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| Row your boat: Central Park in springMITCHELL FUNK |
You’re never really an outsider in New York City, because everyone’s an outsider. The Big Apple is a migrant metropolis, and anyone who claims to be a native New Yorker is just someone who’s been in town a bit longer than you. That gives this teeming conglomeration of brick, glass, steel and water the intoxicating nervous energy of a city where only a hard-yards hustle will get you to the top. Brooklyn is still the hippest of the five boroughs, but the newly launched NYC Ferry service is making hitherto largely unexplored neighbourhoods such as Astoria and the Bronx increasingly attractive. They’re less touristy, accommodation is cheaper and the views of Manhattan are spectacular.
What to do
Let’s start with what not to do. First off, don’t walk everywhere. Manhattan alone is enormous, and even if Google Maps makes it look like a stroll from Central Park to SoHo, it’s not. And try not to use the yellow cabs, unless you like traffic jams. Instead, buy a seven-day Unlimited Ride MetroCard (£23).[post_ads_2]
Chances are, jet lag will wake you early. This is a gift, because the city is magical at dawn. The streets are empty, steam billows from the sidewalks and, as the sun rises over Brooklyn, the skyline lights up. Three top spots are Central Park (opens 6am); the High Line, a railway viaduct turned park in Chelsea (opens 7am); and Brooklyn Bridge Park (opens 6am).
Yes, we know Times Square is a neon-lit tourist trap. But it’s also home to some new attractions, including the NFL Experience, a four-floor interactive temple to the sport (£21; nflexperience. com); Gulliver’s Gate, a £30m world in miniature (£26; gulliversgate.com); and National Geographic Encounter: Ocean Odyssey, an immersive undersea experience (£29; natgeoencounter.com).
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The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is one of the world’s great galleries, with works by Dali, Matisse and Picasso (£18; moma.org). Yet the Whitney Museum of American Art, in the Meatpacking District, trumps it this season with its Grant Wood: American Gothic and Other Fables show (£18; whitney.org).
If bricks and steel move you, join one of the superb architectural walks organised by the American Institute of Architects. There are 24 to choose from, all offering opinionated insights (from £15; aiany.org).
[post_ads]David Bowie lived and died in New York City, and his favourite neighbourhood was Washington Square — the burial ground turned chess battlefield and performance space in Greenwich Village — where, he once said, you can discover “the emotional history of New York in a quick walk”. See it, then cross the East River to the Brooklyn Museum, where the smash-hit David Bowie Is exhibition — with more than 400 objects from the singer’s archive — is making the last stop on its world tour (until July 15; from £15; brooklynmuseum.org). For show and exhibition listings, see nycgo.com.
Nightlife
It’s complicated, faddy and cliquey, but nightlife in the city that never sleeps is always fabulous. Until late last year, it was illegal to dance pretty much anywhere in the five boroughs without a special licence, but the Prohibition-era Cabaret Law has been repealed, paving the way for a nightlife revolution.Brooklyn is dance central, with top joints including the Bossa Nova Civic Club (free; 1271 Myrtle Avenue); the House of Yes, in Bushwick — a “temple of expression” where entry is sometimes free, sometimes £12 (booking advised; houseofyes.org); the Jupiter Disco, over the street (free; jupiterdisco.com); and, two blocks north, Elsewhere, a huge indie club (from £8; elsewherebrooklyn.com).
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| The House of Yes, BrooklynSARA NAOMI LEWKOWICZ |
In Bushwick, the Threesome Tollbooth is a broom cupboard turned wood-panelled bar. It has — as the name suggests — room for three, including the barman, for an hour of bespoke cocktail therapy (from £72pp; exploretock.com). At UES, a retro ice-cream shop on the Upper East Side, ask to see the storage room and you’ll be whisked through a fake shelving unit to a dark room of kitsch chandeliers and fiery cocktails (theuesnyc.com).
Over near Union Square, the Library of Distilled Spirits has more than 1,000 bottles and enthusiastic staff who mix the drinks in a clubby setting (libraryofdistilledspirits.com); while top pick in Greenwich is Slowly Shirley, an art-deco bar where some customers dress in 1940s style (slowlyshirley.com).
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Ride the NYC ferry
This is the biggest bargain in New York, ousting the Staten Island Ferry as the best-value sightseeing trip. Launched last May, the 23 boats serve 21 terminals across four boroughs, making the outer ones more accessible and offering fabulous views of Manhattan, the Statue of Liberty, Coney Island and the vast expanse of Upper Bay. One-way tickets from the Pier 11 headquarters on Wall Street cost just £2 (ferry.nyc). These are the trips you must take:● Astoria The waterfront in this corner of Queens has magnificent views of Manhattan and the monstrous Hell Gate Bridge, but you need to walk uphill to find the neighbourhood’s heart. Its main attraction is the Museum of the Moving Image (£11; movingimage.us) — a memorial to Astoria’s heyday as New York’s Hollywood. Walk northeast along Steinway Street and the multicultural nature of the ’burb becomes apparent, with hookah bars alongside Greek delis, Colombian loncherias and Italian coffee shops. Turn left on Ditmars Boulevard and you’ll see that, someday soon, Astoria could be as hip as Williamsburg used to be. Check out Taverna Kyclades (tavernakyclades.com) and, for imaginative cocktails, the Last Word (tlwastoria.com).
● The Bronx The ferry won’t stop in the Big Apple’s northernmost borough until summer, but here you might find the New York neighbourhood you were looking for. Come for the Bronx Zoo (£21; bronxzoo.com), the Yankee Stadium (from £11; mlb.com) and Belmont, widely regarded as the city’s true Little Italy. Best pizza? Probably Mario’s, serving whole pies since 1926 (mariosarthurave.com). Get all the gossip on the area’s cinematic connections on a two-hour food tour, followed by lunch at Mario’s, with local Danielle Oteri (£75; arthuravenuefoodtours.com).
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● Rockaway Beach The longest route on the NYC Ferry is the 57-minute cruise to Rockaway Beach, the wild Atlantic shoreline immortalised by the Ramones. The beach is magnificent, but don’t expect any Coney Island-style shenanigans here. It’s a low-key spot backed by residential areas and is buzzing in summer, when New Yorkers arrive for picnics on the soft sand. Surfers come all year round — a 60-minute private lesson costs £71 (localssurfschool.com).
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| A bite of the Big Apple: thrills on a budget at Coney IslandALAMY |
Budget New York
Karen Turner is a native of Queens, a dedicated cheapskate and author of the Wanderlustingk travel blog. Here are her top tips:▶ Entry to MoMA is free on Fridays between 4pm and 8pm, saving you £18.
▶ Pop into the main branch of the New York Public Library (476 Fifth Avenue) to admire the magnificent beaux-arts Rose Main Reading Room — a hallowed space almost two city blocks long.
▶ Find the Whispering Gallery in Grand Central station — extraordinary acoustics.
▶ Save yourself the £26 entry fee for the Empire State Building and visit a rooftop bar instead. At the Rainbow Room’s Bar SixtyFive, £14 gets you a Manhattan in a glass — and Manhattan at your feet (rainbowroom.com/bar-sixty-five).
▶ See the fabulous abandoned City Hall station by staying on the downtown-bound 6 train after its last stop.
▶ Get cheap thrills along Coney Island’s boardwalk. A ride on the vintage Cyclone rollercoaster costs £7; the beach and blue-collar seaside vibe are free.
▶ Walk across Brooklyn Bridge for the best skyline view in New York.
▶ Join the audience of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Tickets are free, but apply online in advance, rather than join the queue outside. The show runs Monday to Thursday at the Ed Sullivan Theater (1697 Broadway; colbert.1iota.com).
▶ If you don’t mind sharing a bathroom, stay at the Jane — a former sailors’ home in the West Village that hosted Titanic survivors in 1912 and is now an atmospheric hotel with river views (bunk-bed cabins for two from £96; thejanenyc.com).
Where to eat
The hottest dinner in New York right now is Gem, a Lower East Side opening by Flynn McGarry, a 19-year-old wunderkind. His stage is an ordinary cafe by day, but by night he serves a 12- to 15-course tasting menu. Dishes include crab with leek, rose and grapefruit and a Ritz cracker sandwich with foie gras (£112; gem-nyc.com).Over in TriBeCa, there’s considerable excitement over Tetsu, a huge industrial space where the Michelin-starred sushi maestro Masa Takayama sells low-cost small plates such as pork belly skewers — reservations aren’t necessary if you sit at the bar (from £4; tetsunyc.com).
At Pizza Moto, near the Brooklyn waterfront, the food-truck pioneer David Sclarow found a bricked-up oven at the back of a derelict shop. That oven now turns out ridiculously good, crispy pizzas (from £10; pizzamoto.com).
Four blocks north is Frankies 457 Spuntino, a diner with fairy lights on the terrace and sublime food, from gnocchi marinara with fresh ricotta to sweet sausage with peppers and onions on polenta (from £10; frankies457.com).
The Grill, in the Seagram Building in Midtown, is probably as close as you’ll get to the flashy New York restaurant of your dreams. Reservations must be made a month in advance for a glitzy event that self-consciously references the Mad Men era of dry martinis and prime rib. Don’t expect much change from £180 for dinner for two (thegrillnewyork.com).
Where to stay
[post_ads]If your New York fantasies are all about the views, you can’t beat 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, where the plant-filled rooms look out towards the bridge arcing over the East River. The hotel is powered only by wind energy and offers Tesla transfers (doubles from £245; 1hotels.com). The antidote to corporate hospitality is the Urban Cowboy B&B, in gentrified Williamsburg. The beard and tattoo count may be high, but this five-bedroom Wild West-themed spot is as friendly as it is fashionable (doubles from £180; urbancowboybnb.com).Hotel Indigo LES is bang in the middle of the Lower East Side’s throbbing bar scene. The views of the Manhattan skyline from the buzzing Mr Purple bar and from the rooms on the ninth floor up are fabulous, while the public spaces are targeted at iPhone-swiping twentysomethings (doubles from £160; hotelindigolowereastside.com).
On a bigger budget? Try the Gramercy Park Hotel, where the city’s trendsetters come to party and guests get the key to a private park. It’s a palace of European luxury as imagined by New York — all Louis XV, crystal and velvet — while its Rose Bar offers surefire celeb-spotting (doubles from £284; gramercyparkhotel.com).
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| Roof with a view: the pool at Hotel Indigo LESCHRIS SANDERS |
Fly for £297
The cheapest flight to New York from the UK this spring is just £297 return with Primera Air. Who? The no-frills Icelandic airline launches its first long-haul service from the UK — Stansted to Newark — on April 19, then flights from Birmingham a month later. A warning: that price doesn’t include in-flight meals or a checked-in bag. Norwegian has been offering similar “unbundled” fares across the Atlantic since 2014. Last week, it had returns from Gatwick to JFK in May from £335.[post_ads]British Airways and Virgin Atlantic, clearly worried by their new rivals’ headline-grabbing lead-in prices, have responded by introducing hand baggage-only long-haul fares. Their tickets will include meals. The cheapest Virgin Economy Light fare from Heathrow to JFK this spring is £449 — saving £30 on an Economy Classic fare. BA’s Basic Economy fares have not yet been released, but its current best Heathrow-JFK price is a competitive £370 return.
Chris Haslam was a guest of BA (ba.com), 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge and Hotel Indigo LES
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