More on Long Island Road Trip

From Greenport, we took two $15 ferries to Sag Harbor where we had made reservations at the American Hotel. The best part about this town was the beautiful display of potted flowers. There were some shops, but you could see they were beginning to close up, and it was still early on a Saturday.

 

Our dinner at the American Hotel was not great. When I asked if they had any specialty drinks, the waiter lifted his chin and said "No, but of course we have a full bar." Then my husband asked for a wine list and the guy dropped this, I kid you not, 3-inch thick 3-ring binder with a hundred pages of wines listed in tiny print. For that, we decided to not order alcohol. Our bill still came to over $100 for unremarkable food. We also were seated in a kind of hallway. Granted the place was crowded and small, but that could have been ignored if we'd been treated better.

Road Trip to Greenport

Greenport is located on the north-eastern tip of Long Island. The town was having a little street fair with arts, crafts, food and raffle booths last Saturday. There was a little parade going on that the crowd hardly seemed to notice.

The Scrimshaw Waterside Restaurant pictured above was recommended to us, but it wasn't open for breakfast. We found another place to eat then walked around the exhibits. You'd think a town this close to New York City would offer amazing arts and crafts at their street fairs, but no one was selling anything I hadn't seen before in the Midwest. Midwest arts and crafts shows ROCK! I'm just sayin'. (-:

The Hamptons Road Trip

These pictures are from the Bidell Winery in North Fork on Long Island. We stopped and had a tasting and purchased two bottles of red. The wineries have developed a brilliant way to sell their goods with tastings, in my opinion. There's no way you're going to walk away without making a purchase after bothering someone to pour you a sip or two. There were wineries everywhere along the way to The Hamptons. It was like driving through Napa Valley.

Road Trip Out of the City

 

My husband rented a car and we had an invitation to use his friend's summer house in South Hampton! It took us about two hours to drive. I'll post more tomorrow.

Visiting a Buddhist Ceremony

We were invited to a Sunday morning Buddhist ceremony by a young man we have met many times at our favorite restaurant. If he'd only invited us once, we would have nodded and said we may just do that sometime. But Ryan would text us three Saturday nights in a row after his initial invitation. So we went. (-:

The Soka Gakkai International or SGI (Community) Center is located in Forest Hills, NY, in Queens--a 20 minute subway ride east of Manhattan. Our friend was waiting on the steps to take us in. As we entered, people were chanting rhythmically in a monotone that you could almost tap your feet to. In fact I ended up tapping my feet as it continued for 20 minutes. 

Next there was a sharing from a young woman who attributed her chanting practice to many good things in her life, one being her efforts to increase lawyers in her firm doing pro bono work. There was a lot of clapping and laughter during her talk. (I like it when there is laughter in any religious setting.) Ryan leaned over and told me this was his favorite part of the service.

After that, a group of women sang a lively song called "When Love Takes Over" accompanied by four female dancers. This could have been placed into any Christian service. There was a speaker then a video was shown of their Sensei in Japan about the importance of appreciating workers "behind the scenes".

Overall, it was an interesting experience. If you want to hear how the chanting sounded, I found a good example on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNbU2-9YcGI.

Morning drawing

It's easier to draw cups and notebooks than skyscrapers.

Petting Zoo in Central Park

 

You don't need to buy a ticket to the Central Park Zoo to see some of the animals. Just peer over the fence along 6th Avenue.