Hints and Tips for a Visit to the Big Apple…
General tips
Get a pass. The “explorer pass” was the cheapest and most useful. We saved hundreds of dollars with this choice. Save even more by getting the pass through Groupon.
Don’t get a MetroCard unless you really want to use the subway.
Use the Big Bus hop on hop off tour to get around, they’re included in the explorer pass and go absolutely everywhere on 4 different routes and are every 15-20 mins from most stops on the route, very useful. The added bonus is that a tour guide will be giving you info every step of the way so even travelling from A to B has value! Get your 72 hour ticket at Madame Tussauds (left hand queue) in Times Square. There is an app called big bus tours in the app store that will give you the real time location of every bus, very handy.
Footwear is the most important thing to consider dress wise as you will easily walk 30 to 40 miles in 3-4 days. Wear layers in winter, despite the cold you’ll get warm walking really quickly so you’ll want to be able to take a layer off now and then.
Timing a walk between stops is easy enough. It takes 1 minute to walk 1 block ‘street to street’ and 3 minutes ‘avenue to avenue’ so it’s easy to estimate how long it’ll take to walk.
Plan your itinerary geographically. Destinations span the whole of Manhattan and you can waste a lot of time unnecessarily travelling.
2 Bro’s pizza (they’re every few blocks) is one of the best pizzas in NY (imo), they’re a dollar a slice or 8 bucks for the whole thing which is massive. Joe’s pizza down town is one of the most famous but apart from the base which was excellent the toppings are meh.
Be ready to tip for most things, 10-20%, the city runs on tips.
If you fly into JFK and it’s your first time be ready for a 2-4 hour queue for immigration. Our transfer didn’t wait and stranded us at the airport. We used a shuttle share service costing $22 each which was better than $70-$90 for a cab.
Don’t take CD’s from rappers in the street, they’ll want $20-$40 and their stuff is usually crap and don’t take a selfie with one the characters at Times Square, they’ll expect paying for it!
Things to do, in order depending on where you stay. We stayed in times square so I’m starting this in ‘midtown’.
Midtown
In midtown you have Times square (42nd street between 8th and 5th Ave), Madame Tussauds is here. 5th Ave is where all the posh shops are. West down 42nd street is Hell’s Kitchen, there are loads of places to find good cheap food here and you’ll also find Rudy’s Bar (there is a giant pink pig outside) which serves free hot dogs with the drinks (the barman was named TJ was awesome) beer here is $3 a pint and $8 for a pitcher.
In this area you’ll find Macy’s department store and the empire state building (included in your pass) and the Rockefeller center which includes Top of the rock. Do top of the rock at night and the empire state by day as you’ll see the empire state all lit up at night from the top of the rock and good views of downtown from the empire state in the day time, as long as weather permits (a low cloud will obscure all views). In the lift at top of the rock don’t forget to look up. The Rockefeller center also has the iconic ice rink and at Christmas time has the iconic tree seen in Home Alone 2.
On 42nd street you’ll find Carlos bakery from TV’s cake boss, expensive for cake but best cake I’ve ever had (fudge rainbow is highly recommended). A few blocks south (36th?) you will find Clinton Hall where you’ll find the best cheese sauce burger in town (they hollow out the bun and fill it with cheese sauce) and board games.
On the West side at the beginning of 42nd St is a ferry terminal for the boat tour which is included in the pass which is very good, it takes you around the statue of liberty and under the Brooklyn bridge and the tour guide is excellent (well, ours was). next to this is the Intrepid air craft carrier and NASA museum where you can see the space shuttle also included in a pass.
Do “The Tour by The Ride” (Not “The Ride” as this is gimmicky but the choice is yours) it’s really good and included on the pass (you can book this online).
Uptown
Uptown is central park. The carriages are very expensive ($50-$100 for 20 mins), we haggled a rickshaw guide down to $50 for an hour with tour, the park is vast so we got a lot of bang for our buck. In the park are such things as the Friends fountain, the spot where John Lennon was shot (strawberry fields) and the Home Alone Bridge. over a 150 films have been shot on Central Park so a lot of it is very familiar which is spooky.
The natural history museum is half way up on the west side. The 2 T-Rex skeletons are well worth the visit and the pass gets you in.
On the east side you’ll find the art museum and Bloomingdales on 3rd Ave. Around that area you’ll find St Patrick’s cathedral and a few blocks up 5th Ave you’ll find Grand Central Station, look out for the single black patch they left when they cleaned the ceiling (hint, it’s above the steps at the end with the café). On the way back to midtown you’ll see the library (if you’re a fan of ghostbusters this is the library from the first scenes of the original). All of the above is a good 2 or 3 days’ worth.
Downtown
It’s quite a trek to downtown so the Big Bus is critical (we walked it right down 5th Ave but regretted it!) Number 1 Wall street Court 82-92 Beaver Street at Pearl Street is the building used as the infamous continental hotel from John Wick.
Obviously the number 1 thing is the world trade center museum. Very heavy stuff. Especially the room that has the victims family talking about them, very emotional. There is always a massive queue for tickets (it’s included with a pass but you still need to get a ticket) then there is the Oculus, which is pretty cool (that’s the white building with the ribbed spikes next to the museum).
On the east side is Brooklyn bridge which takes you to Dumbo (short for Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass). A Big Bus takes you right to these places.
On the southern most point is battery park (fictional home of the Men in Black) and the bronze bull, people queue to touch its horns or balls for financial luck. This is where you can get a ferry to see the Statue of Liberty for free or go from Clinton castle to Ellis Island itself but this has airport level security taking 4 hours or more so can be a waste of time.
There are loads more things to do and you’ll discover something new on every street and the tour guides tell you about stuff but there simply isn’t enough time in one visit, we’re already planning to go back!
I hope this helps, have a great time!
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