After SXSW I’ll be stopping over in New York for a few days. Amazingly I’ve never been to NYC before so I’d love to hear your top tips for the city. Also if anybody can recommend a good, reasonably priced hotel I’d appreciate it.
Posted at January 13, 2005 7:37 PM
Marvel and DC.
If you don’t stop by at least Marvel headquarters you will regret it… maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but soon… and for the rest of your life.
The hotels in NYC don’t get too cheap, but there’s a decent one in Chinatown you might want to check out. Chinatown is only a couple of blocks from Soho, which is a good neighborhood to base yourself in. It’s called the Windsor Hotel and it’s on Forsyth St. Nothing special, but it’s under $200 a night which is tough to find in the city.
Additionally, for good eats, make sure to check out Il Bagatto in the East Village for some great Italian food, and Balthazar in Soho for excellent French food. I know you Brits hate the French, but the food really is quite good.
Hotel 31 and its sister Hotel 17 are very reasonably price ($70/night), and kept clean. They’re nothing fancy by any means, and not somewhere to stay if you plan to spend a lot of time in your hotel room. However, for a budget place to sleep, nothing beats those two.
Make sure you visit The View at the Marriot Marquis, Times Square one evening. The emprire state has virtually no queues in the evenings (except the night we went, it seems). NYPL is a very cool building. Chrysler building is a bit underwhelming. Gound Zero is stunning - best to view it from the new world financial centre (i think) viewing gallery. Battery Park and the Staten Island ferry are cool.
I found the best way was to just wander around, take it all in.
Its really bloody cold out there right now :o)
The major things I did while I was in NYC were standing in Times Square, going through the Lincoln Tunnel, ride up and down the escalators in Macy’s (all the way up and all the way down - 12 stories), and go on top of WTC building two. You can do any but the last, of course.
Don’t know whether you’re much of a comic book and/or Kevin Smith fan but, if you are, you should definitely head over the river to Red Bank, New Jersey and visit “Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash”.
Other than that, I loved walking everywhere in NY - all the way up Broadway to Brooklyn gives you such a variety of views of the city.
MoMA has opened in bigger premises and it’s probably worth of visit, even if the ticket prices may seem steep ($20 for adults and $12 for students).
Guggenheim museum is another great museum. Check out also Whitney Museum of American art . The admittance is almost free on Friday evenings (pay what you want).
SoHo is splendid neighbourhood with cafes and galleries. Times Square is really photogenic if you like flashy lights and adverts.
I have a few NYC reviews on my site. Check them out.
When I went to NYC in 2003 we stayed at the Jolly Hotel Madison Towers. Its in a great location and you can walk to pretty much anywhere (Times Square around 0.5 miles away). Go for the Delux room if you can, there is a big difference between that and the standard rooms! Have fun.
Don’t go for a hotel, sublet an apartement. Look on craiglist for short term sublets. You can get a big nice apartement for cheaper than a hotel and it’s a much nicer and relaxed atmosphere. As for somewhere to eat, try SPICE the Thai restaurant in Soho.
You should cross definetly cross over the Brooklyn Bridge and check out the neiborhodd where are grew up: Brooklyn Heights. A walk on the Promenade is a must for any NY first timer.
If you don’t plan upon using the services a hotel provides and want somewhere in a great location with lots of space you could try one of our Luxury Managed Apartments. I’m currently redeveloping this site from the ground up by the way! Please don’t blaim me!!!
If you don’t plan upon using the services a hotel provides and want somewhere in a great location with lots of space you could try one of our Luxury Apartments. I’m currently redeveloping this site from the ground up by the way! Please don’t blaim me!!!
As you can tell, having a good day. My appologies. Here.
If you like Chinese food, go to Chinatown. :) And if you like pastries…go to Chinatown. There are bakeries all over the place (sometimes right next to each other) and everything is eerily cheap. Sorry, that wasn’t much of a tip but I could spend a good part of my day visiting different Chinatown bakeries.
Taking a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge is quite nice. Better yet, there’s a restaurant called Junior’s on the other end that specializes in cheesecake! Oh man, I’m back to food…well you deserve something for all that walking.
If you want to see everything, here’s an excellent guideline: The Be All End All New York City Cheap Ass Tour For $10 Or Less
Piano’s is quite a cool bar in Greenwich Village if you are looking for some drinking spots after all the site seeing…
One recommendation is to look at NYC (especially Manhattan) as a set of tightly interconnected villages (or neighborhoods), each with a distinct culture. For me it makes the city and planned visits more manageable.
Pardon the plug, but I run a site that should answer most of your questions. NewYorkology.com — updated daily with links to hotel deals, restaurant and bar reviews, museum stuff and the like.
This should answer a few of your questions Andy:
The Morning News: When in Manhattan…
Dammit Jeremy, you stole my thunder! :-)
Try this: New York by the Subway
My wife and I celebrated our first anniversary there over New Year’s. We spent just under five days and still felt rushed. There’s just too much to do in NYC. See my photo journal showing most of the places we went to. Nice post - wish I had these comments from everyone a month ago when I was planning!
Thanks for all the tips folks. What I’m ideally after is some kind of stylish boutique hotel or B&B that’s also ridiculously cheap. Preferably less than $200p/n and in a good location.
Check dis if you wanna get off the beaten track.
Living in NYC and working in Times Square, I sometimes have to cope with the tourists—who seem to outnumber New Yorkers 20 to 1. I’m glad to give directions and such, but sometimes, I’m annoyed at some of their unifying traits. So for heavens sake, please do not do the following:
Don’t walk around 90% of the time looking up. If you must, stand on the side so people don’t bump into you.
Don’t walk at half of the speed of others. Follow the average speed, kinna like driving.
If in a group, don’t walk in a single horizontal line, so that people can pass your tourist speed of walking.
Don’t stop suddenly in the middle of the street to walk into a shop. Again, like driving, find a course into the shop to continue the flow of pedestrian traffic without making them frantically adjust to your whim.
Don’t walk around with a camera around your neck, weaing a white ‘I love NY’ t-shirt and a ‘I love NY’ cap, hold a white ‘I love NY’ bag filled with 6 for $10 ‘I love NY’ t-shirts. For crying out loud, you’ve only been here for 30 minutes!
Sorry for the rant: Ran out of medications. Some useful advice:
When riding subway, always ask someone to make sure a train is going to go where you think it’s gonna go. If you’re thinking, ‘I’m good with signs and stuff, so no problemo’, you’re in for a big surprise. In NY subway, signs lie more than the politicians… Well, maybe not quite, but close.
Sometimes, it’s faster to walk, especially if you’re not familiar with the subway system or it’s rush hour. So If you’re going from times square to rockefeller center, don’t get a cab or subway if you can walk 1/4 mile. 20 street blocks, or 10 ave blocks = 1 mile. The whole island of Manhattan, in the longest length, is 11 miles.
Here’s a link to a fairly useful site that I use.
http://www.newyorkmetro.com/
Portland Square Hotel. Right around the corner from Times Square. Older, but clean. About $150/nite. Evergreen Diner across the streat serves great pancakes. Museum of Modern Art is free on Friday afternoons.
User Experience Designer and CEO of Clearleft, Andy is the author of CSS Mastery, curates the dConstruct and UX London events and is responsible for Silverbackapp, a low cost usability testing application for the Mac. Andy is a regular speaker at international conferences and was named one of the 100 most influential people in the UK digital sector by Wired Magazine.
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Circus Royale said on January 13, 2005 8:24 PM
Andy, what is your budget for hotels?
As you know, it all depends on how much you are ready to spend. Price may vary from $20 for some backpacker hostels to thousands of dollars for upscale hotels.
So, how much are you ready to spend and what you expect to get?