Big Attractions in New York

This journal is meant to give info on the Big Attractions around New York. If you want off the beaten track, this is not the journal for you. (I have others--check them out!) This is meant to provide reviews of the really famous New York sights, the things that everyone will ask you about when you go home. So really, they're all highlights: the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, the Metropolitan Museum, the Empire State Building, Ground Zero, Times Square, Central Park. You've probably seen all of them in movies or on the news--wouldn't it be neat to see them in person?

In fact, though, some are much more exciting than others. The Met will occupy all the time you care to give it, but it's hard to spend more than 20 minutes at Ground Zero, because it's mostly just a big hole in the ground. So the idea of this journal is to help you plan and let you know what you can see if you're pressed for time.

Quick Tips:

There are a lot of iconic New York experiences you can have anywhere in the city. Take a ride in a yellow cab or on the subway. Wander into an appallingly overpriced boutique and ogle the price tags on the blue jeans. Buy a hot pretzel (with salt!) from a street vendor. Eat some pizza. Keep your ears open and count how many languages you hear spoken over the course of the day.

Best Way To Get Around:

Subways— per ride or for an all-day MetroCard! And constant free entertainment from the street performers, odd homeless people, and fellow passengers.

Taxis really are fun. I especially like the recording that tells you to buckle your seat belt.

One of the perks of visiting the Statue of Liberty is that you have to take a ferry ride.

The Statue of Liberty is a great tourist destination for lots of reasons. First, of course, is the statue itself, which really is a very impressive sight: it's massive and really rather beautiful, and the views of downtown from Liberty Island are lovely. Second is the fun of getting to the island: you have to take a ferry from Battery Park, which is always entertaining, though it can be extremely cold in winter. Third is the people-watching: real New Yorkers never go to places like the Statue of Liberty, unless they're escorting out-of-town guests, and as a result, the line for the ferry is even more delightfully international than most of New York.

Entrance to Liberty Island is free, but in order to get there, you must take a Circle Line ferry. Tickets cost $11.50 for adults, $4.50 for kids, and $9.50 for seniors. Ferry tickets can sell out, so it's a good idea to buy ahead, especially if you want to go inside the base of the statue--for that you'll need a separate free ticket that admits you on a guided tour. These are time-stamped so that you have reservations for a single tour. The time-stamped tour tickets sell out well before the ferry tickets do, so if entering the statue is important to you, plan ahead.

If you don't enter the statue, there isn't very much to do on the island except walk in a wide circle around the statue, admiring it and the views of Manhattan and New Jersey. But it's a very pleasant thing to do.

The ferry leaving Liberty Island takes you to Ellis Island, which is a much more interesting (if less picturesque) spot: the former immigration center that processed hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the early 20th century is now a museum documenting immigration to America. Most of the exhibits consist of photographs of immigrants, although there are also some cases full of objects people imported with them (embroidered dresses, silverware, books, etc.) and later donated to the museum. I found the photographic exhibits surprisingly moving: they're well selected, and the information provided along with the photographs is thorough and varied. The museum manages to do a good job of showing just what immigrants were up against in their home countries (the Irish potato famine, massive unemployment in Italy), and then what challenges they faced in America (anti-immigrant sentiment, the difficulties of assimilation).

If you're interested in doing genealogical research on Ellis Island, there's a library, although you should contact them in advance for permission.

There's food available everywhere on this trip: while you stand in line for the ferry, you'll be surrounded by pretzel carts, and there's a concession on the ferry, a fast-food restaurant on Liberty Island, and a cafe at Ellis Island.

There are pros and cons to the Empire State Building. The pros: It's one of the most famous buildings in the world, and you can feel a little thrill thinking about the fact that you're in the very place where King Kong once placed his mighty foot. Also, the view really is spectacular, especially at sunset. The Empire State Building is located on 34th Street and 5th Avenue, so you have a close but not too-close view of the other skyscrapers, a vista to the south of New York Harbor, and to the north the full extent of Central Park. If you're not really oriented in the city yet, this is a great place to figure out what's where. The Empire State Building is open from 8am to midnight, so it's sure to fit in your schedule somewhere.

The cons... may not matter, depending on your attitude. There's a lot of standing in line. You stand in line first to go through security (leave your pocket knife at home); then again to buy tickets; then to get in the fast elevator which takes you up... not to the observatory which is located on the 86th floor, but to the 84th floor, where you stand in line all over again to have your picture taken; then to reach the observatory you have to stand in line for the final elevator. The indoor portion of the observatory is all gift shop, of course, full of "I [Heart] NY" mugs and T-shirts, but there's access to the outdoors, too. During all the time you spent standing in line, there have been people sternly telling you to rent an audio tour for $6, because there's no information available at the top; this of course turns out to be false, and there are perfectly good signs explaining what the major buildings are in each direction.

The ESB is pricey. Entry for adults is $16; seniors and youth ages 12-16 are $14; children under 12 are $10 (under 6 free). There's also a "skyride," which is really a video screening on the ground floor, which you can see for an additional fee (though it's not clear why you'd want to). And then there's that picture they snapped of you on the way in, which they'll try to sell to you, for $20, as you're on your way out.

So... your call. I could happily spend a lot of time in New York without going up the Empire State Building, but that may be because I've already been up. How much are you willing to do for a great view?

The Metropolitan Museum of art - on 5th Avenue at 82nd St - is one of the world's great museums. It's got something of everything, and it's essentially free. You enter the Met by going up the gigantic, imposing marble staircase facing Fifth Avenue. (There's a special entrance for the disabled around to the right.) The stairs themselves are a New York institution, a good place to hang out and watch the world, eating a hot salted pretzel or an ice cream cone from one of the vendors on the sidewalk.

Once you're in the lobby, though, you may feel confused, because it's not instantly clear where to go next. This is because you have a lot of options. There are coat checks immediately to the left and right of the doors - you're required to check any large packages; it's free, but the lines may take a long time. There are admissions kiosks directly ahead of the entry doors, and also to the left and right. It doesn't matter where you get your entry ticket.
Suggested admission is high: $20 for adults, $10 for students and seniors, though kids under 12 are free. But the beauty of it is that the fee is only suggested. They'll let you in for a quarter, if that's all you can afford to pay. (Not that I'm recommending it. The Met's a great institution and deserves your money. But if you're on a tight budget, you can still go.)

Whatever you pay to get in, you're getting a lot for your money. The Met has more than anyone can see in one visit. My favorite is the Egyptian wing, which has massive sculptures, mummy cases, little model boats... and finally, as you reach the end, an entire Egyptian temple, the Temple of Dendur, moved to New York from the Nile when the temple was flooded by the building of the Aswan dam. But the Tiffany windows in the American wing are spectacular; the Modern wing contains some fabulous Picassos; there are rooms and rooms of period furniture and nineteenth century paintings and Chinese ceramics, and then there's the Arms and Armor wing, which contains a troop of life-size mounted knights, looking like they're about to gallop off into Central Park.

There are always special exhibits, constantly changing. These are announced on the long banners displayed on the museum's facade, and there are signs throughout the museum pointing you to the exhibits near you. These exhibits are all included in the admission price, though you may choose to rent an audio tour.

There's something for everyone at the Met - and probably something for everyone in the enormous and well-stocked gift shop, too. The museum is closed Mondays. It's open from 9:30am to 5:30pm Sunday and Tuesday through Thursday; Fridays and Saturdays from 9:30am to 9pm.

It's hard to say if this counts as a sight at the moment. Until the city of New York finally finishes wrangling and builds something at Ground Zero, what people go to look at there is an absence: a huge hole in the ground, several hundred feet deep, surrounded by a chain-link fence.

For people who saw the Twin Towers while they were standing, the sight has to be impressive: they were enormous -- not very beautiful, but very large, and their absence is shocking; the volume of material that had to be carted away is staggering. For people who never saw the Towers, the size of the remaining hole gives a sense of their scale: larger than most city blocks, several stories deep, with, at least last time I was there, rubble still in evidence. It's a distressing sight, a vision of waste and destruction.

There's a timeline posted on the fence around the hole, detailing the order of the events of September 11th, 2001 -- the one day, not the events leading to it or the events which followed, which would be impossible to put on a public memorial without stirring up endless controversy and outcry. That absence, too, is striking: for a moment, the former site of the Twin Towers ceases to be a symbol (of American supremacy, paranoia, innocence, or guilt; of terrorist perfidy or power; of the Bush administration's confidence, incompetence, or impotence; of the city's failure to protect its citizens or of its duty to the future; of the casus belli or the locus of misinformation; of all the myriad things for which Ground Zero is constantly invoked) and becomes a plain reality.

Twenty minutes of staring at the hole and contemplating your mortality should probably be sufficient, though visitors passionately interested in geopolitics, nationalism, or seismic architecture might take longer.

Any subway to Lower Manhattan will take you there, though some stations remain closed for reconstruction. The 4, 5, J, M, Z, 2, or 3 to Fulton Street or the A, C to Broadway/Nassau St all work.