Everything & Anything New York City 26 January 2010 at 1:11PM edited 13 January 2016 at 2:58PM in Overseas holidays & travel planning 8.5K replies 1.1M views

John259

Another idea (but costly): a sightseeing flight to Niagara Falls. I found a company who does them:
http://overthefallstoursniagara.com/tours/new-york-1-day

I've visited the US side of the Falls. The US town of Niagara Falls is somewhat of a dump (IMHO), but the park area adjacent to the Falls, especially Goat Island, is excellent and of course the Falls themselves are most impressive. Also, the parkway road along the rim of the gorge north of the actual falls on the US side is very pleasant. I haven't visited the Canadian side.

BTW Niagara Falls is about 400 miles by interstate highway from NYC so a day trip by bus or train is probably not a viable choice.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps?saddr=New+York+City,+NY,+United+States&daddr=Niagara+Falls,+NY,+United+States&hl=en&ll=41.754922,-75.915527&spn=5.769347,13.282471&sll=52.8382,-2.327815&sspn=9.350822,26.564941&geocode=FXFAbQIdK8KW-yk7CD_TpU_CiTFi_nfhBo8LyA%3BFZaYkQId1fpJ-ym3M-Yp6mPTiTGzqsW55FqXYQ&oq=niagara&mra=ls&t=m&z=7

Savvy_Sue

If you're getting a train, you save money if you pre-buy tickets!

PeacefulWaters

John259 wrote: »

Another idea (but costly): a sightseeing flight to Niagara Falls. I found a company who does them:
http://overthefallstoursniagara.com/tours/new-york-1-day

I've visited the US side of the Falls. The US town of Niagara Falls is somewhat of a dump (IMHO), but the park area adjacent to the Falls, especially Goat Island, is excellent and of course the Falls themselves are most impressive. Also, the parkway road along the rim of the gorge north of the actual falls on the US side is very pleasant. I haven't visited the Canadian side.

BTW Niagara Falls is about 400 miles by interstate highway from NYC so a day trip by bus or train is probably not a viable choice.
https://www.google.co.uk/maps?saddr=New+York+City,+NY,+United+States&daddr=Niagara+Falls,+NY,+United+States&hl=en&ll=41.754922,-75.915527&spn=5.769347,13.282471&sll=52.8382,-2.327815&sspn=9.350822,26.564941&geocode=FXFAbQIdK8KW-yk7CD_TpU_CiTFi_nfhBo8LyA%3BFZaYkQId1fpJ-ym3M-Yp6mPTiTGzqsW55FqXYQ&oq=niagara&mra=ls&t=m&z=7

We flew up on a Jet Blue flight to Buffalo, hired a car and drove the 20ish miles to Niagara Falls to do the falls and related stuff.

Went over the bridge into Canada, took a right and enjoyed a couple of hours of amazing scenery following the Niagara River to the big lake.

Not a cheap day out, but so pleased we did it.

John259

If we're into the idea of combining a relatively short internal flight and renting a car, then how about flying to somewhere within range of Shenandoah National Park and/or the northern part of the Blue Ridge Parkway? There are quite a few potentially possible towns in the area, so it might take quite a bit of effort to research the possibilities.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenandoah_National_Park
http://www.nps.gov/shen/index.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Ridge_Parkway
http://www.nps.gov/blri/index.htm

Map (Shenandoah Nat Park highlighted) https://www.google.co.uk/maps?saddr=Skyline+Dr&daddr=38.7571498,-78.2713013+to:38.494122,-78.4504053+to:38.2421015,-78.7084149+to:Skyline+Dr&hl=en&ll=38.543869,-78.321533&spn=1.557395,3.348083&sll=38.239259,-78.609238&sspn=0.391001,0.837021&geocode=FXmrUQId4sFW-w%3BFR1jTwIdu6xV-ynH9izWksq1iTFkRKT_W-OfpA%3BFapfSwIdG_FS-ympL0CWYUO0iTENAthA_vEIyw%3BFTWHRwIdQgFP-ylLTYR3TYa0iTEuvB5bVSXGpA%3BFcxkRAIderxM-w&mra=dpe&mrsp=3&sz=11&via=1,2,3&t=m&z=9

BTW the Shenandoah Valley road, US340, makes for a very pleasant and very different alternative return route.

I've driven the whole combination, Front Royal to Gatlinburg (Shenandoah NP, Blue Ridge Parkway, Great Smoky Mountains NP) and the Shenandoah Valley road. Awesomely beautiful, all of it, extremely highly recommended.

elphaba

If my flight lands at 13:24, I'm not going to have enough time to see a show at 3pm am I? I'd need to drop my luggage off at hotel too but hotel will be in Times Square area but I guess flight could get delayed or immigration lines might be long. Actually I'm not even sure how long it takes to get from JFK to Manhattan?

Also whilst we're on the subject of money, I'm going to have about £600 to change up, if I get a prepaid card are they widely accepted just as debit/credit cards?

Savvy_Sue

elphaba wrote: »

If my flight lands at 13:24, I'm not going to have enough time to see a show at 3pm am I?

No, not even if you go straight there could you reliably get there by 3 pm. IMO ...

John259

elphaba wrote: »

Actually I'm not even sure how long it takes to get from JFK to Manhattan?

I found some answers to that question:
http://getawaytips.azcentral.com/travel-time-manhattan-jfk-4634.html

UPDATE:

I tried to find some figures for the average queueing time for immigration when arriving at JFK, but failed. The best I could find were a few articles from 2012 and 2013 stating delays of up to two and half hours, but obviously it's very variable depending on how many flights arrive at the same time.

elphaba

Thanks for the replies.

On Friday at work I did a search for flights & hotel and got a price around £900, last night I searched and got £834 and now I'm searching at work again and got £1000. I'm planning to book this evening and hoping I'll be able to find the £834 one again. I'm going to go price up the flights and hotel separately as well.

Just wondering has anyone booked through Expedia before and experienced this?

greenface

Price changes are the norm not unusual one bit to change (and 840 to 1000 isnt a great leap .) check your flight times when chasing the cheap prices as you could often loose a full day or near to.

elphaba

Basically I was being stupid and managed to accidentally put in 3 nights and that's how I got the £834 price.

I've just booked now and when I initially searched the price was £987 and I ended up paying £1037 so not too bad a leap in price, plus I chose to pay £11 extra because I didn't like the first lot of flights they gave me.

Ah I've not been to NY for 8/9 years, I cannot tell you how excited I am to be going back!