Lucy and John’s Excellent New York City Adventure @LucyBurdette

LUCY BURDETTE: At least once a year, John and I take the train to New York to take advantage of what the city has to offer. I confess that I’m a creature of habit. We’ll often choose a Broadway show or two to splurge on, and then run through my obsessions.

 These include a visit to the Strand Bookstore (I know, I know, I have more books piled up already than I can read in a lifetime. But still…) And we often visit the Eataly store where we have a delicious Italian lunch and come out with a huge bag of their pasta. 

Plus have dinner at our favorite Greek restaurant in the East Village, Pylos. 

Since John teases me about being such a creature of habit, this time we squeezed in a few new stops. We visited the Morgan Library and Museum to see an exhibit about Beatrix Potter, featuring many of her letters and drawings and book illustrations. What a fascinating woman, a scientist and conservationist, as well as a writer and artist. 

She also was a whiz at character merchandising. I particularly loved this game board, which was apparently too complicated to produce commercially. 

From there, we took the ferry from 34th Street to Astoria. What a glorious way to travel on a beautiful day!  

We were headed to a retrospective of ceramic artist Toshiko Tokaezu at the Noguchi Museum. She was my college best friend’s mentor, and I’m pretty sure I took a class from her, though I lacked talent and she scared me to death! I knew he would not be able to attend the exhibit so we went in his honor. 

I highly recommend both the museum and the retrospective, which will be traveling once it closes in Queens. 

I’ll put extra photos from Beatrix Potter and the Noguchi at the end if you want more. When you go someplace outside your home turf, do you revisit familiar stops or like to try new things?