Well it is official, we will be there over NYE!

Central Park with dinner before sounds great. Is there a place they shoot the fireworks off at, or can you see them everywhere?

I just put your dates into Kayak.com, and there are some Courtyards in Manhattan, ranging from $159 to $199 + tax (average nightly rate). I think any of these would be better than staying in the other boroughs or NJ.

http://www.newyorkled.com/moreNYseas...ears.htm#cprun

Above is a source for information on activiity in Central Park on New Year's Eve,

Well I tried priceline a few times with no luck. Hotwire also has no rates we liked so I decided to end up staying in two different hotels.

For the first 3 nights I booked Fairfield Inn Astoria which is nearish LaQuardia where we are flying into late at night. It has a free shuttle to the airport and to the nearest subway. We will use this mainly while doing bowl game activities.

For the last 3 nights I booked the Hampton Inn Times Square South.

All of this averaged under $200 a night with taxes/fees and both hotels include free breakfast. The Fairfield Inn is also refundable so if closer to the date I somehow find a better rate somewhere I can cancel and rebook.

Thanks for all the help! Hopefully changing rooms won't be too much a hassle

The Hampton Inn should be fine, but location-wise, the Fairfield doesn't look particularly ideal to me - it's right on top of the highway and not walking distance to any subways, so you really will be reliant on that free shuttle.

That said, it would be good to find out which subway stop they drive you to! Hopefully it's the 46th Street one, which serves the R (4 stops to 59th Street/Lexington Ave in Manhattan, where you would switch to the uptown 4 train to Yankee Stadium) and the E (which you would take to get to the Port Authority and thus the Hampton Inn). The other nearby subway station serves the N/Q (6 stops to 59th Street/Lexington Ave and not very helpful for switching hotels).

If you're curious, check out the "commute" using hopstop.com. It's a great resource for NYC public transit; you can even put in specific dates/times and it will take any scheduled reroutes into consideration.

Oh, and FWIW, the N/Q/R will be straightforward to get to Central Park. 59th St/Lex is the first stop in Manhattan from Queens; go one station farther to 5th Ave and you'll be right on the SE corner of the park at The Plaza hotel. A few stops past that and you'll be in the heart of Times Square (though not close enough to the Hampton Inn to walk there with luggage)...

It doesn't say which one, just says the closest one. So I assume that means the N/Q subway. If need be we will take a taxi back from the subway to the hotel depending on which subway we get off at.

The free shuttle from the airport convinced me to book that hotel, and the good reviews. We will arrive around 11pm at night and didn't want to have to navigate a new neighborhood or buses at that time. Since it is refundable I am going to keep looking for other options closer to a subway.

Hopstop works great! Looks like it will take about 50 minutes to transfer hotels if we keep it the way it is now with a bit of walking. To Yankee Stadium about an hour.

Yes, that's true. Another thing to know about NYC is that outside of Manhattan, it's not a sure thing to be able to hail a yellow cab - they don't ply the streets they was they do in Manhattan. Each neighborhood has a number of local "car services" (livery cabs) that you call and they take you for a flat, reasonable rate. Since Astoria is a fairly popular destination not far from Manhattan, you might also have good luck finding available yellow cabs when you get out of the subway...

Of course you can also take a yellow cab from Manhattan; the 59th St/Lex subway station is very close to the 59th Street Bridge (no toll) and quickly into Queens, though it does get bogged down if it's a weekday rush hour. (As an outer borough resident, I'll often do a combination of subway and taxi to get home without breaking the bank.)