Jones Beach and East Village

Jones Beach


Where's the water?!


We had the beach to ourselves around 11:00am.


The crowds showed up around 1pm.


My thighs aren't really that big.

Yesterday my friends and I took the Long Island Rail Road from Penn Station to Freeport, which took about 40 minutes. It was the perfect day for a Labor Day weekend beach getaway, with the weather at about 80 degrees with a cool breeze. We brought chips to snack on and noticed some birds staring intently at us and slowly pacing in front of us, waiting for a crumb to drop. Even the NY birds are aggressive! After laying out and napping for four hours, we were ready to go home to nap some more (at least I did) and get ready for the night.

We headed down to East Village without a definite destination, deciding that the best way to learn the city is to explore it without predetermined plans. Logically, we walked toward the area where there were crowds of people and walked by a bar called Crime Scene, where the promoter in front persuaded us to go in and get a free shot. A free shot? Sure, why not? When we walked in, we could see why they would need to lure people in with a free shot. The place was kind of a dive, with beer pong tables scattered throughout the bar. It was basically a college party. When we got our free shots, they were jello shots! Yep, definitely college party. After my friend was hit on by some greasy-looking frat boy, we passed by a Cuban bar that offered $5 mojitos. $5 mojitos in Manhattan? It was too good of a deal to pass up so we all got one, with mine being mango flavored. Yum.

Sick of walking around, we were ready to get our dance on. For us to consider a place dance-able, naturally, the music has to be good. We found R Bar, a decent sized bar that plays a variety of music genres that girls could karaoke to, and danced for several hours until a drunk blonde flung her arm out, knocking over a guy's drink and spilling it on my friend's skirt. To make up for that party foul, we fed our tum tum a gyro from the beloved halal cart, which seriously had at least 50 revelers in line at 4am. Not wanting to wait in the long line, we went to the cart with the shorter line. The night was complete when my stomach was happy.