52 replies to this topic

[NewMarketSean]

Wife and I are going up Thanksgiving week. Hope to witness the Macy's parade for the first time live. Will be hitting a bunch of shows. I love Broadway stuff. So we'll be around the Times Square area a lot, and I hope she's up for doing a big hike thru Central Park, which the time I went I thought was the coolest thing ever, right in the middle of this metropolis.

 

We're staying at the Westin in Jersey City and taking the PATH into Penn Station.

 

Looking for CHEAP eating possibilities. I've tried Shake Shack and thought it was overrated.

Keste Pizza on Bleecker...it's also right across from John's which is more famous but Keste is better.

[KWebz]

Wife and I are going up Thanksgiving week. Hope to witness the Macy's parade for the first time live. Will be hitting a bunch of shows. I love Broadway stuff. So we'll be around the Times Square area a lot, and I hope she's up for doing a big hike thru Central Park, which the time I went I thought was the coolest thing ever, right in the middle of this metropolis.   We're staying at the Westin in Jersey City and taking the PATH into Penn Station.   Looking for CHEAP eating possibilities. I've tried Shake Shack and thought it was overrated.

I've been to the Macy's Day parade before and it was def really cool to see. It was bone chilling cold when I went which was a drag. High fives for staying in Jersey and taking the Path. It's so unbelievably cheap. For breakfast, check out Best Bagels on w 35th. Maybe it's not number 1 but it's damn good, like a few blocks from penn station, and very affordable.

[Nigel Tufnel]

The Minetta Tavern has great burgers and it's near a PATH station...  not cheap, though.

[tennOsfan]

One fave experience of mine in NY are all the dollar slice places without any tables. Just a board nailed to the wall where you can stand and inhale pizza. If I had that down the street from my office ...

 

I haven't done the Jersey strategy before, but I got the Westin for $98 a night on Priceline after Hotwire had it for slightly more. It appears I can be at Penn Station within 15 minutes.

[RShack]

One fave experience of mine in NY are all the dollar slice places without any tables. Just a board nailed to the wall where you can stand and inhale pizza. If I had that down the street from my office ...

 

I haven't done the Jersey strategy before, but I got the Westin for $98 a night on Priceline after Hotwire had it for slightly more. It appears I can be at Penn Station within 15 minutes.

 

I've gotten by for several days in NY on nothing but stand-up pizza slices (and mega diet cokes)... even the least-good slices were pretty damn good.... I'd get just one slice every couple or three hours... you can keep going indefinitely that way while hoofing around...  

 

I'd also stroll slowly through Washington Sq Park to see what not-so-legal substances would come find me, before going to some cheap off-off-off Broadway play, the kind where you have to climb stairs to get into the place... good times...

[DJ MC]

One fave experience of mine in NY are all the dollar slice places without any tables. Just a board nailed to the wall where you can stand and inhale pizza. If I had that down the street from my office ...

 

I haven't done the Jersey strategy before, but I got the Westin for $98 a night on Priceline after Hotwire had it for slightly more. It appears I can be at Penn Station within 15 minutes.

 

The PATH is awesome.

[NewMarketSean]

Another good pizza place, and in midtown, is Don Antonio by Starita on W 50th St. Really good crust, light and airy and crackly on the outside. Gets packed around lunchtime though so try to pop in after the lunch rush.

[tennOsfan]

Thanks for all the tips. We had a heck of a time. Saw five Broadway shows (if you're into such, go right now and make plans to see The Color Purple's revival), one of which was Les Mis where I waited three hours for rush tickets, getting there early enough to be first in line and getting two tix on the front row for $74 total. Awesome.

 

Rode the train to Coney Island after experiencing the misery of the Macy's Parade (so this is what three million people are like). What a dreary beach. My wife said it was the first time in her life that she'd visited a beach that she didn't want to live at.

 

Used a Groupon for a restaurant at the Hilton Garden Inn in Times Square to get $100 of Italian food for $45. Unbelievable value there. Wandered into an English pub called the Cock and Bull for some quality stuff. Also, we hit the dollar pizza many, many times at 40th/Broadway.

 

We stayed in Jersey City on a fine Priceline deal, and I rode one train stop over to Hoboken several times and got goodies from Carlos' Bake Shop as seen on the Cake Boss.

[RShack]

Rode the train to Coney Island after experiencing the misery of the Macy's Parade (so this is what three million people are like). What a dreary beach. My wife said it was the first time in her life that she'd visited a beach that she didn't want to live at.

 

But did you eat some dogs at the original Nathans?  I assume it's still there... nothing special, it's a dump.. but still, it's the original one...

 

Last time I was there, they had wrecking crews there trying to demolish a famous old wooden roller coaster... and that sucker would simply not come down, no matter how many pieces of large yellow equipment they had bashing and tugging and bashing... a bunch of really, really old folks were gathered around, watching and crying, remembering how they rode it all summer when they were young... 

[tennOsfan]

Yeah, we ate at Nathan's. Checked that off the bucket list. The minor league ballpark at Coney looked cool.

[RShack]

Yeah, we ate at Nathan's. Checked that off the bucket list. The minor league ballpark at Coney looked cool.

 

That ballpark was built on the site of Steeplechase Park, which was the 1st of 3 mega amusement parks built on Coney Island in the late 1800's and early 1900's... Donald Trump's father bought it and bulldozed it in a hurry before it could be declared a historic site, and tried without success to get the zoning changed so he could develop the land with big apartment buildings... he eventually sold it to the city, which in turn led to its use for the ballpark... zoning has said for ages that it has to be used for some kind of amusement... baseball counts as amusement....

 

In addition to having views of the ocean, the ballpark has views of the parachute tower from the old amusement park... evidently, it cost so much to demolish it that it just sat there forever until it was declared a historic site...

[NewMarketSean]

Was in NYC Saturday night w/ friends who live there. Just had a fun time. NYC gets all the props it deserves but it really is so amazing in so many ways.

[NewMarketSean]

Friends have since moved to Brooklyn. It could be so awesome if the people who live there could do one simple thing. Properly dispose of trash. Don't get me wrong. People do throw out their trash. But no one uses trash cans in the city and some bags get destroyed by rats and then it's everywhere. It's sad to see. And obviously, when it's 95 degrees it smells like hot trash.

 

Traffic was also terrible, the worst I've ever seen in 20 years visiting the city. And my friends drive everywhere and don't use the subway. Driving to the Bronx took 90 mins.

 

Still had a blast though. We watched the fireworks from their roof. Best fireworks experience of all time.