New York City 2

I was lucky enough to be in New York to celebrate my friend Steph's birthday who was in New York for a wedding and visiting her sister with her boyfriend. This meant birthday celebrations with the organising by a real live New Yorker! 

La Esquina

La Esquina was on every person's (read NY expert) 'oh New York you should go to...' list. After walking down stairs and through the kitchen you could tell it was very cool. The mexican food was good, albeit a little over hyped. At the stroke of midnight at La Esquina we all did tequila shots to celebrate Steph's birthday.

Lavo Brunch

Catch & I 

Steph, Brooke & I

Nothing could quite prepare you for a Lavo brunch. It was quite an odd experience, but a bloody great time! There was time for a quick bite to eat before tables got wisked away to create a dance floor with the best music playing that I had heard in a very long time. Yes Andy Murphy even better than Seven on a Thursday night underage. It was when the tubs of Moet appeared on the table when I really got excited! The after party at the Dream Hotel watching the sunset turn the skyline pink was also incredible and something that the camera couldn't quite capture. 

Smorgasburg

On a beautiful sunny New York day we tripped accross the river to the Brooklyn flea market then Smorgasburg in Dumbo. We felt we hadn't tasted some true American dishes and ate some crunchy fried chicken and veal schnitzel sandwich. Walking back to Manhantten via the busy, yet beautiful Brooklyn Bridge.    

Balthazar

Our final dinner together was a surprise to me and I couldn't have been more happy with the choice of Balthazar. French food & wine yes please. I also think I have never eaten so much in one sitting, steak tarter, lobster AND dessert! It was a bitter-sweet last night to say the least. 

The Butcher's Daughter

With still time for a few more restaurants I said my goodbyes to Steph & Luke at The Butcher's Daughter in Little Italy. It was such a gorgous little vegetarian eclectic place and really made me miss the cafe's in Melbourne (and my friends who I used to visit them with!) The avocado on toast was out of this world. 

Although this was my second trip to New York I left thinking of the restaurants and places in this city I was still yet to discover, hoping that one day I will get to go again. 

New York City Part 1

New York seems like an age away. It sort of was & I have been lazy again with the blog... But reliving it through writing this just makes me realise what an incredible time I had. I still cant believe how many restaurants we managed to squeeze into our time in New York! The week was straight out of a fairy tale for me. Meeting up with my man-friend in New York after 2 and a half months of anticipation, our first night strolling down the high line hand in hand,watching the sunset from the roof top at the Standard and things only got better.

I am going to split my New York posts on the blog into two. There are just so many places to cover and I don't want to miss a thing. 

We stayed at a great AirBnB apartment in Chelsea near the market & high line, this picture was a block away from where we were and captures my feelings of the trip! 

Catch

Catch - Seafood restaurant in Meatpacking district. For obvious reasons with the name we wanted to go here. For our first meal in NYC it set the bench mark pretty high. Couldn't fault a dish although the popcorn shrimp was a highlight. 

Central Park - Beautiful, we got Wholefoods from Columbus Circus and ate it in the park. I still haven't made it up to the 'boat house' but I will one day! 

Daniel 

Great selfie mirror picture here before Daniel. What an incredible dining experience that was, our booking was for 5:45pm so that we could order the 'pre-theatre' menu. I must say the meal itself was quite a theatre, with the most attentive waiters I have ever experienced. 3 chosen courses with paired wines, 2 chefs specialties and a couple of petite fours later we rolled out onto 5th Avenue.  

Diablo Royale

We were on our way to SoHo for dinner when the cab stopped at some lights in the West VIllage, the vibe was so 'electric' we decided to jump out and have a drink in the area. Chatting to someone in a bar they suggested we go here for dinner. It was incredible Mexican food, interesting cocktails and Jason Wu was sitted behind us! It was also a street down from 'Carrie's stoop.' Where I made my man-friend give me a kiss after stumbling upon it - must have been fate!

Jack's Wife Freda

I am going to be completly honest here, I only found this place from Ashley 'Ring my Bell''s instagram! I was sort of hoping for a celeb spot, but instead we got to sit outside and watch all the gorgeous SoHo New York women pass us by. I also got to see my friend Steph for the first time in nearly 5 months! 

Bruxelles

Amelia & I (living life on the edge,) decided it would be fun and cheap to meet Brooke my eldest sister in Brussels for a weekend getaway. The bus was interesting... And cheap! Brussels was beautiful and home to quite possible the most stunning square in Europe La Grand-Place which is a picture in time of the early 14th Century. I got in the French spirit of the hybrid Country and attempted to speak some French,  this failed miserably! The home of praline didn't disappoint, it was magnanimous and made the bus trip home much more bearable.

We had 36 hours in Brussels and I think this was well and truly enough. We did a walking tour with New Europe which I thought was interesting and covered quite a lot of ground and Brussels history. Besides that we ate a lot of chocolate, bread & cheese! 

Bath & surrounds

We decided to take a little day trip out of London to visit 'The prettiest village in England' Castle Coombe, Bath & Stonehenge. This was a great idea till we couldn't find an exit route out of London because of some silly bike race... We will never look at cyclists the same again! But alas we made it out and had a wonderful day being tourists. 

Castle Coombe was beautiful on a typically English rainy day. Bath was as gorgeous as everybody had said, set into the hill with beautiful windy streets looking over the country side. We had a lovely fixed price menu lunch (when the bill was corrected!) at Brasserie Blanc. We took the scenic route to Stonehenge from Bath with some of the most amazing scenery I have seen in the world, people walking their horses and all! 

I would strongly recommend this as a day trip for anybody visiting. There were 5 of us in a hire care and it cost about £20 each - much less than a tour or a train ticket to just Bath. 

Castle Coombe

Brooke, Amelia & I

Bath

Lunch at Brasserie Blanc

Stonehenge (poor mans view!)

Croatia (Split & Zadar)

My beautiful eldest sister came to visit me in London. She only stopped over for 6 hours before we jetted off to Zadar then Split in Croatia. Brooke had organised the trip to perfection staying in AirBnB's in great locations in both cities, so we were both looking forward to a sunny getaway. We both got a lot of sun, spent time boating between islands off split, Hvar being the biggest, watching the sun set over the clear blue waters and wandering through the white stoned streets with ice-creams! We went on a great day trip to Sebenik and The Krka waterfalls which I would recommend. Overall the food was a little disappointing as a lot of the seafood wasn't fresh and the Venetian influence of pizza seemed to take hold of the tourist area's. 

There was so much we didn't get to see in Croatia. I think you would need about 3 weeks to see it properly adding in a sail trip, Zagreb, Dubrovnik & Plitvice Lakes. This was a great taste of Croatia where Brooke & I had a lovely time catching up. Hopefully I will get a chance to return soon!  

The view over Spilt from Marjan Hill

The apartments near where we stayed

Clockwise: Zadar courtyard restaurant, Diocletians Palace Split, Hvar dock

Krka Waterfalls

Zadar

Sunset at Zadar

   

Summer break

I have had a lovely 2 month Summer break from my blog, but I have been busy gathering material for my blog/ living life in London! Within this great city I have seen some great things including  J.Lo and Chic in Hyde Park, Robbie Williams at Wembley Stadium, Russell Howard Show Live, Richmond Park and The Body Guard in the West End. As well as trying many new cafes, restaurants and bars. I will also have some new entries on the places I've visited; Bath, Croatia, Brussels & New York City. Plenty more posts to follow! 

xx

The Body Guard at the Adelphi Theatre - I loved it! 

Borough Market - Bastille Day

Feast - Shoreditch

Richmond Park

Robbie Williams at Wembley 

25th Birthday in London

Over the weekend I turned 25. It was a hard one to miss as I feel I definitely got an extra 9 hours of birthday time with the time difference between London and Melbourne. Having a surprise birthday party the week before also helped! Thanks Rach & co! First thing on Sunday I got the best present one could ask for given to me by the best friend/housemate/cousin one could ask for. An ASOS voucher & cash... Just joking Tim Tams & pizza shapes! Again I joke, although I did receive that, I received the loveliest of birthday cards from all my girls, my parents & a special man. I definitely felt the love. Pictures below document the birthday weekend. The 2 bunches of flowers will make my birthday last that little bit longer. Till I remember I am 25 #stayalive... Thanks to everybody for all of the love. 

Being in London also meant I missed my twinnies 25th birthday and my big sister Brooke's special 30th - Happy Birthday ladies all my love xoxo

Coffee 193, located 2 doors off Oxford street with amazing coffee. This place is a must between Zara & Primark! 

11 Pimlico Road, breakfast brunch with Bellini's!

The Swedes, Amelia, The Boys, Beck

The Lion King, absolutely incredible. 

Pizza East, featured on GP blog in Shoreditch.

Had the pork belly pizza for dinner - amazing.