The Natural History Museum, Shake Shack and Harlem

It's tuesday and we thought we would walk to the Natural History Museum which was on the same side of Central Park as we were.  While doing my homework I found that there was a Shake Shack (Danny Meyers low brow place) 1 block away from the Museum.  The plan is set.  We have been getting out of the starting blocks pretty slow.  It's been fun so we didn't get to the museum until about 10:30.  We got our tickets and briefly looked at the first exibit for about 20 munities and headed out for lunch.  The Shake Shack is know for long lines so we wanted to get there early.  No line, great.  Got our burger and fries.  While this is not really my forte but Linda loves burgers.  This was a great burger.  Must have been cooked in butter.  One of the best burgers you will ever have.  Cheap.  Good start to the day. 

Back to the museum.  We new this was going to be diorama central.  Lots' of the exibits were dioramas where the stuffed animals were placed in front of the scene of their native environment.  Normally these things kind of creep me out but these were very well done.  We enjoyed it very much.  They also had a great geology section.  I love that.  Lot's of rocks and minerals.  They have the biggest Metorite in the world.  A 24 ton chunk of iron that fell in Greenland.  Very cool.  The museum was lot's of fun.

We had dinner reservations in Harlem at the Red Rooster, which is Marcus Samulson (Aquavit) 3 year old restaurant in Harlem.  We left the museum a little early so that we could walk around Harlem for a little while.  We walked around for a while and decided to head to the Red Rooster early figuring that we would just drink until our dinner reservations were ready.  It was a spactacular day.  We sat in front of the restaurant and had a couple of drinks.  It was slightly cool but very sunny.  Great time to sit out and watch the Harlem foot traffic go by.

 Great meal, moderate.  Chicken was great.  Juciy with a crispy crust.  Definitely worth the trip to Harlem.

Chicken and Waffles with greens

Fried Yardbird with mash potatoes and mace gravy.

Cornbread

Subway murals

On our way back we were in the Harlem subway station and I decided to take some photos of the great mosaic murals in the station.  One of the locals see's me and we start up a converstions about the history of Harlem while we are waiting for the train to arrive.  He was a great guy and very pleasant.  A nice conversation with a local.  Very cool.