As the oppressive humidity oozes out of every subway grating and the honking cabs, rotting curb-side garbage, and inane hordes of summer tourists congeal into a liquid miasma of misery, there's only one place real New Yorkers can be found: the fabled shores of the Hamptons.
Westhampton, Hampton Bays, Southampton, Bridgehampton, East Hampton, Amagansett, Montauk. Like a glittering string of diamonds in the window of Van Cleef & Arpels on Fifth, the villages of the Hamptons stretch out along the Atlantic coast, basking in their magnificent unattainability.
Luckily for those untouchable few who arrive on the standing-room-only Long Island Railroad instead of the family Gulfstream, there's always the East Hampton House. A quaint throwback to a simpler time, the 1960s motor inn has something even Gwyneth Paltrow's palace down the road doesn't: the best location in town.
With local favorite Bostwick's Chowder House just across the road and the endless Two Mile Beach a short walk down the perfectly manicured country lane, there's no better summer-time base in all the world.
Moby's is where the glitterati come to strut around in their pastel Vineyard Vines shorts and Prada driving shoes. Break out the Bud Light Platinum boys, it's frat party time!
Moby's massive lawn comes complete with a dimly-lit make-out hammock, in case the Swedish models are impressed by your prowess at double-fisting those aforementioned Platinums. Just remember, they're socialist so explaining that your bonus is bigger than their GDP shouldn't be your opening line.
If you can't score here you might as well slink back to that unpaid mid-tier merchant bank internship from whence you came. This is Goldman territory ladies, hang on to your bikinis the vampire squids are on the prowl!
The town of Montauk is perched at the very end of Long Island and is best known for The Sloppy Tuna, a beach dive bar of dubious repute, and a big lighthouse that once kept ships away but now lures in 4th of July visitors by the Maserati-load.
Don't tell Donald Trump but none of these folks where actually born here. Rally the border guard, they must have slunk ashore in a leaky dingy! There's no better way to celebrate America's birthday than with fireworks, compulsory self-deportations, and a few lane closures on the George Washington Bridge.
The rugged Long Island coast is a reminder that life on the island wasn't always croquet lawns and champagne.
The land of the free and the home of the brave. Except this is the Hamptons so nothing is free. Even that lift on Daddy's Gulfstream comes with expectations of a Harvard admission letter attached.
Every year Montauk celebrates the 4th with an epic firework display over the village beach. In the meantime there's time for Rock to pull out fireworks of his own with some booming backhands from the baseline.
Unfortunately the soles of those Prada driving shoes aren't really molded to fit a Corolla's gas pedal.
A spectacular fireworks display for the 1%, why that's as American as an apple pie laden with organic, handpicked apples stewed for 12 hours in a bespoke reduction of Krug Clos d’Ambonnay and small-batch cane sugar and wrapped in a mille-feuille crust of grass-fed butter and artisanal stone-ground flour.
If you think the waiting list to get a seat at Santina in the Meatpacking District is long, you probably don't want to wait the decade required to get a membership at this golf club. On the other hand, it might give you enough time to save for the Lamborghini that's going to be required if you want to avoid getting sent out back to the caddies' lot.
Sorry folks, but the good Lord has better things to do than listen to you whine about this year's bonus round or that tree in your neighbor's lawn that's encroaching on your helicopter landing pad.
Probably the world's most expensive windmill. Is that hand carved Italian marble they're using as a counterweight?
Rock finally found a meal he can afford.
Out here Jeb is outselling Hillary ten to one. You can take half my paycheck but you'll never take my Hamptons beach house!
Jack's Cold Brew Coffee in the quaint village of Amagansett is an oasis of micro-batch, shade-grown goodness in a cup. Rock even put on his hipster hat.
Rock's plan to sit by the pool and wait for topless celebrities to come bathing isn't panning out.
Fast forward one week and it's time to check out a coast of an entirely different kind. The wild Pacific coast of Alaska is about as far from coiffed luxury of the Hamptons as one can get.
The highway from Anchorage to Seward surely rates as one of America's great drives. Sure you won't see the Ferraris and Jags that prowl the Montauk Highway, but you might just seem a beluga whale off the starboard bow.
They say anyone can catch a salmon in Alaska. Rock's out to prove there's an exception to every rule.
Setting sail from the port of Seward on a glorious summer day. The fact the sun doesn't set until 1am means the boat can steam out after lunch and still have six hours of fishing ahead.
At least there's plenty of time to admire the scenery given the lack of bites on Rock's rod.
Here fishy, fishy... good fishy, fishy.
Victory at last. After five hours of abject failure and one measly cod, one hapless salmon finally proves there's more than one sucker out on the ocean today.
Just to prove that New Yorkers aren't the only ones who will go to extraordinary lengths for a free feed, these gulls tail the boat all the way home in the hopes of nabbing a few morsels as the crew fillets the day's catch on the back deck.
Next stop on the Pacific Northwest tour: Seattle. This would seem to be a good vantage point to yell as loud as you can: Don't throw the ball! Hand it off to Marshawn Lynch!
The fine city of Hongcouver. Would you like a little maple syrup with your dim sum?
