Fodor's Travel Talk Forums - Trip Report Trip report Part one: New York, December 2014.

This will be my first trip report, which will cover our 5 week trip to the USA in Dec / Jan 2014/15. I'll break it into parts - New York first! Happy for feedback to make the rest of the trip report as useful as possible and also happy to answer questions. This forum was a huge help in planning this trip. The walks I mention were all with the group 'NY By Foot' - highly recommend, all but one of our walks were excellent. You may notice several iconic NY stops arent mentioned.... we have been to NY before, so we didn't re visit the Statue of Liberty etc.

NEW YORK

Hotel: Edison Hotel- Times Square New York City. Perfect location in Times Square (where we wanted to be), great service, comfy bed. We booked an upgraded room for minimal extra cost and was well worth it - the non upgraded rooms aren't anywhere near as nice. It was a very happy NY home!

Day one
We started our day wandering down Broadway and going into a lottery to see the Late Show recorded! After wandering to Columbus Circle, we went straight to Wholefoods for brunch :-) ...such beautiful fresh food! We then wandered through the Columbus Circle Christmas market, which was so lovely. Wholefoods is a great spot to pick up fresh, great food on the run.

We toured the Rockefeller Centre, really interesting to hear the history of this place. By 4:30 we were sitting at the top of the Rockefeller Centre, looking at the Empire State Building as the lights gradually come on. It was hard to believe we were in NY!

Brooklyn Christmas Lights tour

Tonight we went with the tour group 'A Slice of Brooklyn' to see the famous Christmas lights. They were outstanding. The houses in Dyker Heights have thousands of lights and characters and Christmas scenes.... that are just beautiful. There were so many streets full of amazing displays that are just like nothing we've seen before. Our guide was fantastic. We finished with cannoli, hot chocolate and Brooklyn style pizza! Highly recommend this tour.

We were so lucky with the weather today.... chilly but sunny and no wind. Pretty perfect for December! Amazing day one in this amazing city :-)

Day 2
A cloudy but dry day....we found our way to the High Line this morning. Much longer than our visit 4 years ago and obviously most plants and trees were rather dead looking, given the season. A nice surprise though.... we saw a bunch of holly trees!! I've never seen a holly tree before! Overall, Id recommend the High Line for Summer, Spring and Autumn but not really for Winter.

After that we visited to the 9/11 memorial ... a very beautiful place, peaceful and of course sad. The museum was interesting, sobering. Hearing the stories again made it feel very recent.

We had tickets to theThe Rockettes Christmas Spectacular and it was just magical. The theatre itself is just beautiful. Chandeliers .... red velvet.... beautiful. The show featured everything from 3D graphics to the Rockettes dancing, toys dancing, Santas everywhere, sheep...donkeys.... camels... and at the end it snowed on us! The Rockettes were beautiful and such brilliant dancers.... the march of the toy soldiers was brilliant. Loved the whole show so so much.

After the show we went to the Rockefeller Christmas tree and watched the iceskaters.... even saw a guy propose! So beautiful in that area with the decorations, the gorgeous tree and Christmas music. Just such a magical night!

Day 3
Off to the Bronx today! We decided to check out the Bronx zoo ... really nice zoo, lovely enclosures. We saw a mongoose, a grizzly bear and an 'Australian Magpie' :-).

Getting back to Manhattan, we went to Grand Central Station to see their beautiful Christmas Market...such gorgeous things to buy, in a beautiful building. I got a bag, journal and some decorations. There was also a fantastic food market. Standing in the main terminal made us feel like we were in a movie - so much fun in a train station.

We had a quick dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe then went to see the Broadway show, Matilda! The stars were the kids in the show - just amazing, I could definitely recognise Tim Minchins writing :-) Also quite cool to see 'T I M' on the blocks of the set. Subtle but cool. Great show :-)

Day 4
Yet another brilliant New York Day. Today was definitely colder than the rest of the days, but it was still quite sunny and dry. We started the day with a 2 hour walk through Soho (South of Houston St), Chinatown and Little Italy. Our guide was brilliant and really interesting... she told us more about the immigration policy into NY through Ellis Island.... fairly brutal process after 3 months on a boat. Little Italy is now really one street, Mulberry St, which we went back to eat at. We had dumplings from a hole in the wall that looked decidedly dodgy but tasted delicious. Really interesting to hear about how the grid system in Manhattan had evolved over time, where names of places came from. Thoroughly enjoyable walk and once again told us more of the story of New York. We saw Christmas trees being sold on the street! Real ones! Just like those movie scenes where you see a lot full of Christmas trees.

We then went to the Letterman taping! Some people ask for tickets months in advance. Us? We wandered in 2 days ago and put our names on a list. The actual show was ok, good band. There were some funny moments but the guest wasnt very exciting. Jet Lag hit both of us in the theatre.... guess we were warm, sitting still and not overly excited.... so we both started dropping off.... then elbowing each other to stay awake..... then getting the giggles because we were falling asleep in Letterman!!

After the Letterman saga, where we felt lucky that we hadn't been caught falling asleep....we had an early tea at a yummy Italian place near the hotel and debated what to do next... stay in NY? Washington? Drive to Boston? So many choices.... and as at 10:55pm we still hadnt decided!

We joined a Christmas Lights walk but deserted it an hour in..... the guide wasnt good - very self important and after 45 minutes of walking we still hadnt seen any Christmas Lights! We ditched him at Bryant Park and looked at the market there (not as good as Grand Central) and started looking at 5th Ave but got distracted by a Barnes and Noble bookshop and stayed in there until it closed!

Day 5
We moved hotels today, as we decided to stay in NY a little longer and the Edison prices were way too high. Breakfast was yummy at the Edison Cafe.... family run, diner style place that sadly closed recently to make way for a 'restaurant with tablecloths'.
We made our way to Central Park for a beautiful photo tour with the coolest, most lovely man. We saw singers singing carols under a bridge with the most beautiful voices.... could've stayed there all day. We saw a hawk up close eating a pigeon - cool photos but it got a bit gross! Central Park in the winter time is beautiful. .. trees are mostly bare of course but it's still such a great place. So great seeing the ice skaters in Central Park, and the ladders to rescue people if they fall through the ice. It was our first really cold morning - lips turned a bluish tinge and my gloves which are overkill at home were useless. Our faces were stinging from the cold! Kinda cool though.... walking through Central Park on a cold sunny December day.
We then wandered along the edge of Central Park to the tiny but cute zoo. We were sad to learn that the polar bear had passed away last year - but 27 is at least a very good age. We got some great snow leopard photos and watched the cool sea lions being fed :-) After being outside all morning we were frezzing so we found an inside tour - the Radio City Music Hall stage door tour! The hour long tour was fantastic. We got to see a little of the stage show again from the production area- totally different perspective! We met Barbie, a Rockette who chatted to us about the rigorous audition process - 2 days! The theatre has such a great history. Loved it.

Later, wandering along 5th Avenue - as you do - we saw some very cool Christmas windows and kept getting glimpses of the Rockefeller tree as well. Magic. Entering Tiffany- THE Tiffany - the Fifth Avenue flagship, 5 storey high store was very cool. Such a beautiful store, especially at Christmas. Beautiful trees, wreaths, decorations :-). I got a beautiful decoration and Tom found me the prettiest bracelet :-). Who would have imagined I'd own jewellery from Tiffany in New York? :-)

We had dinner in Little Italy. We navigated the subway again and wandered the pretty Mulberry St, lots of Christmas lights everywhere. A man tried to tempt us in by asking if we were hungry or sober, as he could fix both lol. We ended up eating there and the food was delicious. The door man was a great guy and we ended up talking to him for ages after tea- one of those magic moments you can't plan. Today was full of those moments, really. :-)
Our new hotel was lovely!! Another lovely New York room in a hotel with a pretty Christmas tree! Millennium Hotel, Broadway is another gem!

Day 6 - not much to report today as I was feeling sick, so we didnt venture too far - we got some photos at Grand Central and did a little shopping. We attempted shopping at Macy's, on the last Saturday before Christmas, when most things were 40% off. That didn't go so well!!

Day 7
I was better today!
Another brilliant day in this city that we love. We started the day with a chilly walk in Central Park .... so beautiful in winter. None of the bustle of summer, with people sun baking, horse ridding, bike riding, running, busking.... in winter there's more solitude, it's peaceful - with the odd artist selling their work, the occasional street performer, and, if you are very lucky, a group of carol singers just around the corner.

After our walk, we raced across town via the subway (Tom is a genius at reading the subway map) to a walking food tour! Another fabulous guide took us on a tour through a melting pot of cuisines in the lower East side. We tried Chinese dumplings, 'ooey gooey' cupcakes, visited 'the Pickle Guy' (we skipped trying them!), tried flat bread... we got there a few minutes late so missed the first thing to eat - a dough and potato thing - we saw one and we weren't too sorry we had missed out! The stories of struggling immigrants and how they made a life in America was really interesting. The tour guide, Dante, was great. We saw Katz, famous for the scene in 'When Harry Met Sally' and after the tour we went back there to try a famous bagel with cream cheese! The bagel was ok but, seriously, no one needs that much cream cheese!!
From the tour we made our way to the Brooklyn Heights Promenade to see the skyline of Manhattan. The cold, the stinging fingers, the dark- didn't matter though as the view of the Manhattan skyline, the Statue of Liberty in the distance, the Brooklyn Bridge - were all spectacular. Such a beautiful city full of great people.
From there we decided to celebrate our last night by going to the top of the Empire State Building, just like we spent our last night last time. After a guy wearing 'official' Empire State Building badges attempted (unsuccessfully) to scam us, we bought our tickets to the 2 viewing areas and had no wait to get to the top. Unlike last time, the view was beautiful. The lights of New York City seem to stretch on forever. The grid system is easy to pick out, as is Central Park. Beautiful.
Then, it happened. Standing on top of the Empire State Building, it started to snow! Magical, so exciting!!! We couldn't believe it.

Day 8
Our last day in New York :-(

After packing up (hmmm had I already bought a few too many Christmas decorations?) we decided to visit the Guggenheim as we hadn't been there yet. It is definitely a beautiful building. I don't think we are 'arty' enough to appreciate some of the installations though! Then, we decided a tour of Harlem was in order. The tour was led by a lady called Lady AltaVisa who lives in Harlem. She was entertaining and interesting and we learned a lot about the history of Harlem.

In 2010 I fell in love with New York and the love affair continues. I love the people, the accents, the food, the crowds, the icons. I love walking onto a train and getting an impromptu guitar performance. Walking under a bridge in Central Park to hear carols being sung. The lights at Christmas time. Snow at the top of the Empire State Building. It was a magical week :-)