Well, that title pretty much sums up my weekend – it’s a hard life hey?! When the mercury hits 30 degrees C, you do the sensible thing and head for the water. It’s been a scorcher here so I dragged my friend Brennan along to try out the North River Lobster Company boat for a test run before some friends come to stay at the end of the month. It’s a boat bar which sets sail on the Hudson for a 45 minute jaunt every couple of hours while you drink beer, eat lobster and enjoy a view of the New York skyline with a gentle breeze. What more could you want?

You skip down the boardwalk in anticipation of the boat of fun that awaits…

You grab yourself a bucket of beer and head up to the top deck while the boat leaves behind the shoreline and make a toast to this city…

You take a tourist photo because it is a truth universally acknowledged that one can never have too many photos with the Empire State Building…

and then when the boat docks into the harbour again, you order the biggest lobster they have and by the time it arrives you are cruising around the bay again…

I would say this is one of those days which embodies “living the dream” and makes you want to sing Alesha Keys’ “Empire State of Mind”.

But one boat wasn’t enough in this heat. I started Sunday with brunch with one of my co-workers at a place not too far from me where they used “deep dish French Toast” as a way to serve up a hunk of cake with bacon and syrup – no complaints from me on this!

But after sitting in the sun for a couple of hours, I was looking for another boat and that beautiful river breeze. I had arranged to meet my friend Anastasia at the Frying Pan boat bar which is wayyy over on the West Side. I burnt off the French Toast walking there as one thing New York lacks is cross-town transportation, but I saw some great street art on the way, as well as some skywriting which spelled out “Justin Bieber is a Smileophile”. This currently has New York very confused according to Twitter… clearly one of life’s biggest concerns…

Finally, we made it to the bar and settled in for the afternoon with cold beer and moules frites (yes, I somehow still had room after my French Toast).

I had heard it could be a bit of a ‘scene’ full of frat boys but actually I thought it had a really fun atmosphere and it’s a great place to while away an afternoon!

I have been greatly enjoying post-cfa freedom so I was able to meet up with Jackie earlier in the week for some ramen at Momofuku noodle bar and then as it was her last night in New York, we found some extra energy for a trip to The Blind Barber, one of New York’s speakeasies where you enter through a barbershop (where people were still getting their hair cut) to what looks like someone’s 1960s sitting room. Slightly odd but they make a mean cocktail and it’s happy hour until 9pm every night!

It looks like we’re gonna get muggy, stormy weather this week so the heatwave might break but here’s to many more boats in the not-to-distant future!