It was my third visit to new york city. This time we decided to stay in Chelsea area to avoid the tourists and we ended up getting a great deal online for a nice hotel in Chelsea right next to the flat iron building.
It was the weekend after christmas so all the main streets were packed with locals and tourist shoppers looking for the after christmas discounts. We started our day with breakfast at Anthony Bourdain's French restaurant - Les Halles on park avenue. Anthony Bourdain is a celebrity chef who is on Food network and Travel channel, so some of you might know him if you are into that kind of stuff ( I mean food & wine freak). If you don't , the restaurant is still very reasonably priced if you are looking for just great food.
After filling our stomachs we walked few blocks up Park avenue to Grand Central station. It was pretty crowded inside with tourists ogling at the walls rather than actual train passengers. If this is your first time at the grand central, take couple of pics of the ceiling and get out. Few blocks east to it is the UN plaza buildings, even if you don't plan on doing the tour of the UN plaza, its still an awesome sight to just walk in front of the massive buildings and their security details (atleast 30-40 NYPD cars parked in front).
We walked further up to Rockefeller center, it was so crowded that you could barely move, decided to skip it and walked to Time square.Times Square was jam packed and was worst than the Rockefeller crowd. All the pretty lights and one of the "big" sights to be seen here. Well it did have all the bells and whistles but thats it. Take the obligatory photo and move on.
By now, we started hating people so thought it was a good idea to head towards Central park. Central park was nice. Lots of trees, paths playgrounds and such. 843 acres! Wandering through we almost forgot that it was in middle of a very crowded city. We walked almost 3/4th of the central park before turning around. We exited the park right in front of the famous Plaza hotel. We sat in one of the benches in front of the hotel and did some people watching for a while.
We had walked about 5 hours and were exhausted, it was time to head back to the hotel ( its another hour walk to the hotel). We get back to Hotel foot sore and too tired to go out again, we picked up some authentic NY style pizza and retired to bed to watch NFL playoff game.
Next day, we decide to explore the Greenwich Village, SOHO, and Chinatown areas by foot. Funnily enough Greenwich does have a nice village atmosphere and is very easy to walk around. SOHO area is a lot more commercial, tons of cafes, restaurant and shops. We move on down to the Chinatown area which is just crazy with street stalls selling cheap bags, watches, t-shirts & sunglasses and touts asking if you are looking for knockoff bags & watches. Few more blocks down you end up at the financial district.
First couple hours and we saw Wall St, City Hall, the Court house, Statue Of Liberty ( from afar ) and on our way back, Ground Zero. I wasn't sure how i'd feel coming across the big hole , but
everything was fixed up and there was no evidence of anything actually happened here. It just looked like a massive construction site. All the memorials have been taken off the fences, and its just business as usual. Time to move on and we started walking back towards our hotel, but this time we walked thru NYU campus.
I guess it was lot of walking on our last day in the Big Apple, but it was all totally worth it
Next day, we decide to explore the Greenwich Village, SOHO, and Chinatown areas by foot. Funnily enough Greenwich does have a nice village atmosphere and is very easy to walk around. SOHO area is a lot more commercial, tons of cafes, restaurant and shops. We move on down to the Chinatown area which is just crazy with street stalls selling cheap bags, watches, t-shirts & sunglasses and touts asking if you are looking for knockoff bags & watches. Few more blocks down you end up at the financial district.
First couple hours and we saw Wall St, City Hall, the Court house, Statue Of Liberty ( from afar ) and on our way back, Ground Zero. I wasn't sure how i'd feel coming across the big hole , but
everything was fixed up and there was no evidence of anything actually happened here. It just looked like a massive construction site. All the memorials have been taken off the fences, and its just business as usual. Time to move on and we started walking back towards our hotel, but this time we walked thru NYU campus.
I guess it was lot of walking on our last day in the Big Apple, but it was all totally worth it
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