Everything & Anything New York City

KK22_2

Think about what time you want to do TOTR and ESB (day or night) as that will help you put that into your itinerary. Most of your items can be sectioned into day and night activities which makes it easy enough to plan. With the Statue of Liberty are you wanting to go to Ellis Island or see it from Staten Island Ferry? The latter option will obviously be the quicker and cheaper (free) option. You could always see Wall Street and the areas around it (including WTC Site) on the same day as Statue of Liberty. Central park, depending on how much time you want to spend there could be a full day on it's own or do some of your shopping before/after i.e. A&F is on 5th Ave at the corner of W56th street so is near enough.

lappish22

Thanks for reply. Thinking of TOTR and ESB visits early evening (apparantly might be quieter then) Would we need to pre book or just wait until we are there?

Central Park seems to be a whole day as there seems to be lots to do here. maybe hire bikes/boat or carraige ride?

Would we use the subway, or walk, or taxis and would we be best buying a pass for travel.

Also, what are the local bus tours like - would they be worth a trip on?

So many questions!!....

sparky1989

lappish22 wrote: »

Hi

We are a family of 4 (2ad and 2 young teens) travelling to New York for the first time. We are staying at Westin Times Square for 4 nights at the end of April and we have a list of places/things we would like to do, but not sure in what order?!

We arrive at approx 2pm and have a transfer booked and paid for already to the hotel. What do you think would be acheivable on our first day? dont want to cram too much in as I know we will be very tired.

This is our list:
TOTR
ESB
Central Park (perhaps lunch at the Boathouse)
Statue of Liberty
Brooklyn Bridge
Shopping - Abercrombie, Macys, Bloomingdales etc
World Trade Centre Site
Rockerfella Centre
Liberty Helicopter Tour( would pre-book)
The View Revolving Restuarant at the Marriott Times Square
Wall Street?
Trump Towers?

!

Anything for the young teens ? M&Ms in T.Squ .FAO Schwarz on the corner of C.Park

1st Day drop off bags, Go to Time Sq. eat chill wander sleep.

3 more dayz to split i would ,
C.Park/Boathouse. Moma .FAO Schwarz,Bloomys,A+F, Tiffanys,TOTR (which is the rockefeller center)trump towers, Grand Central Station Chrysler,book a show and bed.

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Wall Street,World Trade Center,Century 21,St Pauls ,Helicopter Tour,S.O.L Staten Isl ferry,Battery Park ,Brooklyn Bridge,Brooklyn,eat . Subway back to T.Sq.

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ESB, Macys, MSG,Flatiron, shopping, random tours another Museam maybe . HTH

New_York_No1_fan

lappish22 wrote: »

Thanks for reply. Thinking of TOTR and ESB visits early evening (apparantly might be quieter then) Would we need to pre book or just wait until we are there?

Central Park seems to be a whole day as there seems to be lots to do here. maybe hire bikes/boat or carraige ride?

Would we use the subway, or walk, or taxis and would we be best buying a pass for travel.

Also, what are the local bus tours like - would they be worth a trip on?

So many questions!!....

A bike tour of Central Park is a great way to get your bearings as then you can revisit later at your leisure. We booked a tour online last year using our Caxton dollar card as it was cheaper than hiring when we arrived. We spent 2hrs with our guide for about $34 each. Luckily it was a quiet day and just the 2 of us with our guide. Having not ridden for 25 yrs I was a little cautious but soon got into the swing of things. Visited all the sights and had lots of photo opportunities. Recommend the weekend as the park is closed to traffic. Still lots of rollerbladers, joggers etc about.

Personally we favoured the cycling over a carriage ride as the horses looked old and tired. Felt sorry for them:( plus we needed the exercise !

Re transport issues. It probably depends on how far you are travelling at any one time. You can easily walk a block north south in under a minute and it is not impossible to walk from Times Square to Wall Street if you have the time. Its a great way to soak up the atmosphere.
In the event of having to be somewhere by a certain time the subway is just brilliant. Having seen all the old movies I had really bad preconceptions of the subway however we felt safer travelling the NY subway than the London underground. There is a very active Police presence and we were told that for every uniformed officer we spotted, there were at least 2or 3 plain clothes officers riding the trains.

We even travelled the subway at midnight and felt just at ease. There are some really good posts at the start of this forum explaining how to use the ticket machines and prices of ticket passes etc. We had a 7 day pass as that way we knew that we had unlimited access to the subway and if we ever went wrong we hadn't wasted any money. Pick up a free subway map and it will soon become your best friend. In the event of getting lost just look bewildered and 9/10 a local New Yorker will offer assistance. We actually had one chap stop his commute to the office just so that he could take us to the right platform! Can't see that happening over here!

Didn't feel the need to use a yellow cab howevr just so that we could say we had had a ride in one we took one journey up to about 89th street and walked back through the park. As cabs are all metered you will always have a rough idea how much its gonna cost.:)

tarkytarks

I'll add my comments about walking while it's still fresh in my mind If you have a comfy pair of shoes and don't mind walking around then you can do alot of the Midtown on foot. I'm not a fit person and don't walk so much at home but we did cover miles and I didn't find it too hard to do.

We stayed on Lexington Ave at E48th so if you have a look on a map of Manhatten you might get an idea... The first day we walked over to 5th Ave and then down to ESB we also went into Maceys while we were in that area. Then we walked up to Times Square and looked around there before heading back to our hotel. I think this took around 6-7 hours as we stopped to look in shops, have a coffee and for lunch just generally took it easy. Then we went back out and walked back to Times Square via the Rockafella for dinner and walked back to the hotel.

Second day was the first day we used the subway - got $10 metro cards and went down to Battery Park - then after our vist to SoL we walked up Broadway to the World Trade Center (building) site and also called into Century 21 (don't really see the excitement about this place tbh it felt like a packed mix between Primark and TKmax!!). Then got the subway back to near where we were staying for dinner and walked around the area.

The Final day we walked over to 5th and up to Central Park and then up as far as the Googenheim which is at 9-somethingth st and then got the subway back to our hotel and walked down from there to Grand Central and wandered around about there for the afternoon.

Hope this is helpful - like I said I don't think it's un-management to do most of the midtown stuff on foot, but recommend using the subway over taxi for the further afield stuff simply because you'll be stuck in traffic (while on a meter) if you're unlucky!

M4RKM

lappish22 wrote: »

Hi

We are a family of 4 (2ad and 2 young teens) travelling to New York for the first time. We are staying at Westin Times Square for 4 nights at the end of April and we have a list of places/things we would like to do, but not sure in what order?!

We arrive at approx 2pm and have a transfer booked and paid for already to the hotel. What do you think would be acheivable on our first day? dont want to cram too much in as I know we will be very tired.

This is our list:
[ snip list for copy and paste purposes ]

I know that most of the above are the usual tourist things but in what order should I do them? Also, are there any other places or things to do/see that I have missed that my two teens would prefer or find more interesting?

Sorry for all the questions but I just need a starting point and a little help before I go! I would like to have a rough itinerary before I go, but not be too pushed for time.

Thanks in advance - and I will keep ploughing through all the old posts for more info!

This is quite easy to do yourself, with the use of Google Maps. You can drop pins and then see where things are on the map, and group things together.

I half made a website, which already has a lot of pins dropped, so you could look at https://www.nyc-map.com and see where things are. However, there is easy logic in splitting things into a geographical order

Lower Manhattan

Statue Of Liberty
Brooklyn Bridge,
World Trade Center Building Site
Wall Street

Midtown / Chelsea
ESB
Macy's
Grand Central Terminal

Midtown / Times Square
TOTR/Rockefeller Center (same building)
Abercrombie
The View Revolving Restuarant at the Marriott Times Square (Not the best for food, maybe just go for the view, and a drink)

Midtown / Central Park
Bloomingdales
Trump Towers
Central Park (perhaps lunch at the Boathouse)

Now, each area can easily be done in a day, however, some areas you've not got enough to fill up a day. Some of the things on your list are look and see items, and other take a long length of time. Statue of Liberty for example, if you get first boat, you could be back by lunchtime, and then head into Brooklyn to get walk back across, see the bull, wall street, and the Trade Center site (it is recommended to go to St Pauls Chapel and pay respects where the workers rested).

Now, what to do on your first day, Well, You could easily do central park, and just relax. at 2pm when you land you will think it is 7pm, it'll take a while to get out of the airport, and get through to Manhattan, so say it'll be nearly 4pm, and with been up early to get to the airport, you will feel tired by about 8pm - 9pm. I hope you haven't got a shuttle pre booked, and it is a private transfer, the shuttles in NYC are unreliable, and that 4pm, could be closer to 6pm!

waxxy

well ive just got back from my trip too new york and it was brilliant
heres a few things i thought i had to get off my chest .............

1/the manhatten hotel times square is a very good hotel..i read a bad reviews about it and m4 said a few bad things about it but i think your totally wrong or you were just unlucky the hotel is perfectlly situated ..its a 10 mins walk to central park..5 mins walk to the heart of times square and straight across the road is rockerfeller plaza were you can go to the observatory decks or go ice skating.also stright behind the hotel is the redline subway which will take you downtown to the staue of liberty in about 15-20mins .
the hotel staff were brilliant they were very friendly and helpful and our room was neat and very clean .sure the deco is a little dated but too me the whole point is it clean andis it neat and it was room cleaning staff were there every morning and did a excellent job and the power showers were excellent .we both enjoyed our stay there and would stay there again anytime.

2/i went to the spiderman show and yet again people critised it without actually going to the show and yet again rubbish was written about this show .when we went there was no faults,no accidentsthe music was amazing as was the singing..special effects..acting..ive seen lots of shows and this one was easily the best the whole audience was buzzing as we left and if it comes to the uk or your travelling to new york i highlly recommend you go see this show .one thing i would suggest is prebbok your tickets in this country and click on international pick up the ques were massive each night for the shows but if you have international pick ups you go straight to the front no queing up also the tickets were cheaper than buying in times square.

3/some say shopping is expensive in manhatten and we were yet again lucky ..macys had a sale on so most items were 50--80% off normal prices and we allso got a extra 25% off because we were from the uk ..this voucher was only valid for the time we stayed there and its normally only a extra 10% off but my wife saved loads of money buying top designer gear by guess/michael kors..etc too give you a example she got a pair of michael kors shoes reduced from over $400 too $70 when all discounts applied the only thing no discounts were applied too was make up /perfumes..
one store which was mega expensive and a massive disapointment was bloomongdales..its small ,over priced and badly set out its hard too find what your looking for and we wouldnt go there again.

one store you have to goto is century 21 but becareful you dont get over charged and you leave with everything you paid for twice we got charged more than the tickets said and 3 times e were gonna leave but just as we were going out i checked our bags too find the salesman hadnt put all things in our bags id paid for i had to go back and prove hed ripped us off so keep your wits about you.

4/dont pay for statue of liberty tours there not worth it go on the free statten island ferry as it goes very close to the statue and you get great photos off the lady for free

5/food is very expensive in times square and as m4 rightlly said the quality is terrible which we discovered to our disapointment..theres a chines restuarant you should avoid its on broadway and across the road from the subway and next to a comedy store .the food was over priced and dirty .the restaurant was packed as it looks nice on the outside but we ordered spring rolls and there was a pube in our dips it wasnt a hair as it was too curly we both felt sick after that meal and you need to avouid that place !! one place which we did enjoy was planet hollywood but get there before 5pm because after that youll que for hours too get in out of all the meals in times square area its the best we had and the cocktails were great..one area which was really good for food was around central park the food and service was brilliant but unlucky for us we only found the best places on our last day but we know were they are and will return to those places in the future .

6/ one thing i hated was the guys trying to sell you comedy store tickets there bloody everywere and some are very rude also the so called rappers some are pushy so avoid eye contact and ignore them they are mainly around the center of times square.

7/newark airport is terrible ..the staff are ignorant ,,unhelpful next time we will try to get into another airport.

8/dont travel by a shuttle service to your hotel the one we had was terrible we had to wait for over 2 hours for our driver he snapped at people and the van was a shitthole and they dont understand english and the two lazy,ignorant girls at customer services are both racist and ignorant and unhelpful for anyone asking for help saw them give this old asian lady a lot off trouble for no reason the lady only came to get her recipt and they tutted and made her wait in line for ages until they printed her a recipt out then they ust threw it a her instead of giving it too her ..avoid..

9/we flew with continetal airways from manchester and on the whole the flight was ok but one steward in particular was the most distgusting human being ive ever met..he was a old,fat,bald scottish guy that was obviusly based on fergal from little britans come fly with me !!
he asked me what drink did i want and i said tea please no sugar and a bit of milk he said so you want it black i said no thanks just with a bit of milk he then screamed at me so you want it tea with milk in future just say that or are you stupid then he made a crazy circle with his finger.when i feel a sleep he asked my wife what she wanted to drink she said tea ,milk no sugar he said you what?she told him again he then screamed at her do you understand english what do you want to drink she said just give me a tea with milk ..he then snarlled well why didnt you say that from the start next time learn english.i saw him kick one other guest and told him to move his f@kin leg !! he threw food trays at people everyone was talking abvout him as we left and everyone said he shouldnt be working for any airline..my wife was crying on the way home about the way he treated her unfortunatlly or fortunatlly for him i didnt here him say it too her on the plane but hes a rascist as my wifes asian and he was obviusly being disrespectful to her ..she talks perfect english and in fact has degrees in english he was just being ignorant..
(if anyone else has delt with this idiot please post on here as ive reported this to continetal airways and would like more to complain if possible about him to get something done)

9/keep all recipts and if possible check your travel money card or credit cards transactions online sameday as we got charged wrong a few times so keep a record off everything..i bet this happens to tourists all the time as they know were only there for a few days so were easy targets for scams so keep your wits about you.

10/dont get the multiday hop on hop ff tours there very expensive we got the one day pass which was enough to get a rough idea of the area then we got a $30 travel pass and used that to go everywere..the subways system is scary at first but theres always passengers who are more than willing to help you out because we never saw anyone working down there on all the days we travelled on the subway system.

11/ avoid the south seaport outlets they were the same prices as uptown stores and some scarey people were lurking about when we went there .food is also roughlly the same price as uptown and sonme places were filthy.

............................

so in summary we loved it sure there was bad things and good thing but all the things we were told would be bad turned out to be the best things ever and all the good things wed heard turned out too be terrible.my advise is take everyones opinons on here with a pinch of salt especially m4s sure you can tell he knows new york well but what he likes and doesnt like is worlds apart from what others will like or not like if you wantto goto a area dont take his word or any others word as law if you wanna do it do it you may be pleasentlly surprised as we were.also prepare to deal with some of the most ignorant people on earth you need the neres and temper of a saint to travel to new york

waxxy

just seen m4rkms list above and i would avoid the wall street ,world trade area except to goto century 21 the world trade site is just a building site..wall street was boring and not a buzzin place id thought it would be as traffic was closed to that area because theyve had terrorist warnings .

abercrombie was way over priced and the store was too dark the clothing was also very preppy and not really fashionable we didnt see any bargains in there even though the store was full .

bloomingdales..yes you have to go because its famous but prepare to not buy anything unless youve won the lottery or they have sale items..

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i loved central park we went there just as it was turning light around 7am and it was the best place ever but was shocked just how much dog poo there was everywere..it smelt bad too in places because people were letting there dogs poo and not pick it up but stick to the paths and its ok..great photos from that area and nice delis to buy food.

top of the rock is a must see youll get great photos up there too and when you go down lots of restaurants with nice food too .

greenface

waxxy thanks for your opinions for your first visit to new york . sound like you both enjoyed it & hated it too. Its a little bit marmite and i couldnt get my head around the abruptness and general rudeness of the people (esp white young workers)Try pushing a wheelchair around NYC on a friday afternoon . Im not going to defend M4RKs posts hes big enough to do that himself but i do know that his post above yours is to help first time tourists like yourself group together areas and like yours its just his opinion.Ive heard about problems with staff in C21 before and needs to be pointed here more often .I think its more of a staff scam than a C21 watch out all > Your post is good and honest In Your Opinion Only. I am interested in your post number 9 ( the first number 9 ha)As someone with a strong opinion and views i am suprised you didnt defend your wife and yourself a little more than reporting him.I would have kept kicking him until you landed but thats just my opinion.

goneshopping

Hi - I'm looking to visit New York with my Mum in either Nov or Dec we are pretty flexible.

I've found a couple of deals for Novotel in Times Square with direct flights from Manchester £1100 each this is for 7 nights departing either 16th Nov or 13th Dec.

Is this a good deal?? Would you recommend November or December departure.

Getting excited about booking something but don't want to book something wrong in excitement!!

Thanks