Insight Guides: Experience New York City

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New Yorkers tend to think of their city as the center of the universe, and even if you arent willing to subscribe to that belief, you will have to agree that New York is one of the greatest places on the planet. At least, you will feel that way after you spend any time at all here.

With its skyscrapers and sophisticated ways, the city is the essence of urbanity, just about everyones notion of what a city should be. This is a place where dreams come true, vast fortunes are made and lost, and fame might descend briefly and flit away or linger for a spell.

What all this means for visitors is that New York is a fascinating spectacle. You can see top-rate drama and great art, dine and drink very well, and simply soak in the excitement. You might run into a celebrity on a grimy side street, or enjoy being drawn into streams of ordinary folks on the sidewalks. The city is so iconic that even visitors who have never set foot in Manhattan feel they are on familiar ground. You can look up the heights of the Empire State Building and imagine King Kong clinging to the spire or still hear Cole Porter hammering out a tune in one of the citys refined cocktail lounges.

The best way to appreciate New York is simply to throw yourself into the fray. Walk up the Upper West Side to sample bagels, amble through the galleries of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, ogle diamonds on Fifth Avenue, linger over coffee in Greenwich Village, listen to music on the Lower East Side or Brooklyn. Explore colonial New York, catch up on the contemporary art scene, ascend to the top of a tower to see the spectacle of the glittering city at your feet. However you choose to amuse yourself in this great city, you will find more to do than you have time to do it in.

In the Mood for

street life

Joe Buglewicz/NYC & Co

As the old song says, East Side, West Side, all around the town, the sidewalks of New York are a great place to trip the light fantastic and to watch New Yorkers, some of the most fascinating specimens of life on the planet. Some especially rewarding stretches of pavement are Union Square , just west of Gramercy Park (for more information, ).

fine dining

Chris Chen

You can eat well anywhere in New York, but the settings are suitably refined and the cuisine is masterfully French-influenced in such gastronomic uptown spots as Daniel , Dovetail , and Jean Georges (for more information, ).

retail therapy

Christopher Postlewaite/NYC & Co

New Yorkers fall into two camps, bargain hunters and those who consider it rather crass to look at a price tag. The former are quite willing to battle the crowds at Century 21 in Lower Manhattan or Nordstrom Rack in Chelsea (for more information, ) .

Meanwhile, those who just have to have it, whatever it costs, will find plenty of temptation on Bleecker Street from Bank to 7th Avenue in the West Village (for more information, ), a little patch of designer heaven where the celestial creations of Valentino, Armani and Ralph Lauren are on offer.

Fifth Avenue around 57th Street (for more information, ) is home to the citys holy trinity of refined department stores (Saks, Henri Bendel, and Bergdorf Goodman) and where the shop windows of Tiffanys, Harry Winston and Cartier are filled with glittering jewels .

Old New York

The Frick Collection/Michael Bodycomb

New York is more caught up with the brash new than with the distant past, but you can get a sense of the early days of the city in such cherished landmarks as the Morris-Jumel Mansion (for more information, ) show off fine art as well as the lavish homes of a long vanished era.