New York City. The Big Apple. The city that never sleeps. Whatever name you know it by, I’m certain you either know someone that’s been there or have been there yourself. And for the majority of my life I found myself in the former group up until now. This fall, I was fortunate enough to be able to go on a bit of a world tour (NYC, London, Rome, Istanbul, Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon) with some of my brothers and New York was our launchpad for the rest of the trip as stop #1. After the whirlwind 3 days we spent in town, I can definitely see what all the hype is about. In todays post I want to go through my time in New York City (NYC), how we got there, how we felt, where we stayed, what we did, ate, saw, and wish we did as well. As it’s definitely a city I would put firmly in the “visit again category”.
Getting to NYC from Toronto you normally have a myriad of options (bus, car, plane, train). But things have really changed significantly of late due to Covid-19. As a result, reducing travel time was of the essence for us due to the amount of time we planned to spend in town, so we elected to fly there. At the time when we went you only needed an antigen test to enter into the states but things are constantly changing. The best way we found to stay on top of all of the various travel restrictions on our world tour was through the Sherpa website.
Only time will really tell if pre departure tests like this are going to be a staple of international travel moving forward. However, that website definitely saved our skin as without certain documents or tests we would have been refused entry to some of the countries on our list. The flight into town was relatively cheap as well at only $163 CAD. Although it was a bright and early flight at 6:35 am, the early departure time didn’t bother us too much, as we were finally departing on a voyage that we drew up months before late one spring evening. So as you can imagine, the excitement was palpable and fueling us. However, truth be told I promptly fell asleep as soon as we were in the air. Which was something of a trend on this trip, encapsulated by my trip motto that I kept repeating to my friends which was, “you can sleep at home or on the plane”. So I caught up on all the sleep I missed in each city, on each flight between cities.
You can sleep at home or in the air.
Me
Day 1
Once we landed at JFK airport we were faced with our first real decision to make in the big apple. How to get to our hotel, which we got at a great price and in a great location (I’ll have a future post on how to secure great prices on hotels). Our hotel was right by Time Square (you got to cut us some slack we were first time tourists) so we could have taken the air train and then the subway but it would have taken around an hour. So we elected to just split the $50 flat rate taxi into the city to save time and get a different view of the city by driving in.
We were greeted by our first NYC traffic jam which luckily wasn’t that long. All in all, we got from the airport to our hotel in around 35 minutes. Our taxi driver also gave us our first bits of knowledge about the city pointing out different landmarks but the tidbit that stuck with me was how to hail cabs. We didn’t need to hail any cabs but I guess its useful information to know (cause you never know when you’ll need it) so I’ll include it in this post. I initially thought hailing cabs was as simple as just sticking out your hand like they did in the movies but there’s a bit more to it. The NYC taxi light system used to be extremely complicated with the sign atop the cabs roof having multiple meanings but they were simplified to this simple binary. If the lights on, the cabs in service and you can stick out your hand to flag them down but if its off its either occupied or not available for some other reason. So after some crazy driving through the maze that is Manhattan we made it to our hotel, checked in and the adventure could finally start! Was what I wish I could say, but before things could really kick off we had to go grab a Covid test for our flight to the UK which was a couple days away.
We had grown accustomed to having to pay for these PCR and antigen tests in Toronto but luckily NYC had so many free options. And a free mobile testing van was only a short walk away from our place. While we were getting our tests done we noticed a movie shoot happening nearby. After asking the crew we found out they had just wrapped up filming but we could have been extras had we been there only a couple hours earlier. Wasn’t. Meant. To be. But with the Covid test out of the way the NYC adventure could finally truly begin!
Dollar Pizza & Yankee Stadium
And the first stop of that adventure was Yankee stadium. Before that however, we had to get our hands on some of that infamous $1 pizza that New York is known for. Those slices, along with the fact that every food cart we stopped at was halal, are just some of the few things from New York I’d love to bring back with me to Toronto.
After some fuel, we made our way over from Manhattan to the Bronx with the subway which, although a little crowded at times, was extremely fast for getting around the city. Navigating the NYC subway system was pretty straightforward in my opinion but if it seems like a daunting task, checkout this site for all the information you could ever need about their transit.
One thing no one told me about when they speak of New York is the smell. Man, Manhattan had such a strong smell which I find hard to describe with words, it truly wasn’t pleasant. I’m not sure if it had to do with the weather ( it was really hot the days we were there ) or if that’s just a Manhattan thing but the smell was horrendous. Although midway through our second day, I had grown accustomed to the smell. But the reason I bring it up now was that I distinctly remember the Bronx was like a breath of fresh air, quite literally. It didn’t smell at all like Manhattan. So that may have added to my enjoyment of the baseball game. We had tickets to the game against the Cleveland Indians and the game held special significance for some reason to do with the standings. But I’m not a huge baseball guy anymore so I was there more for the vibes. And the vibes were great, if I lived in town I would definitely come down to games often. We were also given free Yankees hats upon entry too which was a nice little memento. There was a lot of baseball star power on display (shoutout Aaron judge) and the tickets only cost $8 CAD so it was a great way to start off our evening.
Before heading over to the game we made friends with the Starbucks barista near our hotel (shoutout to you Juan) who came to be something of our NYC fairy god mother. He gave us plenty of recommendations on things to checkout and recommended we go to the game when we were on the fence about it. From there we went and explored the lower east side where there were plenty of places to eat and go out. And so came an end to day 1 in NYC and the vibes were at a great level already we went to bed buzzing for what day 2 had in store.
Day 2
Day 2 started bright and early at around 10am. Despite the fact we were up late the night before (I was serious about that barely sleeping) we were all energized regardless. Something we ended up doing inadvertently on this trip, due to a lack of research in terms of touristy sites to visit (at least in some of the cities we visited ) was just exploring and stumbling upon areas of significance. And that is exactly what happened after some of the gang got breakfast on our second day in town. We were walking and a tall building caught our attention, I want to say a Jimmy Fallon sign was what caught our eye but I can’t remember for certain, all I do remember is that for one reason or another we made our way into a building that turned out to be the Rockefeller center. And upon walking around the building I found myself at an elevator bank, which I promptly entered because why not? And that elevator took me to the top of the building where there was an amazing observation deck.
I later found out that this observation deck was known as the “Top of the Rock”. An experience that I also found out absolutely wasn’t free but was a great free experience regardless, thank you New York (they really need to put up some signs). No one asked me for a ticket so I’ll have to charge this one to tourist luck. From the top of the rock I could see the empire state building, world trade center, central park and just a nice view of everything.
Halal Guys, Central Park & The Met
The morning was already off to a great start. From there we made our way to central park but before that had to try the famous halal guys food cart. Full disclosure we have a halal guys restaurant in Toronto but I wanted to see if this spot had its own “je ne sais quoi”. As I’m sure everyone’s experienced certain locations of a franchise making the same meal much better than others.
Spoiler alert this one didn’t, it was the same but that didn’t lessen my enjoyment it still tasted good. And enjoying it in central park on such a beautiful sunny day was a nice way to ease into the early afternoon. Such large green space in a literal concrete jungle was refreshing to see and I can definitely picture a lazy day spent with friends in this park. We walked all throughout central park, saw the spot chuck and blair got married (where there were as engagement shoot happening), passed through a chess tournament, saw countless animals and got propositioned for a massage all within 30 minutes of one another. You’ll never be bored in this city.
You can walk through the park and exit it beside the metropolitan museum of art AKA the Met so that what’s we did. As you begin to approach the Met, you can already see from a distance just how popular of a location it is, for its iconic look just as much as the art inside its walls. There was another wedding shoot going on outside of the building with a full party of people, love must’ve been in the air that day. The line outside the Met was ridiculous so we passed on going inside but it’ll definitely be something I do on my next visit to the city, as entry was only $12 for students and $25 for adult admission. However, just relaxing there by the steps was a nice recharge before we hopped on the subway and made our way over to Kevin Durants current stomping ground, Brooklyn.
Brooklyn Baby
And the vibe was immediately different in Brooklyn compared to Manhattan. I know both areas are comparatively huge and I should be more descriptive when describing them both. But like I said, we did a whole lot of wandering and got to spots more by asking for directions as opposed to using our mobile data (which definitely had its perks as we met a lot of cool people this way). You could feel immediately that the pace of life in Brooklyn felt was slower and it just felt a whole lot more artsy than Manhattan. There were people just lounging about watching street musicians, less people overall on the streets and people in parks running basketball games. Along with a game that looked like squash but they were using their hands to hit the ball against the wall (the first time I’ve ever seen this). We played red ass as kids which was similar in that you threw the ball against the wall but also fundamentally different (they weren’t whipping the ball at each other LOL) so it was cool to see. They all seemed really into it. We saw all of this as we made our way over to the Brooklyn bridge which was a nice experience in and of itself.
It’s just a long bridge at the end of the day but you do get views of the city as you walk along it. It’s where we all caught our first glimpse of lady liberty herself and spotted people on jet skis in the water. Something I definitely need to look into for my next trip. All along the bridge there were people selling souvenirs, water, shaved ice, and fruit, but the prices did seem inflated ($3 for some water, get out of here). Once we got to the end of the bridge we were starving as we took 37 thousand steps that day. In hindsight, all of the walking was a great way to counteract all the junk food and sweets we had been eating. So we made our way back to Manhattan, got some food and relaxed in Bryant park, another nice park right in midtown with plenty of little tables and chairs.
One belongs to New York instantly, one belongs to it as much in five minutes as in five years.
Tom wolfe
Times Square
You’ll have to forgive me dear reader, for the lack of food recommendations. Something I’ll have a lot of for the other cities I’ve visited but in NY I’d be lying if I said I didn’t spam the dollar pizza and food carts located all around the city. They were cheap and really hit the spot. In my next trip to the city I’ll take better stock of the food options on offer. Although one spot we did try for breakfast and enjoyed were the bagels at Ess-a-bagel. Now, back to the journey, after some dinner we made our way back to the hotel to freshen up before going to times square. We originally got our Covid tests in Times Square on our first day in town but I’ll admit we had a hard time recognizing it as the Times Square during the day. And we all wanted to experience it during the night time. I knew there’d be a lot of people but I didn’t picture such a sea of people there, all sitting on the steps, all sorts of performers in every corner, hustlers handing out their mixtapes, more food carts. This place was buzzing. And there were a number of things to do in the area, going to comedy shows, different roof top lounges, Ripley’s (believe it or not) museum. Or even just doing what we did which was taking it all in.
After we had our fill of Times Square, we made our way to the Lower east side where we stumbled upon this cool retro-y space with ping pong, pool tables and a young crowd. Which upon researching while back home looks to have been called sour mouse. It was a nice vibe we chilled there for a bit before exploring more of the lower east side.
The night ended with (you guessed it) $1 pizza (oh how I miss you), and a nice serendipitous moment. As we were walking back towards the subway to head home after eating our pizza. We were passing around hand sanitizer and talk of getting on a roof somehow came about. We had been talking about it our whole time in NYC but something sparked the conversation in that moment. A stranger overhead our roof talk after asking for some sanitizer. And what do you know, it turned out that they used to live in the area and knew of a rooftop we could access.
And once we got to the top of the roof this random feeling of euphoria washed over the group, everyone was so giddy about being up there. Getting on a residential roof felt like a bit of a pipe dream our whole time in NY so far as we didn’t know anyone that lived there. So to finally be on one just felt like a great omen for the rest of the trip. And it felt like a representation of our time in NY thus far, no concrete plan just vibes but everything seemed to work out in the end regardless. We lounged up there celebrating our victory for a bit before making our way back to our hotel. After such a long day all of our heads were thankful to finally grace our pillows.
Final Thoughts
There wasn’t a whole lot of memorable events on our third day in town as it also doubled as a checkout and travel day. But something I wish we had done while in NY was the $2 ferry with great views of the city (it looked pretty magical). There was a $2 tram as well but we got our tram experience in London. On the return bucket list as well are things like going to the tonight show or Saturday night live, visiting MSG, going to a Broadway show, among others. So there’s definitely plenty more NYC has to offer and I do plan on going back one day. But even though the time I spent there wasn’t long and we didn’t get to try all of the diverse food options on offer. For my first time visiting NYC the experience was still great and an amazing start to the trip. I gave it an 8.5/10 and my friends were all pretty much in consensus with everyone scoring it in the same ball park.
As a trip I definitely recommend going to check it out but I can’t speak too much to what it would be like actually living there (expensive I imagine). We originally tacked on NY as a bit of “why not” city to visit before making our way to Europe and it exceeded every last one of my expectations. It had us setting off to London with smiles on our faces, excited for what the rest of the trip had to offer. I’d love to hear your thoughts if you’ve been to New York, would like to go, are avoiding it like the plague or just what you thought of this city walk through post of mine.
Till next time, see ya.
