Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with newyorkcity and tourist

NYC on a Weekday

LolaGeek — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:35:33 -0800

NYC Filter: What's fun to do in New York City on a weekday? Three friends and I (two men, two women, all late-20s) will be in New York City as tourists on a weekday. This will be in the near future, so the weather will probably be chilly.

We are spending the previous night in a hotel just outside the city (a 30 minute bus ride away), so the first problem is getting into town during the morning rush hour. Should we take our time checking out of the hotel and leave in the late morning when traffic will presumably be lighter?

Once we get there, what's cool to do? We've all been to NYC before, but probably not on a weekday - is there something we should take advantage of doing while most people are at work? Free or inexpensive would be great, though we wouldn't be opposed to a museum or something with a reasonable admission price. But I'm sure there's tons of cool places to just go visit.

We'll be leaving the city probably just ahead of the evening rush hour, so suggestions for lunch are also welcome.

Ferris Bueller, you're my hero

Diagonalize — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 10:17:58 -0800

How can I channel my inner Ferris Bueller and have one great day, except in New York? It's my little brother's very first trip to the East Coast! He's coming to see me in Boston, but he also really wants to see New York while he's out here. I've gone looking through a ton of the old NYC touristfilter questions, but trying to combine all of those great suggestions with my limited understanding of New York and an extremely ambitious timeline is proving daunting.

Mostly because of limited funds, we were hoping to make this a one day affair; we take the Chinatown bus out there, see whatever sights we can manage, stay up all night, and then take the first bus back in the morning. I've never taken the Chinatown bus before, so please talk me out of this if it seems like a tremendously bad idea.

My brother is a lot like Cameron: sarcastic, funny, fairly disinterested in most things, but still an all-around good guy and generally more easy-going than Cameron. The only thing I know for sure he wants to see is Times Square (I know). We're both in our early- to mid-twenties, kinda square, but still adventurous, and this East Coast trip is supposed to be his big last hurrah before becoming a grown-up. “Life moves pretty fast”, so how can we have one great day in New York, on the cheap?

New York for the Young

ashaw — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 09:06:24 -0800

Help planning a 5 Day trip to NYC - Do you know of any secret delights that New York City has to offer? I need recommendations/advice on everything from where to stay to where to go. Much more details inside. Just to spark some ideas, I'm a twenty year old single british male traveller who has clichéd hipster young adult interests like: music (open mic, gigs, records), antique fairs, flea markets, good cheap vintage/secondhand clothes, coffee shops, cheap carnivorous food, literature, art, film as well as all the usual tourist traps (brooklyn bridge, statue of liberty, modern art museum etc).

I'm very much boggled by my research, NYC is huge and I don't know where to stay which is relatively cheap ($80 a night would be pushing it) and in a good location to get to all the areas. I know the US hasn't got the travellers mentality to hostels, so any recommendations would be excellent.

Would be great if someone could tell me if there is a sightseeing tour which can hit most of the tourist spots leaving more time to do the more unique, quirky stuff. I've been told the Lower East Side and Williamsburg are all good places to spend some time.

Remember the cheaper the better and bearing in mind I'm not of drinking age, so alternatives for night life would be really great.

Things to do in NYC with a bad knee?

felix grundy — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 11:10:11 -0800

Bad Knee, Big City, or: How do I entertain my mother while she's here in New York this weekend? Usually we're good with museums and just wandering around, but she just had knee surgery last week, and while she's mobile enough to get around anything that requires lots of standing will probably just be too taxing.

More specifics:
She had knee surgery because her knee troubles have been keeping her from running half-marathons, so it's not like she's generally incapacitated, and I want to try to avoid making her more frustrated than she already is with her temporary lack of mobility—thus while we could probably get a wheelchair and I could push us around MoMA, I think this would be more exasperating than fun.

They arrive Friday afternoon and are leaving Monday morning. They'll have a car, but unless we leave the city I doubt we'll use it.

I think we'll probably go see a play in the afternoon on Sunday, but that's still up in the air. We also have dinner reservations every night that they're here, at the kinds of places where dinner can pretty much take the whole evening, so the evenings are pretty well covered.

I've thought about movies, but while she enjoys them she's not exactly a cinephile, so the fact that we're seeing something that's rarely shown is not likely to outweigh the fact that we're sitting in the dark and not really spending time together.

She and her husband (who will also be here, but who has no mobility problems and is hence not at the forefront of my considerations at this moment) are both really into food and wine—are "foodies," if you will. (Hence the dinner reservations, which were probably made before they even booked a hotel room.)

They're staying near Wall Street, right off of the 2/3.

Touristy stuff is fine; they're not snobs (except about food), and though I kind of am I can probably swallow it down for a weekend.

Thanks in advance for your brilliant ideas, fellow New Yorkers.

trying to have an unusual time in new york city

donabean — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 13:58:09 -0800

Trying to plan a honeymoon in New York City-looking for an affordable (150$ or under) hotel that is decent, in a good location for someone trying to find their way around the city, and maybe with some character(although the character is definitely not as important as having my own bathroom). I would really like some suggestions of good sites to see with a surreal or fortean/paranormal flavor. My fiancee loves to do grave rubbings(charcoal rubbings of old or unusual graves), so any pointers on what cemeteries would have the oldest gravestones would also be appreciated. We are planning for the beginning of august time frame and for around a week- thanks in advance!

How to entertain unfun folks in nyc?

Bookhouse — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 11:49:08 -0800

What are some free or inexpensive ways to entertain anti-New Yorkers in New York City? Some relatives are coming into town tomorrow, and we're at a loss of how to entertain them -- they aren't into exotic food, art films, art museums, a lot of walking, spending money, shopping or the outdoors. Yeah, New York City isn't really for them, but they are coming so we've got to find some cheap ways of filling the days. Bus and boats tours seem pretty pricey, and we're hep to the big tourist thangs like the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building, but any other ideas for time fillers and non-threatening eating would be welcome.

Who are those spray-paint art vendors I see in Times Square?

®@ — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 15:57:05 -0800

For anyone in the NYC area, you know those spray paint artists who make the "galaxy" pictures? They're usually around Time Square, making their pictures for crowds and selling them. Do you know what this style of art is called?
Bear with me, this is a long explanation:

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, or think I'm talking about graffiti art (like Google), allow me to elaborate: Sometime on the NYC streets you'll see these guys with 6-10 spray paint cans working on a piece of cardboard about 10"x15." Over the course of several minutes, they will lay down many layers of paint, using common tools like can lids or pieces of newspaper to block, scrape, or otherwise manipulate certain layers of paint at various points in the process. After about ten to fifteen minutes' worth of work, they've produced full paintings, almost always of planets on a sky background, occasionally with impressionistic buildings or rainbows. The paintings have a "luminous" quality, like those annoying Kinkaid pictures, and part of the 'sell' is having the crowd ooo and ahh as the artists produce some impressive effect by scraping a newspaper across a solid field of paint. The vendors are obviously working off of pre-set paint schemas applied over and over: I'd imagine this is the kind of mass-produced "gimmick" work that drives art school folks bonkers. Morever, I think they work in groups, as I've seen guys come buy and give them "refills" of spray paint and scrap newspaper. Is there one organization that trains these guys and sets them out? Is it a trend that caught on? And above all else, is there a specific word for what they're doing?

Parking in and around New York City

striatic — Thu, 17 Feb 2005 11:36:53 -0800

Hi, i'm looking for a place to keep a rental car in or around New York City. My friends {travelling from toronto} and i will be staying at a hostel on 891 Amsterdam Ave and will be staying arriving Friday, overnight Friday and Saturday, leaving early sunday. Leaving the car outside of the city is fine so long as it remains secure.

Is it better to pay to keep the car in the city? the hostel people say that we should be able to pay 15 to 25 dollars per day at a nearby garage depending on the size of our car.

Is it better to park outside of the city and "commute" in by transit? if so, any suggestions as to where to keep the car?

any and all help would be appreciated, and thank you in advance.