Another East Coast Trip!

I typically try to visit my friends on the east coast every other year and you might recall, I did a tri-visit two years ago visiting Chris in New Jersey, Nate in Connecticut, and Mike in Washington D.C.

This year, I had a couple good reasons to make it out again this year (not that there's ever a bad reason to fly out there). 
1) My friend Jen had just moved from Tucson to Jersey City in February to look for a job and for a change of scenery.  Because nothing is guaranteed out there for her, I wanted to make sure to visit her before she moved back, if that were the case.
2) Mike, Nate, and Chris all planned to go to D.C. for a Washington Nationals game, so anytime this crew can all get together in one place at the same time is a great reason to join!  Especially since it's less likely that Mike and Nate will be flying back to Arizona as often.

Traveling Pains en route to the East Coast: July 1

I chose a flight on American Airlines that was to leave Tucson at 1pm on Monday and arrive in Newark at 11pm.  When I woke up Monday, there was an e-mail waiting in my inbox telling me I was rebooked to another flight because my 1pm departure out of Tucson would have made me miss my connecting flight in Phoenix.  The new flight would leave at 6:45pm and get me into Newark at 5am...yuck!  I decided to select a new route through Dallas-Forth Worth that would leave Tucson at 3pm and get into Newark at 1am...only a 2-hour delay. 

When I arrived at the airport, there was a 45 minute delay due to maintenance.  When we landed in DFW, we could not taxi to the gate because there was too much traffic caused by the rainy weather.  I ended up missing my connecting flight to Newark, which was the last flight out of DFW for the day.  American Airlines rebooked me on the first flight out the next morning and put me up in a hotel 20 minutes away from the airport.  I had to call an Uber because the Holiday Inn wasn't picking up the phone and thus there was no courtesy shuttle from the airport to the hotel.

I ended up getting to the hotel at 11pm, but I didn't have any of my things except my laptop because I had checked my bag.  I almost never check my bag, but I was feeling nice before the flight out of Tucson and wanted to save cabin space since I was boarding last group and it was a full flight.  UGH.  I ended up having to go to the gas station to buy contact lens solution and by the time I went to bed it was 1am.

I woke up the next morning at 5am to catch a shuttle to the airport for my morning flight.  Unfortunately, there were direct flights to Newark out of DFW all of Tuesday and they had me landing in LaGuardia, which is 90 minutes away from the house I'd be meeting Jen at.  When I landed, Jen was super nice to meet me there and had a Sapporo and BBQ pork buns waiting for me.  We took a bus and two trains to get back to Jersey City and I finally arrived at my destination some 14 hours behind schedule.  Funny thing is, our friend Matt left Tucson early Tuesday morning and arrived just a couple hours after I did.

I would eventually write to American Airlines about my frustrations and asked for a travel voucher for the inconveniences.  I was awarded $175, which is about the cost of one leg of a round-trip flight.  I guess that will have to do.

New Jersey / New York: July 2-4

The first night in Jersey, Chris and Priya met myself, Jen, and Matt and we all went out to New York to try North River Lobster Company, which is dinner on a boat that goes around the Hudson river.  The food was average, but you are going for the experience.

We would end the night on Grove Street where Chris and I usually hit the bars whenever I visit him, although we didn't make it out to our usual spot O'Hara's this time. :P Regardless it was a good first night, even though it was a pain to get to this city.

The next day we relaxed around Jersey City and found ourselves a pool hall to shoot at in Jen's neighborhood.  It was an interesting hall because it didn't serve alcohol and was a bit of a hole-in-the-wall sitting above a car mechanic's garage.  It was only $6 a person per hour though, you could BYOB, and there was even a pool hall cat roaming around...my kind of place!  We also ran into an APA league that was playing there and got to spectate how Jersey players shoot.  Free scouting for Nationals. ;)

That night we would end up in Hoboken, which is always an entertaining experience.  Lot of young people in Hoboken.  Jen and Matt proceeded to get very drunk and the night ended with a stop at Taco Bell before bedtime.

The last day would mostly be spent in New York.  We rented Citibikes via the Lyft app and biked around Battery park with plans to watch the fireworks near the Brooklyn Bridge for the 4th of July.  It was super crowded but they had several fireworks going off around the East River, so there was plenty to see.  I don't think I've actually ever been that close to a fireworks show before, so that was something different.

Washington D.C.: July 5-8

On Friday, Chris and Nate picked us up and the 5 of us all carpooled to D.C., where we would all hang out at Mike's house in Arlington.  We went out to Old Town Alexandria that night and had dinner at this amazing seafood restaurant called Fish Market.  They had clams, mussels, amazing shrimp, the works.  Even Herman came out and hung out with us, who Mike had not seen since the last time I had visited!

After dinner, we found a bar that had trivia cards and we actually had a lot of fun guessing the answers.  We made an impromptu game off of the Smart Ass cards, in which Jen won barely over Herman.  Good times with good friends was exactly what we were hoping for and I was especially lucky having so many of my close friends all in one place at the same time. :)

The next day, several us went to attend the Nationals game (Royals at Nats) for an all-inclusive package.  This ended up being a good decision because there was all-you-can-eat-and-drink, but it was also a bad decision because it was all-you-can-eat-and-drink. I ended up eating so much that I passed out for a couple innings in the hot summer heat.  We'd continue drinking throughout the night, but by the end of the day I was just exhausted and tired.  Ready to move onto tomorrow.

The next morning, I skipped watching the Womens soccer match to sleep in and get a quick workout in before venturing out for what is always drinking when I'm hanging out with Mike.  I eventually met up with them in downtown D.C. and we'd basically bar hop for most of the afternoon.  In the evening we had pho back in Old Town Alexandria, but it was funny to witness the power go out and find ourselves eating in the dark, haha.  It would end up being a chill night back at Mike's because everyone else had gone back home, so we watched Shazam and Skyscraper.  I enjoyed the former and found it funny, but the latter was a little ridiculous. :D

I flew home the next day and no trip would to D.C. would be complete without a stop at Theismann's. :) Here's to another fun east coast visit and I had no problems getting home!  Until next time!