199 Best Sights in New York, USA

Exhibits at this zoo along the Genesee River include Rocky Coasts, providing aboveground and underwater viewing of a polar bear, penguins, and sea lions; A Step Into Africa, a re-creation of Tanzania's Ngorongoro Crater with African elephants and olive baboons; and a cougar exhibit in which you can crawl through a tunnel to see the cats up close. During your day in the wild, you might also spot Bornean orangutans, white rhinos, Arctic wolves, and meerkats, among other beasts.

In 1986, local artist Mark di Suvero and other residents rallied to transform what had been an abandoned landfill and illegal dump site into this 5-acre waterfront park devoted to public art. Today, a superb view of the East River and Manhattan frames changing exhibitions of contemporary sculptures and topical multimedia installations. A farmers' market, outdoor yoga, and free public programs, including workshops and performances, are offered seasonally April to October. Socrates is open 365 days a year, 9 am to sunset, but the best time to visit is during warmer months.

Head to this unique Manhattan museum, housed inside Schermerhorn Row's early-19th-century brick buildings, to understand the history of The Seaport—and its importance in making New York the ultimate commercial harbor of early America. The museum's visitor center ( 12 Fulton St.) leads you to fascinating exhibits within the carefully preserved, landmarked spaces, and ties into displays at the printing house around the corner ( 211 Water St.) and inside Cannon's Walk ( 206 Front St.). Many find that The Seaport Museum's main attractions, however, are the four restored tall ships docked in the harbor at Pier 16. Museum visits include access (weather permitting) on the 1907 lightship Ambrose and the 1885 ship Wavertree. There are also public sailings of the 1885 schooner Pioneer. The museum organizes walking tours of the area, too. (Creative nonfiction lovers take note: Joseph Mitchell's collection of early New York stories, Up in the Old Hotel, brings to life tales from the neighborhood and the hotel that once occupied some of today's South Street Seaport Museum spaces.) Consult the website for hours and tours that change seasonally.

At this 96-acre water park you can ride an inner tube down the 1,300-foot-long Lazy River, passing waterfalls, geysers, and wave pools, or go for something more exhilarating (or scary). Attractions include Monsoon Lagoon, Mammoth River Ride, Kiddie Cove, and the new Bootleggers Run and Battle of Mutiny Bay water roller coasters. The park has three pools, a beach area, four restaurants, and the Parrots of the Carribean show.

Photos, exhibits, and memorabilia pay tribute to western New York's steel workers and what was once the largest steel plant in the world, Bethlehem Steel. The museum is open only three days a week from 10 to 2.

This is the only Revolutionary War battleground in Rockland County. A museum with exhibits and a slide show describes the battle, and reenactments in period costume are common. It is also the home of the oldest lighthouse on the Hudson River, built in 1826. Lighthouse tours are offered the first and third Saturday of the month, from April to October.

In 1968, the Studio Museum in Harlem opened to celebrate artists of African descent. In 2018, the museum closed for a $300 million renovation and expansion project, and is slated to finally reopen in fall 2025 after a seven-year hiatus. The reopening will feature work from Tom Lloyd, an activist who was a focal point of the institution's opening 56 years ago. There will be works of art dating back to the early 1800s, showcasing more than 200 years of work by Black creatives, such as Houston E. Conwill, David Hammons, and Glenn Ligon.

Swing Low, a bronze statue of abolitionist Harriet Tubman rising from a traffic triangle at the crossroads of St. Nicholas Avenue, West 122nd Street, and Frederick Douglass Boulevard, was created in 2007 by sculptor Alison Saar. Inspired by West African "passport" masks, the striking monument incorporates the faces of "anonymous passengers" of the Underground Railroad in Tubman's skirt. The granite base includes bronze tiles that depict pivotal events in Tubman's life and traditional quilting patterns.

The amusement park, on the eastern shore of Oneida Lake, is loaded with old-fashioned fun. Attractions include an old-time carousel, bumper cars and boats, roller coaster, food vendors, and arcades.

This is the most energetic part of New York City, a cacophony of flashing lights and shoulder-to-shoulder crowds that many New Yorkers studiously avoid. Originally named after the New York Times (whose headquarters has since relocated to 8th Avenue), the area has seen many changes since the first subway line, which included a 42nd Street station, opened in 1904. The area was once a bastion of the city's unseemly side, but today it's a vibrant, family-friendly destination, with pedestrian-only plazas that line Broadway with tables, chairs, and granite benches. There’s no longer a visitor center here, since the Official NYC Information Center is down at 151 West 34th Street in Herald Square, with maps, brochures, coupons, and a bilingual staff.

The focus of the entertainment might have shifted over the years, but live shows are still the heart of Midtown's theater scene, and there are 40 Broadway theaters nearby. (A few of the most historic theaters are spotlighted in this chapter's introduction.) Learn about Broadway's history and architecture on a two-hour Times Square walking tour by Manhattan Walking Tours ( $50  Daily at 10:30 am  www.manhattanwalkingtour.com) or join the two-hour guided Inside Broadway tour ( $39  Daily at 4 pm  www.insidebroadwaytours.com) that leaves from the George M. Cohan statue at West 46th Street and Broadway.

Rare and one-of-a-kind toys are on display at this museum, which also houses a collection of Fisher-Price toys from 1931 to the present; a huge fully furnished dollhouse; circa-1970 puppets from the locally syndicated Commander Tom Show; and changing exhibits. The Fisher-Price toy store is next door.

Wallabies, chinchillas, emus, otters, parrots, snakes, and lemurs are among the more than 100 exotic and indigenous small mammals and birds that reside at this zoo on the grounds of the Millbrook School. Students, along with full-time and consulting staff, run the zoo and care for the animals as part of their curriculum at the college-preparatory school; their enthusiasm for their charges is infectious.

Each year, from late August through early September, approximately 1 million fans come here for the U.S. Open, which claims the title of highest-attended annual sporting event in the world. The rest of the year, the 34 courts (19 outdoor and 12 indoor, all DecoTurf, plus three stadium courts) are open to the public for $40–$80 hourly. Ball machine rentals are also available for $18 per hour. Make reservations up to two days in advance. Parking is free but limited.

A brick building in the historic Main Street district houses four floors of hands-on exhibits for all ages. There's a Dinorama, with dinosaur models and fossils, and a Weather Room, with Doppler radar. Kiddies can walk into a replica Iroquois longhouse, don firefighting gear, and pretend to fly a 17-foot-long airplane. Outside you can explore the inside of an old Adirondack locomotive, dining car, and caboose parked alongside the building.

Siberian tigers, Alaskan grizzly bears, and California sea lions are some of the 200 animals that reside in this city park with views of the Mohawk Valley. A petting zoo and live animal shows are options in summer.

You can see a blacksmith at work using traditional, antique tools at this historic shop behind the old schoolhouse in the center of town, and the artisan on site is enthusiastic about answering questions about his craft and the history of blacksmithing in Greenport. Housed in an old East Marion onion shack, the building is a replica of the original, destroyed by a nor'easter in 1992. You can purchase small, handmade items made here including wall hooks, and the proceeds help fund the site, which is part of the East End Seaport Museum.

From April 1782 to August 1783, General George Washington made his military headquarters and home in this Dutch fieldstone house, where he attended to the final years of Revolutionary War activity. Guided tours show how Washington, his wife, Martha, and his aides-de-camp lived and worked here as the war drew to a close. Filled with period furniture and reproductions, the house opened to the public in 1850, becoming the first official historic site in the United States. A monument to peace, the Tower of Victory, was erected here in the late 1880s. Adjacent to the house is a small museum containing artifacts collected since the mid-1880s. Lectures, live music, military and crafts demonstrations, and family programs honor Washington's birthday during a three-day extravaganza over Presidents' Day weekend.

Honoring the history of the 19th-century Black community of Weeksville, one of the first communities of free Blacks in New York (founded by James Weeks), this Crown Heights museum with an industrial-modern building by Caples Jefferson Architects has rotating exhibitions, botanical gardens, and three preserved houses on gravely Hunterfly Road in the back, dating back to 1838. Tours inside these structures depicting life in the 1860s, 1900s, and 1930s can be booked through their website.