I'm in a New York State of Mind
 

Hey GC I'll be in NYC for 5 days. Are some museums more overrated than others? Which places are a must see? Where is the best place for a NY slice of pizza? Favorite places to shop. Any suggestions would be great. :)

Pick up a copy of
Gerry Frank's Where to Find It, Buy It, Eat It in New York

One of the top NYC guide books.
Pizza? NYC? Just about any place. John's is one of the best.
Original location on Bleeker Street may be the best of those.
Grand Central is rather interesting. Took a tour of it once.
Find the whispering corner.
One can spend a day all around Rockefeller Center. Several tours for it, NBC, and Radio City.
One of the two best roof top views of NYC. The other being The Empire State.
St. Pats very close by.
Be very hungry if you go to any of the remaining true NYC deli's.
And one can try for tickets if either baseball team is in town.
Get a NYC subway map; best free map of NYC.
Many web sites; this is the official one: http://nycvisit.com/
Bring your comfortable walking shoes. For walking and subway are the best way around town.

One thing that is off the beaten path is the Cloisters in Manhatten. http://www.metmuseum.org/cloisters/events/

Very true-it was rather interesting and nice to see.
IIRC there is a guide book for NYC called Off the Beaten Path:D
The following is an article based off of it:
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Travel-g6...aten.Path.html
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractio..._New_York.html

You two have offered quite possibly the worst advice to any tourist. Cloisters? yes, if I was a 10 year old boy. Johns pizza? the empire state? rockefeller center?

I'd rather walk into oncoming traffic than deal with that garbage.

The Cloisters is actually pretty interesting, and you can use the same "badge" for the Metropolitan Museum during the same day -- The Cloisters being a unit of The Met.

And, The Met is great. The museum and the opera, but I'm talking museum in this case.

Something many people don't realize is that at some museums, the admission fee is just a suggestion -- you can pay more or less.

MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) is also good. Wearing comfortable shoes is good advice for all of these. Check out the MoMA store across the street, too.

I (we) try to see at least one show every time I go to the city. Last time (about two weeks ago) we saw Spring Awakening. Dark, but really good. You can find half price tickets for some of the less popular shows at the TKTS booth at the Marriot Marques. Some shows also have lotteries for unused tickets or sell standing room only tickets. You have to research those, because they are at different times of the day -- not just prior to showtime. I've also been known to stand in line for unused or returned tickets to the big shows. I saw Spamalot that way when I just decided on a whim to stand in the line. That is full price, though.

I worked for NBC for a number of years, so the NBC Tour is nothing to me, but the Radio City Musical Hall tour was fun when we took it several years ago.

If you're going to be at Rockefeller Plaza (Radio City), a lot of the famous stores (Saks, etc.) are in the same block of Fifth Avenue on the East side of the Plaza. Just go out the arcade by the skating rink.

I can't even remember the name of the place, but the best Pizza I've had in NY was at a place at about 34th and Third. There are a lot of spots, though. Just be sure you like thin crust and grease.

I always think it's fun to walk around in Central Park which goes from 59th Street to 110th between Fifth and Central Park West. There's a lot to see there and it's only a few blocks North of Rockefeller Plaza.

Finally, although it sounds really "touristy," if it's your first time in the city, don't discount one of the double decker bus tours. You can cover a lot of ground, and the ticket is good for 24 hours and you can get off and on as often and as long as you want.

Also, get a MetroCard (daily, weekly, monthly) to use on the subways and bus systems. I agree, the subway is great! Plus, New York is one of the worlds great walking cities! The only reason I take public transportation is if I'm going to divergent parts of the area -- like Midtown to the Village or something like that.

Have a good time.

Teacher's girlfriend: "my firm has season tickets to The Met."

Barrymore/Josie: "oh well..haha...i love baseball..haha!!!"

Teacher's girlfriend: "*blank stare* Nice to meet you."

~ Never Been Kissed

The met (museum) is considered a k-mart of art. The MoMa offers more of an original and cohesive collection. You probably don't need comfortable shoes for the MoMa given how small it is unless you're planning on walking over the bridge to PS1 after. For more traditional art, the Frick is much better.

People who talk about the greatest pizza in NY, don't generally talk about it by the slice. And John's is considered a tourist joint but the rest like lombardis and ferraras and the 5-10 other old, pizza by the pie joints are pretty much the same. And those aren't greasy.

And spring awakening? How risque deltalum.

I second central park...only because my apartment is right next to it and that makes all the ladies up in NYC dig me.

Although the tour is kinda lame (one room), the Brooklyn Brewery's not a bad stop. The brew's pretty decent too.

http://www.brooklynbrewery.com/home/

I've always heard lots about the big apple,
So I thought I'd come up here and see,
But all I've seen so far is one big hassle,
Wish I was camped out on the Okachovee.

If this is the promised land,
I've had all I can stand,
And I'm headed back below that Dixie line

So, do you have any positive POV's to offer up?
And as it seems that you live in NYC, perhaps you should think about what your
out of town friends/family would enjoy rather than yourself.
I posted just some of what my Big Sister and her family loved on their last trip.
And she loved the information provided by Gerry Frank's book.

I haven't noticed an Impressionist collection like that at K-Mart, and Mrs. DA really likes the Tiffany glass collection.

But, to each his own.

There are a number of excellent smaller galleries, but I don't think you can go wrong with The Met for a first time visitor because there's a whole lot of stuff under one roof. Otherwise, you're wasting travel time going from one small place to another.

Quite the reflection on your sister!

Umm the Frick is across the street. And that entire area has a lot of large museums right next to each other. But I guess the frick, gugg, whitney, cooper hewitt are all small and can't compare to the k-mart art collection. And when someone is done checking out the non-kmart art collections and wants something more fun, the brooklyn museum has a rather fun collection and I think the murakami exhibit is still up.

Coming from a non-NYer who is there at least once a year but rarely goes to the City.....

FAO Shwartz (i feel like i spelled that wrong)
Tiffany's... to browse
Central Park (never been in 27 years that I've been going)
Statue of Liberty tour (never been)
Get a hot dog at one of the many corner stands
Buy an I heart NY shirt
Take a pic in front of Playboy
Isn't the Sex Museum in the City or nearish?
Soho.... buy some bags if you're into name brands but can't afford (illegal but fun)
Walk on the Brooklyn Promenade
Ground Zero.... yes it's sacred and has become quite the tourist stop, but I had the most amazing and sad feeling being there. You can feel the heaviness in the air and it's SO quiet even though there is busy citylife going on around.

If you make it into Brooklyn, stop in Carroll Gardens. Go to Vinny's on the corner of Smith and Union. He's got the greatest food in the area. Annnnnd he's my uncle! i have to plug..... http://sugarcookiebrooklyn.com/2007/...-thy-neighbor/

See a Broadway play. Any play, it doesn't matter. I saw The Little Mermaid and almost died from the fantasticness (but that was for the benefit of my inner 5 yo...you might wanna try Wicked or something ;)). The Empire State Building costs 19 bucks, but for the view you get at night when the whole city's lit up, it's worth it. Times Sqare is a must, but I warn you, it's full-on sensory overload after dark. It's so bright and loud and people, smells, and sounds press in on you from every direction. Even just to walk around and shop or go to D&B (which you could do anywhere) is a major something. If you go to Lady Liberty BUNDLE UP, it's so windy on that water, we froze half to death before we even got on the ferry. And yes, I've never had a desire to go see Ground Zero, but I'm glad I went. It's one of the most moving things you'll see...much more than a 16 acre-ish hole in the ground.

If this is your first or second trip, brush up on your NYC movies that you love, and visit some of those places. I'm not a fan of Katz's Deli, but I can appreciate how many movies it's been in. Little Italy, Chinatown, and the other small neighborhoods are interesting to see, if not eat there.

Try Strawberry Fields in Central Park, then visit the Dakota. Rosemary's Baby used it as the couple's apartment building, and of course, you can pay your respects to John Lennon there. Many other celebrities live there, too.

I like the Forbes Museum at 5th & 12th. It's quirky, but worth the cost of admission: free! It used to be known for its Faberge collection, but there's much, much more, like toys & a Presidential collection.

You're getting some super advice!

And several other posters here as well fratty, I mean Rudey.
You have yet to say anything relative to OP's request.

Sorry to hijack, but Rudey isn't fratty. He's been around a lot longer than you. And at least he isn't always posting links to everything and anything.


Back to our scheduled thread.

Do they still do carriage rides in Central Park?

Yeah, Rudey's just Rudey. :)


I think so.

http://www.nytours.us/tours/tourType...FRUdsgod5itdpA

Drink here. A lot.

http://www.continentalnyc.com/

I posted several museums. I named several pizza places. You're either dumb, blind, or a fibber but I'll let the medical experts decide which.

If wrigley wants, there are about 500 threads on visiting NYC on greekchat alone as well.

So what have you offered aside from your handful of tourist traps? Perhaps she should also buy electronics by times square.

Now post 45 links to news articles on here to make my life complete.

If you're going to go to super cheap bars in nyc, then subway inn is the way to go. It's right next to bloomingdales, which also has the best frozen yogurt in the city. The only problem with bloomingdales is that it's bloomingdales.

The Met is indeed far too general for anyone with a real interest in art. Like Rudith said, there are other specialized museums that won't be as crowded:

MoMA
Whitney
Neue Galerie
Frick
Jewish Museum
Cooper Hewitt

It all depends on what you're interested in. You can buy something called an ArtPass that will let you go to a few museums for something like $35. But, if you like one-stop shopping and fighting large crowds of tourists, knock yourself out at the Met. If, however, you insist--the Temple of Dendur is pretty cool.

I'm a big fan of the Brooklyn Heights Promenade--the only touristy things I'd suggest in Brooklyn would be the Promenade, the Brooklyn Museum, and Grimaldi's/Brooklyn Ice Cream factory. The Brooklyn Botanical Garden is gorgeous.

Unless you plan on buying things that you can buy in Chicago with less madness, I'd stay away from Saks, Macy's (ewww), and Bloomingdales. Only go into Barney's or Bergdorf's or even Bendel's unless you came to run with the big dogs. Avoid Tiffany on 5th Avenue unless you're going during lunch on a weekday--the Wall Street store has much fewer Japanese tourists taking pictures of themselves at the counters.

My only real advice? Just be prepared for how expensive everything is. Yes, everything from bottled water to pizza to museum admissions will be far more expensive than where you come from.

Have you been to the Jewish Museum? Is it any good? A friend of mine was terribly disappointed, but that could be for a lot of different reasons (like having too many kids in tow!).

There are definitely still carriage rides in Central Park.

I've never taken one, but they look like fun.

I'm finished talking about the Met, except to say that my wife, with a degree in fine arts and a former docent at a fairly major gallery which shall remain nameless, loves it.

That is not to disparage in any way any of the smaller galleries mentioned. Your can get a lot for your money and time at The Met. The comment on crowds at The Met is valid.

Oh, and not everyone has a background or education in art.

I echo the comments on Times Square -- even in the daytime. Be mindful of your purse and/or wallet. We were sitting in a restaurant there with a friend of our son who was in Avenue Q at the time, and her purse was stolen off the back of her chair while we were all sitting at the table! One guy created a diversion and another lifted the purse. For the most part, the area has really been cleaned up and it's pretty safe.

I also agree on the comment on shopping, but I don't like shopping at all. Some people do get a big charge out of shopping at the big name stores, though. My post earlier was considering efficiency of time used. If you're at Rockefeller Center, some of the stores are within a couple of minutes walk.

If you have the time and inclination to see a Broadway show, I'd recommend doing some research on the web and ask friends for advice. Some tickets are nearly impossible to get less than a month or two in advence (Wicked and Jersey Boys for instance) unless you want to pay huge premium prices). Don't expect to walk up to the box office and buy seats for a good show like you would a movie. (You can buy online, but will pay a service fee -- which may be OK for the piece of mind of having your ticket in hand) Also, some of the shows (Lion King for instance) is a lot of glitter. If you like glitter, go for it. If you want something a little deeper, try something like Spring Awakening. I, personally, tend to stay away from the ones who rely on a "big name" TV or movie star. In my experience, needing the "name" is generally a result of a weak overall show.

ETA, please don't let any of us talk you out of seeing something you really want to see or do something you really want to do -- whether it's "touristy" or not. I've been to New York many times as a tourist, on business and I lived in Manhattan for a while supervising the radio and TV engineers at the UN. It's good, I think, to take in the bigger attractions your first couple of times there, and learn some of the things you'd like to see when you go back -- and most people do want to go back.

Have a great time.

There's definitely carriages all around Central Park, but they're ridiculously priced. It's like $36 for a quarter of a mile (maybe less) and $10 for each fraction thereafter. Save it for a romantic evening, if you're just having fun, your feet will do just fine.

I agree with you DA but for one (or two) things:
TDF's TKTS booths;); one in Mid-town, the other in South Street Seaport.
For cash, luck and some time invested on lines (this is not a secret site any more to anyone) you can get same day tickets to plays both on and off Broadway.
For information:
http://www.tdf.org/TDF_ServicePage.aspx?id=56

And if OP is a member of AAA, pick up their New York TourBook.
Free to members and has pages of things to see and do.

Yeah. The TKTS booth used to be right in the middle of Times Square, but that has been temporarily closed down due to construction in the area. It's about half a block off Broadway now. The other one used to be at the WTC. I didn't realize it had been moved to the South Street SeaPort. If you're in mid-town, though, that's a subway or cab ride away.

Also, as I said above, there are same day alternatives, even to the biggest shows. As you point out, though, you have to have time to invest. Standing room tickets, for instance, are generally sold mid morning for that evening's performance. Lotteries are usually held in the late afternoon for an 8:00 PM show and you have to be there in person for either.

Most of the stuff I've talked about is trying to take into account using your time efficiently -- not spending it in cabs, etc.

I'm a big fan of wandering through the Village and if you like fun funky shops, St. Marks is good, the market in Union Square is awesome too (I think it's on Saturday, but it might be sunday), but that's better for farmer's market type stuff, but it's still interesting.

Jon wrote me some ridiculous PM that made no sense. Probably because he couldn't respond to my comments after insulting me.

Evidently you just named a bunch of small galleries. Did you know that? Who knew the frick was a small gallery.

I guess I know nothing about art. Who knew?

The Jewish museum had a really cool wood sculpture exhibit not too long ago but I think it's gone. They have an interesting Warhol one now. I like the cafe at the neue.

Sometimes one insult draws another. See early post about the worst possible advice, etc.

Subtlity is not one of your many virtues.

But come on, Rudey, don't complain.

You live to trade insults.

Yeah, I've been to museums all over the world, with my second major in art history...but apparently, what do I know? I'm just a redneck from Florida since I don't think the Met is the end-all.

The Jewish Museum is currrently having a Pollock-deKooning exhibit. Sounds interesting...and it's near all those other little no-name galleries.

Not at all.

On the other hand, people who have an interest in seeing it shouldn't be criticized either.

I wouldn't say I've seen museums all over the world, but I've seen my share in this country, Italy, France, Germany and the UK, and I rather enjoy The Met.

I don't think I'm a redneck either. (Although Mrs. DA sometimes has to explain things for me)

I'd rather see someone go to The Met than spend their entire vacation in Virgin Records, the M&M store, chatting with the Naked Cowboy or some of Manhattan's other cultural wonders.

Worst possible advice is an insult? Who knew?

Now, now deltalum, it looks like you're making accusations again. Why is that? Perhaps you need to calm down by visiting a k-mart art museum with your art expert wife!

Never claimed she is an expert.

And I'm not an expert on much of anything.

Good thing I've got folks like you to keep me informed.

Okay folks - let's bear in mind that what are or are not the best places to visit is a really subjective call. Tell the OP your favorite places, why you like them, and let him/her make up their own mind.

Now there's a real concept.

I like it.

Gives we poor, underpaid moderators a lot less work to do.

J - you ain't never lied!! And be ready for the crowds of people!

Brooklyn or NY Botanical Gardens (NY location is in the Bronx) tho at this point the cherry trees are done & rose gardens aren't full yet...
MoMA or Cooper Hewitt
Uptown Churches - St John the Divine & Riverside (much less crowded than St. Patrick's)
Downtown if you don't mind some history
Conservatory Garden in Central Park
My one touristy suggestion/confession is that I like the Museum of Natural History, but that's probably the teacher in me talking!

Is the whale still there? I'm trying to throw a party there in the fall for this charity i'm involved with.