Which didn’t took that long. At 6pm we were ready to go out for dinner, we had a lot of fun planned for the evening.

    Walking to fridays for dinner it was the first time it was actually busy and the first time I felt like damn, yeah the city that never sleeps. But hey it was rush hour after all.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Moulin rouge & times sq

    October 19, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 10 °C

    After our dinner we went to MOULIN ROUGE. I was so excited. We were in the back back row but it was amazing. I didn’t really have any expectations regarding the show, but it was above all that.

    It was also the first time that one of the main characters was switched after the break because his voice couldn’t take it anymore. We got an understudy, but it was just as good.

    After we were blown away from the show we went to times sq. It amazes me how different it is then during the day. All the lights are intens. We got really thirsty so we went to the nearest McDonald to grab something to drink. To discover that a large medium or small soda is only $1. I mean you’re paying $4 for a water, but soda is only one, no matter the size. America is weird you know.

    After our confusion about the drinks we went back to the Airbnb. We walked, but we took an ally with a lot of bum. Which felt super uncomfortable, so we continued because there was no turning back, but stayed close. After we came out of the ally we almost all said together that we never taking that one again.

    Weird how one ally can be/feel dangerous but the other one is just fine.

    We ofcourse made it safe back to our Airbnb and got tucked in for a good night sleep.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Dancing at broadway dance centre

    October 20, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 8 °C

    Anouk found a great place for some breakfast pancakes. Because who is going to America with having pancakes at breakfast right? So we decided to walk there, it was only a 30 min walk.

    The plan of the day was follow some dance classes and soho. Since the others didn’t want to follow the same classes as I wanted we decided to split up again. I walked back because it was a 40/45 min walk and I had some time to kill. I love walking through a city alone. And I had some trust issues with the subway because that was the reason I couldn’t make it yesterday.

    I stopped to grabbed a fresh smoothie because I was craving something ‘healthy’. But damn. That was not fun, it was nearly $10!? How is soda $1 and something good for your body $10???? I still can’t believe it.

    Yesterday I already saw where bdc was located because it was next to the theatre of moulin rouge. I got in and waited for the class to begin. I was planning on doing theater jazz and jazz funk. Jazz funk was really something we in the Netherlands call commercial, but it was suuuuper fun. I really enjoyed the 3 hours of dancing. After that I grabbed a subway back to the Airbnb and grabbed a quick lunch (dunking donuts). To find that the others were already back and waiting for me. So I showered super quick, got dressed and we went straight to SOHO.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Soho & stardust diner

    October 20, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 14 °C

    When we arrived it was already 5 pm. We walked around for a little bit and saw some shops. I think soho and cons town were a really disappointment. Maybe I remembered it wrong from last time, I don’t know. Or maybe we were just a wrong time.

    We ended up in a McDonald for something to drink and snack and to plan out our evening. I had one big bucket list thing I wanted to do: stardust diner. But it was already 7 PM. But we went anyways. There was a HUGE line outside with people waiting. I think we waited around 45 minutes. Which was pretty okay.

    When we got in the theatre kid in me was awakened. It was amazing. The songs, the interior, the people. Everything. The food was also fine, but the entertainment was something else. Thankgod I got to hear defying gravity and some of my other favorite musical songs. We had a blast and stayed till 9:30 pm.

    After that we returned to our Airbnb because we were tired of all the dancing and walking.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Cycling through central park

    October 21, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 17 °C

    It was the first morning we kind of slept in and got used to the time zone. We grabbed some coffee and breakfast at the supermarket/foodmarket and hopped on the subway too Central Park. We are our breakfast at a bench and discussing whether we wanted to hire some bikes to go through Central Park.

    We found a ‘cheap’ one near Central Park and made our way over there. At 11:30 am we were biking through New York City. But jeez that’s something else then biking here in the Netherlands. We had to go through a bit of city before going in to Central Park. But that was THE scariest bike moment of my life. We had to go through a roundabout but there weren’t any biking lanes. So that was a disaster and a dangerous experience.

    After we found our way in Central Park it was pretty easy and nice. Its all one way. The views were stunning and amazing. It was fall but not every tree was completely colorful. But I think that made it super nice. It was also still pretty hot.

    We took a LOT of pictures and stopped for a hotdog and coffee.

    It was a lot of biking but it was fun. When we returned the bikes (2:30 something ish) we grabbed something to eat again (I think McDonald but I really don’t remember).    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Roosevelt tramway

    October 21, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 12 °C

    After our cycling we headed to the Roosevelt tramway. This was another one on my bucket list and I really wanted it to do it during sunset, because that would be so cool. It costed us nothing since we had the unlimited card for the subway. The views were absolutely stunning. It felt weird, but it was super amazing. This really was one of the highlights of our trip.Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Olive garden, dancing & yard house

    October 22, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 9 °C

    After the Roosevelt tramway we returned to time square around 6 PM. We kind of decided last minute that we wanted to do another dance class. So we decided to grab a quick bite at the Olive Garden, since we wanted to try that out. Well we (at least, I) am never going there again. I thought I would be nice, but I should've done a little bit more research, lol.

    It was okay I guess, but not to grab a quick bite. It took forever. After our tummy was way toooo full
    Anouk, Lize and I were going to BDC again. Thirza went to a coffee shop to read a book. Anouk and I did a really classic American style jazz class. Lize went for contemporary.

    Afterwards we met up and decided to go out for another drink/beer. Wellll drinks are super expensive, of course everything is. But a beer was also around $10, without any tip. Well the beers were good tho. At 11:30pm we decided to walk to our airbnb.

    sleep tight.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Brooklyn flea, dumbo & foodmarkt

    October 22, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 15 °C

    For breakfast we decided to get some dunkin donuts, since it was almost halloween we got some nice halloween themed ones.

    At 10:30AM we decided to hop into a subway to Brooklyn. We heard there were some flea markets on Saturdays, so we wanted to check that out.
    The weather was super nice, sunny and just chill, a good Saturday tho. We spend all morning walking through the neighborhood (which was actually involved in the years I hadn't been there, so I turned out nicer than I remembered).

    The flea market was nice but can't be compared to the flea market at Waterloo plein tho. Didn't buy anything, but it was nice looking around.

    We chilled a bit in the park underneath the Manhattan bridge, and found a food market and ordered some food. I really don't remember what I got, but I do remember sharing it with Lize haha. We ate our food looking on to the water which was super nice and quite relaxing. And really got hot outside sitting in the sun.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Brooklyn bridge

    October 22, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 14 °C

    We actually spend a lot of time in Brooklyn which was nice. At 3PM we went on to the Brooklyn bridge. The Brooklyn bridge was my favorite thing to do last time, but that made me really excited bout this one. But is was super crowded which made it kind of a disappointment. Next time I'm in NYC I really want to do it during sundown or sunset.

    The views were nice, but the people not haha.
    I took almost an hour to walk across it.

    After we got back in Manhattan we hopped on a subway to grand station, because we didn't checked that one out yet and it was still on our list.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Final evening

    October 22, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 12 °C

    We arrived at 4PM at grand central, it was nice. Not that spectacular. I really remember that we were really exhausted and we had some time to kill. So we walked all the way back to the restaurant we were planning on eating. Lize had a lot of blisters starting from the 2nd day, but they really were super bad at this point.

    We grabbed some coffee (cold brew foam, which is my new favorite) at times sq and were check on how to get to the restaurant. We actually wanted to do a Korean bbq but that got expensive really really fast. So we did found a burger tent to go to.

    On our way there we stopped at the broadway store (dreamsssss), I really wanted everything they sold, but well yeah... I ended up getting a broadway sweater.

    The restaurant we went to was pretty packed when we got there, so we had to wait a few minutes to be seated, which was okay. The people working there were awesome and super friendly. We def had a lot of fun with our waiter. Anouk got him to give us free beer. Which was super fun. We ended up with a free round of beer. It was a super chill final night. We made our way back through Times Square to squeeze in the final night. And stoped at some classics -- m&m store and the other chocolate company with Reeses and stuff. I really don't remember how it's called tho...    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    MET

    October 23, 2022 in the United States ⋅ 🌧 14 °C

    After the start of the day including packing our suitcases and dropping them off in the luggage store. we went to time square. Only to find out that I had put my metro card in my suitcase, so we had to go back to the hotel, whoops. We grapped some breakfast at Applebees, which I also remembered as really good from last time but it wasn't lmao. It was fine tho but my expectations were definitely higher.

    After breakfast we split up again. After I got back from last nyc trip I discovered I missed out on something BIG. The metropolitan museum of arts, especially with my interest in greek/egypt mythology this is THE museum to go to. Sadly the other didn't want to join because they wanted to go to MOMA, which is a modern art museum. I actually really liked going alone to the museum, I've never done that before here back in NL, but it was something else! I loved how I could just go at my own speed and just stop how ever long I wanted to. Which was really great. I spend a lot of time in MET. I arrived at 11:30AM and stayed till 2:30PM. It was so big and beautiful. And I only really saw the greek/roman section and the Egyptian section of it. But I was quite done with it after that. Enough information of the day.    Read more

  • Esmee van DijkEsmee van DijkNEW YORK CITY 2022

    Last souvenirs & going to jfk

    October 23, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    Since Moma was near times sq I went back to times sq to meet the others up. We grapped a quick bite, which was a crazy hotdog or something. The weather today was pretty rainy, but that was okay tho we were leaving anyway. We did some last minute gift shopping and some last minute grocery shopping (American candy you know right). Got back to our airbnb and changed in to some comfy clothes. And went to the subway.

    The subway was CRAZY packed. It was the same long ride (30 minutes or so) but it was super hot and nowhere to be seated. Because of our long walking days our feet were hurting and we just wanted to sit hahahah.

    Our flight wasn't leaving until 9 but since we didn't know how busy it was going to be we wanted to be in time. We arrived at 7 ish at the airport, the line was long but it was manageable. After security we chilled for a bit and grapped some McDonalds (again..) but since we thought we would get any food until breakfast time at the plane we decided to eat something. We didn't had any thing since the hotdog at 3, so it was about time.

    at 22:45pm, during our flight we actually GOT food. I was just about to go to sleep. But they had other plans haha. The food was really nice, but we weren't that hungry. We just took our sleeping pills, but we decided to get some wine with it any way.

    That was the best decision of the trip tho. I slept like a rose. I never sleep on planes, because I just really can't. But this time I did..

    The sights in the plane were amazing when I was waking up. Because the sunrise was starting. Eventhough it was 3AM NYC time. I slept for a few hours anyway.

    we touched down at 10:30 dutch time (4:30 AM NYC) I felt pretty okay for the night I've had. We collected our stuff and said our goodbyes. By 11:30 I was in the train by myself, what the journey we had. I always feel super weird sitting in a normal dutch train after a trip. I got home safe and sound and everything turned back to normal straight away.    Read more

    Trip end
    October 24, 2022
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