If you had 4 days to spend in the Big Apple, what would you do,were would you go. Forget Central Park and the Empire State as thats a no brainer to do...

I went to Search Answers and found this recent post. It had some good ideas. Enjoy.

[www.askanewyorker.com]

Hey TPM....my husband and I just did exactly that: 4 days in NYC...besides all the obvious stuff...our highlights were Top of the Rock..not crowded @ all w/ 3 levels of panoramic city views. Also the Circle Line Tours..we did the 7pm tour(2hr) so you get plenty of daylight photo ops and then on the way back the sun has set and you get nice evening city shots. Also the MoMA was awesome as was the Museum of NYC. If possible, walk as much as you can...its the best form of transportation and one of the best cities in the world to do it in! Keep in mind, our trip was pretty much planned according to AskANewYorker's recommendations and they do a spectacular job!! I found an answer to every question by searching their forum. Thanks guys!! And have a great trip!-Brady

Not sure exactly if you are looking for the standard things, the expensive things, the touristy things, the real NYC things, etc..but I will tell you what we did in three days.
I am coming back up here as I have now wrote a book. So warning to those who hate reading long post. Also sorry for jumping around. I had plans to stay focused, but I don't think I stayed organized in my thoughts.
Take into consideration that we had this wonderful very small book-Fodor's Flashmaps New York City. Unreal book. These kick butt! Tons of stuff on each page, yet a very small book. Very nice maps. Maps of parks, streets, buses, bourough's, subways, shopping, etc. Exact locations for everything you could think of. Phone numbers, libraries, museums. Anything you could think of that you would want/need to know where it's at, what to do, how to get there. Great subway maps.
Keep in mind too that I understand very well that the avenues run east to west. Lower starting on the east. I also understood that the streets run south to north. Lower starting in the south. Once you really understand this, the city is not difficult at all.
Now even though the subway maps in the above book I spoke of above are wonderful, and we did use them a few times to confirm, we also knew ahead of time from looking online and asking here which one's to take, but we mostly walked.
WALKING. As mentioned many times here, that is the true way to really, really see Manhattan.
We dicided ahead of time to see for the fun of it how little money we could spend, yet still really see and do a ton.
Before I really get going, I wanted to make sure to mention walking accross the Brooklyn Bridge becauase it has been mentioned here many times as a neat free thing to do, yet we were not able to do it this last time.
OK. Our goal was how much can we do/see in three days for nothing...if you are someone who wants to go to plays, eat at the neat places and actually like go up inside a lot of these things, then my story won't be for you. We knew that with limited and wanting to see how little we could spend, that we not be able to actually 'do' a lot of these things, more see them.
For sure, make a plan ahead of time by sections of the city and know how to get to things.
As far as the lower part of Manhattan..a must is the free Staten Island Ferry with a killer free view of the Statue Of Liberty. We went at 9 AM, and while the line seemed long at first, once they started to load on, which was very fast, the ferry didn't seem that crowded and not many were on the outside decks. Then having to get off and get in line to go back, again, very easy and fast. This was very cool to do, must do. Make sure you are on the right side going and the left side coming back. Then once we got off it was a neat time of mornng to check out the whole Financial District and Wall Street. Then of course Ground Zero.
Like I said, grab that book and start with sections of the city. Know your direction and just zig zag back and fourth as you see where you want to go.
Fascinating too as you make your way to the different areas of the city, how within a few blocks, everything can change.
We then worked our way towards Chinatown. Very crowded, but a must see. Again, as we worked our way uptown, we just zigzagged back and fourth through Chinatown. Much larger than we expected. We just walked and walked and walked.
Now this would be a good time to explain how we ate great true NYC food for nothing. It was getting to about lunch time and we came across a neat looking to go place in Chinatown. Now we love China buffets and have a great cheap one close to home, so we were geared up to pay so much more for a small to go. Well, we didn't. They kept telling us to pick more stuff for just $3.50 period! A water was only .50 We sat in this Chinese park and watched these old Chinese men playing some game as we both chowed on this meal. It was great and we couldn't even finish it!
That's how we ate great and cheap. There we so many places to get something great, cheap, and on the go. Many times we just ate as we walked. We were always hungry when we would come across a great neighborhood pizza place somewhere. We would walk and share a large slice of cheese pizza and be good for awhile. Cost a couple of bucks. This way were were neve stuffed, except for the Chinese food, so were always up for the next thing. Being in the grocery business, we checked out a lot of very neat grocery stores. So much bigger than I expected for the city and of course very cool products compared to what I sell...anyway, a couple of times we grabbed some awesome fresh sushi that we again walked and shared. Only like $3.99. Always found water for .50 or $1.00. One time we came across a Gray's Papaya. We knew about this from the food channel. We got two dogs and a Papaya drink for under $2.50. Sorry, cannot remember the exact cost.
We found that the neatest cheapest on the go food was in the true neighborhoods where people live.
To get back to Chinatown for a minute because some have asked where to find like cheap t-shirts. We found a place selling them for $2.00 and they were Fruit Of The Loom Hefty Brand. So these were our souvener t-shirts, and thay are very nice. Just as nice as what we saw in Times Square....to get to this for a minute before I forget. My wife collects small bears. So we always get one small bear wherever we go. Something that represents that area. We also always get a shot glass and a magnet. Don't shop right in the Times Square area. Just a few blocks up, we got exactly the same stuff we saw there for about half the price.
The other thing was that outside of stopping in to get these few items, to get a bite of food for on the go, and stopping into a few stores we knew ahead of time that we wanted to, we did not stop into every single thing, and that's what really saves the times. Our goal was to just really walk the neighborhoods and check them out that way.
Gotta' check out the whole NYU, Washington Square Park, Village , SOHO, etc area.
Very neat how some of it's laid out. Residential streets, then the stores and food streets. Found this out a lot throughout the city.
We also knew we wanted to SEE the Empire State Building, Crystler Building, Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall, Rockafeller Center Area, St Patricks Cathedral-must go inside..WOW!..and free. We knew we wanted to see things like this, but we didn't spend the money or time to go up or inside most of them. A lot of these are of course cooler to see at night, but many of these can be done very easily at night before or after checking out Times Square at night if you just know where to look or know what blocks to stroll a couple over too.
Another must see is Times Square at night. First off, VERY safe. SOOO many people and cops out!! This was unreal to see and the cops were doing one of their two daily test when we were there. So amongst seeing all the usual lights of Times Square at night, the police has tons and tons of cop cars lines up with their lights on.
As people have mentioned, one of the cool things about the subway system is that you can go as far as you want for the same price. Part of one afternnoon we took the subway from Manhattan to the tip of Brooklyn to Coney Island to get a hot dog at Nathan's. We always love watching the hot dog contest each year, so we had to do this. Granted, it's a little bit of a ride and the dogs aren't cheap, but it was cool to just do it after seeing it on tv on so many shows on the food channel. Went during the week so it wasn't to busy.
Now we aren't into like museums and art galleries, so we didn't have to worry in any way trying to fit those into our plan.
We knew we wanted to check out Central Park, but knew no way we could see all of it. By the way, we did this during the day. Again, VERY safe. Anyway, we knew we wanted to see 'Strawberry Fields', which was in the park and fit into our way of then checking out upper Manhattan and the whole Columbia Cirle area and all that and higher.
Things we remember are silly. Like after seeing Times Square at night, we knew we wanted to walk over and see Radio City Music Hall at night and St Pats and Rockafeller Center. Well, after we were done, it started to totally downpour. We found a little door nook to hide out in across from the side of Radio City, and it was cool just staring at the hall and watching everyone go by. This was about midnight and we felt very safe.
One night we walked back to where were staying in the village. It was getting to be later at night. We walked down 3rd avenue from like 55th street to 5th street and it was very safe and cool. People out everywhere. People having a good time at tons of sidewalk restaurants. This is the true way to really see NYC.
We also knew ahead of time, then having that book and a page on just this, that we wanted to check out, by walking by I should say, all the cool stores on like Madison Ave. It just goes on forever. For those of you who love to shop, wow, that must be fun going into all those stores that have a store just for a brand that we might see in a regular general store. Granted, we did stop into a couple that we knew ahead of time we would, and even found some very cheap killer things on the discount racks.
After all this jawing, I really suggest just walking the city like crazy. And I've only mentioned what was interesting to us. I am sure there are so many other free things to do and see as you walk around the city. It's not just all the touristy things. It really is just even checking out each neighborhood and area of the city. Granted, Times Sqaure is cool at night, a must see, especially if you are like us and didn't want to go to a expensive play or restaurant, or don't do the bar/club thing. There are even lots of neat off Broadway shows, but for time sake, we didn't do this. We just wanted to walk, walk, walk.
I am sure one of our trips, or if/when we move there that we will go to a Broadway Play, and shop like crazy and go to a cool restaurant. And not that this isn't true NYC either, we just wanted to walk the different areas and take in our own feelings. For people who cannot walk a lot or don't want to check everything out, I am sure one of the tours are great, just not our thing. We like to do what we want when we want. Like when we were up in the UES area, we saw so many cool local places to eat. What I can only think to call fast food, but much, much better. Although, I know, much of the food in the city is fast. Anway, it was this roasted chicken place and we knew it would be good because we saw tons and tons of guys on their bikes making deliveries and this was a very small place.
I should say though, we did splurge once-well splurge for what we were doing. We did go to Carnegie Deli and have the strawberry cheesecake...mmmm
Then we walked by the Late Show on our way uptown. I know a lot of people like going to the show, and we will go at some point, but this time it was cool enough just to see it. Or to see where all the kids line up outside of the MTV studios for the live show.
As we walked, and walked, and walked, we were like wow! So much stuff goes on in this town! So many things you hear about, are right here!
So many of the tv shows that people like to go to are all right here!
Well, I'm tired and I hope I have not bored you. I just wanted to share some of our experience with you.

Thank you very much NyNy15 for the best reply to a question ever. Will take on board a lot of what you said. Thanks again.

Oh my god I am crying into my coffee as I read your post, sat back at my desk in grey, gloomy London having returned from 9 days in NYC on the 14th. Wonder if you were in the very same rainstorm we were, watching the lightening across Time Square.

I love the place, and agree - you can do no better than walk and explore. Just strike up a random conversation with a stranger in a bar and before long they will give you a list of things you must do and see. We did this, and ended up making new friends and going out for dinner with them in the Village at one of their local haunts.

Will be back again next year, and every year!! Thanks for your words - spread the news!

very cool, nyny15. Thanks for such a detailed post!

I was looking through that very fantastic book that I mentioned, and wanted to mention that it also had this, plus much more. It had a 'street finder' page. Now, we didn't need to ever use it because we just always used the maps. Like if we needed to know where the Empire State Building was, we just looked at that section of the book and saw exactly which street crossed with what avenue.
But if you needed to know like a address for something that wasn't given with cross streets, this would let you know. Like if you needed 585 Third Avenue, the book would tell you what streets this was in between. Again, all of this works wonderful if you just remmember how the streets and avenues are laid out for Manhattan.
This book that I keep going crazy over..here's more reasons why too. It's very small and thin, yet done so well. You are never opening up a huge map or booklet trying to find where you are, how to get somewhere, what subway to take, etc..
Each page is broken down by sections of the city. Then each section of the book is broken down by specific areas for shopping, subways, eats, hot tourist attractions, museums, parking, airports, stadiums, buses, tons of helpful phone numbers, driving, subways, colleges, arts, hot night life, bars, dancing, hotels, Central Park, Theaters, movies, parks, churches,libraries, architecture, etc.
We liked it so much becuase not only did we very simply have all the info we needed as far as where something was, but it also gave us ideas of things to see that we never would have thought of. It's all done by location and themes.

Also, with all the Starbuck's now. WOW! We never ever had troulbe finding a place to use a bathroom.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/18/2006 03:02PM by nyny15.