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Hi, my family of 4 (2 adults, 11 yr old daughter, 8 yr old son) will be visiting NYC the end of March. We will have 3 full days to explore the city. We are thinking about staying at the Hilton Garden Inn in Chelsa on 121 West 28th Street. Does anyone have any negative feedback about this particular hotel and location?
The main places that come to mind that we'd like to see are mentioned below. We are open to the idea that we may not get to see everything and that's fine - just means another trip in the future! However, I'd really appreciate if anyone could offer ideas on how to see as much as possible (walking or subway). I'm not quite sure what is close to each other to manage walking to, and I'd like to see as much as we could each day.
These are in no special order:
5th Ave (other than shopping, is there anything that we must see or do here)
Brooklyn Bridge
Carlos’ Bakery in Hoboken, NJ
Central park (not quite sure what will see here, but I'm positive that we will visit the park)
Chrysler Building
Empire State Building
F.A.O. Schwarz
Grand central station
Ground Zero
Nasdaq Marketsite
New York Stock Exchange
Rockefeller center (Top of the Rock)
Statue of Liberty
Times Square (must see places/things?)
United Nations
Wall Street (must see places/things?)
If you have any favorite restaurants etc for lunch/dinner in areas we will be in each day, feel free to mention those too!
Carlos Bakery, yeah I know it's on tv and it's fun. I recently went and it's kind of a waste of time. No one from the show is there and it's pretty expensive. I know hoboken is a quick trip but with only 3 days the getting out there and getting back will eat up a chunk of your day. If you MUST do a famous bakery I would go to Magnolia Bakery, which was on Sex and the City. Its mediocre. There are so many bakeries in NYC. I recently found a really cute on that makes amazing/interesting cakes called City Cakes, on 18th between 7th and 8th.
Ground Zero: I know, I know. But there really isn't anything to see. It's literally a construction site. If you didn't know what it was and where walking around you would miss it.
I would also do either Empire State Building or Top of the Rock.
Ground Zero: I know, I know. But there really isn't anything to see. It's literally a construction site. If you didn't know what it was and where walking around you would miss it.
True, but they do want to see the NYSE and the Brooklyn Bridge, etc., so you could knock all of that out in one morning. Also, I like walking through World Financial Center, which has a great overlook where you can see all of the construction site.
I agree about skipping the trek to Hoboken, but I actually think Magnolia is one of the better cupcake options in the city, believe it or not. You should at least walk through Greenwich Village area and Washington Square Park.
I'd skip the ESB in favor of Top of the Rock. View is much better.
No offense, but are you all planning on doing anything, you know, educational? We do have some great museums. I'd imagine the kids in particular would enjoy the Museum of Natural History and perhaps some of the Met. Walking through Central park from the Met to the Museum of Natural History (or vice versa) is always a nice stroll.
Carlos Bakery, yeah I know it's on tv and it's fun. I recently went and it's kind of a waste of time. No one from the show is there and it's pretty expensive. I know hoboken is a quick trip but with only 3 days the getting out there and getting back will eat up a chunk of your day. If you MUST do a famous bakery I would go to Magnolia Bakery, which was on Sex and the City. Its mediocre. There are so many bakeries in NYC. I recently found a really cute on that makes amazing/interesting cakes called City Cakes, on 18th between 7th and 8th.
Ground Zero: I know, I know. But there really isn't anything to see. It's literally a construction site. If you didn't know what it was and where walking around you would miss it.
I would also do either Empire State Building or Top of the Rock.
I'm going to counterbalance Ohiogirl on the bolded. There is a great deal to see. Yes, it's a construction site, a most interesting one, and if you take one of the walking tours given by the Tribute WTC Center, you will get an explanation of what you are looking at, as well as the history of the original buildings and some information about 9/11 that you won't find anywhere else. All of the walking tour guides are volunteers from the "9/11 community"--family members of people who died at the WTC, survivors from the WTC, people who worked on the recovery effort, etc. They run four tours a day and they are almost always full.
The Tribute WTC Center itself (on Liberty Street, the southern border of the WTC) is an interesting gallery containing artifacts pulled from the debris, first-hand stories, a running video of the original WTC from when it stood, and audio accounts of the day from families and survivors.
Ohiogirl's dismissal of these things is not unusual, perhaps because New Yorkers lived through it and don't want to hear about it anymore. 99% of the WTC Tribute visitors and people who take the tour are from other parts of the US or other countries.
Here is some info. Whatever you choose to do on your visit, enjoy NYC!
I was giving my information based on having a 11 year old and an 8 year old. While history is important to children, they may get tired and bored on a walking tour.
True, but they do want to see the NYSE and the Brooklyn Bridge, etc., so you could knock all of that out in one morning. Also, I like walking through World Financial Center, which has a great overlook where you can see all of the construction site.
I agree about skipping the trek to Hoboken, but I actually think Magnolia is one of the better cupcake options in the city, believe it or not. You should at least walk through Greenwich Village area and Washington Square Park.
I'd skip the ESB in favor of Top of the Rock. View is much better.
No offense, but are you all planning on doing anything, you know, educational? We do have some great museums. I'd imagine the kids in particular would enjoy the Museum of Natural History and perhaps some of the Met. Walking through Central park from the Met to the Museum of Natural History (or vice versa) is always a nice stroll.
These are in no special order:
5th Ave (other than shopping, is there anything that we must see or do here)
Brooklyn Bridge
Carlos’ Bakery in Hoboken, NJ
Central park (not quite sure what will see here, but I'm positive that we will visit the park)
Chrysler Building
Empire State Building
F.A.O. Schwarz
Grand central station
Ground Zero
Nasdaq Marketsite
New York Stock Exchange
Rockefeller center (Top of the Rock)
Statue of Liberty
Times Square (must see places/things?)
United Nations
Wall Street (must see places/things?)
Ok, let's see if we can't help organize this into 3 days. You can do the days in any order of course!
DAY 1: AM Rockefeller Center - including Top of the Rock (which is $20-30 per person! expensive but worth it. If you do TOTR, skip the Empire State Building- no need to do both & you have a view of the Empire State Building from TOTR. Not a ton to see there, but if you get there early enough, you can be in the audience when the Today Show films the weather segments outside in Rock Center.
St Patrick's Cathedral - not on your list, but right across 5th Avenue from Rock Center & worth seeing- always open to the public unless mass is going on....you're welcome to attend mass of course, but if you just want to walk inside & walk around it's closed during mass.
5th Avenue Window Shopping - it's all about shopping here! If you're a shopper and pop into several stores, this can take an hour or two to walk 19 blocks. If you're just planning to walk by, it will take 20 minutes or so. Start at Saks Fifth Avenue which is next to St Patrick's and work your way north towards 59th Street. You'll pass famed NYC department stores Saks & Bergdorf Goodman, equisite jewlery stores like the Tiffany & Co flagship/ Cartier/ Harry Winston, huge outposts of tween stores Juicy Couture & Abercrombie, and flagships of every luxury brand imaginable. The relatively new Louis Vuitton flagship is at 57th & 5th and worth a look if you're an architecture fan.
Find lunch somewhere. Angelo's Pizza on West 57th between 6th/7th Avenues is a good pick! Sit-down restaurant, but pizza (good & kid friendly!)
PM FAO Schwartz- at 59th & 5th.
Central Park- it will still be fairly chilly in late March so do this in the PM when the sun is out and it's had all day to warm up! Definitely worth checking out are the motor boat pond, the "mall" leading up to Bethesda Fountain & Terrace, the Great Lawn, the Carousel, the Chess & Checkers House, the Dairy Visitor Center. You can easily spend 3+ hours wandering through the park.
DAY 2: AM- Start the day with a tour of the Statue of Liberty. Lines are LONG so get there super early. This will take 3-4 hours to take the ferries & see the statue & visit Ellis Island, if it's open then.
Afterwards, take a quick walk from Bowling Green (where you catch the Statue of Liberty ferries) north up Broadway. You'll pass Wall Street. All there really is to do there is see the street & the exterior of the NYSE. Due to Post-9/11 security concerns, no tours are conducted. Across Broadway from Wall Street is Trinity Church, not to be missed as some very famous Americans are burried in the cemetary there. Have your kids try to find the signers of the Declaration of Independence!
Eat some lunch!
PM-
Hop on a 4/5/6 train at Bowling Green and go north to 42nd Street. Get out & walk up into Grand Central Station. Again, gorgeous building, but not much to "do" there except see it.
The Chrysler Building is in this neighborhood- across the street from Grand Central. I don't believe you can even get into the lobby- again, Post 9/11 security and you will actually have a better view of it from Top of the Rock, but there are some pretty art deco street-level details you can see by walking by.
Walk west down 42nd Street & you will hit the southern end of Times Square at Broadway. Walk north up Broadway. There's not much to do there except see it. NASDAQ is there- I believe there are no tours due to post-9/11 security concerns (again!), but you can at least see the building.
All of this Grand Central/ Chrysler Building/ Times Square will maybe take 90 minutes to walk to/through.
LATE PM-
Very much going off your "want" list, but you missed a few great things in NYC!!! The museums are WONDEFUL, first-class, and not to be missed! If you enjoy art, spend the afternoon at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on 5th Avenue& 80th. If you're not, I recommend the American Museum of Natural History on Central Park West & 77th Street - great for kids with the planetarium. If you pick the American Museum of Natural History....walk aroudn the block to Columbus Avenue afterwards and just pick a place along there for dinner. Lots of good little restaurants- even Greek, Thai, and other kinds of foods.
DAY 3: AM:
Again, totally going off your list, but you will miss the "real" NYC if you don't go downtown and explore the neighborhoods there!
Start your day by taking the A/C train to Brooklyn- High Street stop. Spend a while exploring the neighborhood (Brooklyn Heights is charming and where the Cosby Show took place...although your kdis probably have no idea what the Cosby Show is at their ages!) and DUMBO is fun to take a quick walk through to the north. Not much to see, except both are pretty neighborhoods with great views of Manhattan. Then walk back into Manhattan by walking across the Brooklyn Bridge. Walking across the bridge takes about 30 minutes. Bubby's in DUMBO is a great family place for breakfast/brunch if you want to start there and then explore the neighborhoods before walking across on the bridge.
Walk north up Centre Street, hook a right at Worth, and a left on Mulberry. The next 10 blocks are some of the most fascinating in NYC! You'll first walk through NYC's authentic Chinatown and as you cross Canal Street, it will turn into Little Italy a few blocks north. Real Chinese immigrants still live there, which makes a nice tie-in to the Statue Of Liberty/ Ellis Island learnings of Day 2. Pick either an Italian place or a Chinese place for lunch.
Spend the rest of your day below 14th Street ("downtown") exploring the West Village and SoHo. Get a NYC history book to learn about all the history of the neighborhoods! SoHo has lots of shopping if you're so inclined (expensive as well as knock-offs). See if you spot any celebrities as these are the neighborhoods where many live & play (Sarah Jessica Parker & Matthew Broderick, Liv Tyler, Gwenyth Paltrow, Nicole Kidman when in NYC, etc).
Overall: A lot of things on your list you just "see", not "do". I left off the United Nations becasue it's almost impossible to get a tour there since they cancel them whenever heads of state are in the building (again, Post- 9/11). Also, the World Trade Center is literally just a construction site. There is NOTHING there from the attacks- no relics, no memorials.....all that will be built in the future, but for now, it's just a construction site. The bakery in Hoboken isn't worth the trip. Stop at Magnolia Bakery in the West Village or an Italian pastry place in Little Italy if you want good pastries! Or Jaques Torres Chocolate Factory in DUMBO when you're in Brooklyn.
I was giving my information based on having a 11 year old and an 8 year old. While history is important to children, they may get tired and bored on a walking tour.
They might. It would depend on the kid, but kids do go on the walking tours. Not to sound sexist, but boys are probably more interested in the construction than girls would be. Then again--the engineer who is the Program Director for One WTC construction is a female. Classes from schools often do tours at the site. At any rate, kids do like the Tribute Center itself, especially the origami birds that the Japanese kids sent after 9/11, and pictures kids drew and sent in, the firefighter stuff, etc.
Ok, let's see if we can't help organize this into 3 days. You can do the days in any order of course!
DAY 1: AM Rockefeller Center - including Top of the Rock (which is $20-30 per person! expensive but worth it. If you do TOTR, skip the Empire State Building- no need to do both & you have a view of the Empire State Building from TOTR. Not a ton to see there, but if you get there early enough, you can be in the audience when the Today Show films the weather segments outside in Rock Center.
St Patrick's Cathedral - not on your list, but right across 5th Avenue from Rock Center & worth seeing- always open to the public unless mass is going on....you're welcome to attend mass of course, but if you just want to walk inside & walk around it's closed during mass.
5th Avenue Window Shopping - it's all about shopping here! If you're a shopper and pop into several stores, this can take an hour or two to walk 19 blocks. If you're just planning to walk by, it will take 20 minutes or so. Start at Saks Fifth Avenue which is next to St Patrick's and work your way north towards 59th Street. You'll pass famed NYC department stores Saks & Bergdorf Goodman, equisite jewlery stores like the Tiffany & Co flagship/ Cartier/ Harry Winston, huge outposts of tween stores Juicy Couture & Abercrombie, and flagships of every luxury brand imaginable. The relatively new Louis Vuitton flagship is at 57th & 5th and worth a look if you're an architecture fan.
Find lunch somewhere. Angelo's Pizza on West 57th between 6th/7th Avenues is a good pick! Sit-down restaurant, but pizza (good & kid friendly!)
PM FAO Schwartz- at 59th & 5th.
Central Park- it will still be fairly chilly in late March so do this in the PM when the sun is out and it's had all day to warm up! Definitely worth checking out are the motor boat pond, the "mall" leading up to Bethesda Fountain & Terrace, the Great Lawn, the Carousel, the Chess & Checkers House, the Dairy Visitor Center. You can easily spend 3+ hours wandering through the park.
DAY 2: AM- Start the day with a tour of the Statue of Liberty. Lines are LONG so get there super early. This will take 3-4 hours to take the ferries & see the statue & visit Ellis Island, if it's open then.
Afterwards, take a quick walk from Bowling Green (where you catch the Statue of Liberty ferries) north up Broadway. You'll pass Wall Street. All there really is to do there is see the street & the exterior of the NYSE. Due to Post-9/11 security concerns, no tours are conducted. Across Broadway from Wall Street is Trinity Church, not to be missed as some very famous Americans are burried in the cemetary there. Have your kids try to find the signers of the Declaration of Independence!
Eat some lunch!
PM-
Hop on a 4/5/6 train at Bowling Green and go north to 42nd Street. Get out & walk up into Grand Central Station. Again, gorgeous building, but not much to "do" there except see it.
The Chrysler Building is in this neighborhood- across the street from Grand Central. I don't believe you can even get into the lobby- again, Post 9/11 security and you will actually have a better view of it from Top of the Rock, but there are some pretty art deco street-level details you can see by walking by.
Walk west down 42nd Street & you will hit the southern end of Times Square at Broadway. Walk north up Broadway. There's not much to do there except see it. NASDAQ is there- I believe there are no tours due to post-9/11 security concerns (again!), but you can at least see the building.
All of this Grand Central/ Chrysler Building/ Times Square will maybe take 90 minutes to walk to/through.
LATE PM-
Very much going off your "want" list, but you missed a few great things in NYC!!! The museums are WONDEFUL, first-class, and not to be missed! If you enjoy art, spend the afternoon at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on 5th Avenue& 80th. If you're not, I recommend the American Museum of Natural History on Central Park West & 77th Street - great for kids with the planetarium. If you pick the American Museum of Natural History....walk aroudn the block to Columbus Avenue afterwards and just pick a place along there for dinner. Lots of good little restaurants- even Greek, Thai, and other kinds of foods.
DAY 3: AM:
Again, totally going off your list, but you will miss the "real" NYC if you don't go downtown and explore the neighborhoods there!
Start your day by taking the A/C train to Brooklyn- High Street stop. Spend a while exploring the neighborhood (Brooklyn Heights is charming and where the Cosby Show took place...although your kdis probably have no idea what the Cosby Show is at their ages!) and DUMBO is fun to take a quick walk through to the north. Not much to see, except both are pretty neighborhoods with great views of Manhattan. Then walk back into Manhattan by walking across the Brooklyn Bridge. Walking across the bridge takes about 30 minutes. Bubby's in DUMBO is a great family place for breakfast/brunch if you want to start there and then explore the neighborhoods before walking across on the bridge.
Walk north up Centre Street, hook a right at Worth, and a left on Mulberry. The next 10 blocks are some of the most fascinating in NYC! You'll first walk through NYC's authentic Chinatown and as you cross Canal Street, it will turn into Little Italy a few blocks north. Real Chinese immigrants still live there, which makes a nice tie-in to the Statue Of Liberty/ Ellis Island learnings of Day 2. Pick either an Italian place or a Chinese place for lunch.
Spend the rest of your day below 14th Street ("downtown") exploring the West Village and SoHo. Get a NYC history book to learn about all the history of the neighborhoods! SoHo has lots of shopping if you're so inclined (expensive as well as knock-offs). See if you spot any celebrities as these are the neighborhoods where many live & play (Sarah Jessica Parker & Matthew Broderick, Liv Tyler, Gwenyth Paltrow, Nicole Kidman when in NYC, etc).
Overall: A lot of things on your list you just "see", not "do". I left off the United Nations becasue it's almost impossible to get a tour there since they cancel them whenever heads of state are in the building (again, Post- 9/11). Also, the World Trade Center is literally just a construction site. There is NOTHING there from the attacks- no relics, no memorials.....all that will be built in the future, but for now, it's just a construction site. The bakery in Hoboken isn't worth the trip. Stop at Magnolia Bakery in the West Village or an Italian pastry place in Little Italy if you want good pastries! Or Jaques Torres Chocolate Factory in DUMBO when you're in Brooklyn.
There is NOTHING there from the attacks- no relics, no memorials.....
Not so. There are huge chunks of bent steel, a melted gun, shoes pulled out of the debris, firemen's coats pulled out of the debris...you get the idea. The firefighters' memorial is on the side of the Ten House and American Express has a beautiful memorial to its 11 dead in the WFC.
At the WTC Memorial itself, 50 trees have been planted and the pools, located where the original towers stood, have been tested. These things are visible to anyone who views the site from the south side, although of course the area isn't yet accessible to visitors.
St. Paul's Church is also now a memorial to the volunteers and others who worked at the site after 9/11.
As I said, New Yorkers don't care much to see this stuff, but you have to think about others who come in from all over the world who do want to see it, and thousands of people go to these places each year.
OP--forgive my internal arguing and go where you want to go. As you may have surmised, I'm one of the WTC volunteers, so I encourage people to visit there. It's a feature of people in the NY metro area that they don't visit the places that are of interest to outsiders. I lived 30 miles from the Statue of Liberty all my life and didn't go there until I was 31 years old and someone from Wisconsin asked me to take him there.
Edit: Turtle Creek did give you a nice itinerary!
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However, I'd really appreciate if anyone could offer ideas on how to see as much as possible (walking or subway). I'm not quite sure what is close to each other to manage walking to, and I'd like to see as much as we could each day. 
I'd imagine the kids in particular would enjoy the Museum of Natural History and perhaps some of the Met. Walking through Central park from the Met to the Museum of Natural History (or vice versa) is always a nice stroll.
Kids LOVE the Museum of Natural History.
