Arthur Avenue Tomorrow November 11 2011

Hi all, we are taking the kids to the Bronx Zoo tomorrow and are planning to go over to arthur ave afterward and had a few questions. some of the posts here on the topic are a little old so I wanted to see if any new people or even old veterans would chime in on some topics.

I was doing some research and saw that the covered market might be a good place to start after coming out of the zoo as there are 12 pretty good vendors in there. Any comments?

How far is the zoo from the actual arthur avenue?
Is parking going to be a problem is I come out of the zoo around 3 and try to find parking?
I have lived in brooklyn as a child and now in NJ and have not been to arthur ave, in my adult life I am going to have about 2-3 hours before things start closing down, what are the must hits? We are planning to bring a cooler and put food into the car to keep safe until we go home.

I was thinking it would be a good idea to try to not drive home from there at 5 on a friday night so we were thinking of eating dinner there. So where would you go if you had to have one meal there and are not coming back for a long while. I am italian and a very good cook in my own rite so basic red sauce and ckn parm is not what I am looking for. But that's good for the kids.

Thanks in advance

Roger