My wife is going to visit New York City on business, but wants to do a tourist blitz in one day from 5 am to 3 am (10 hours).
She will be with one married female friend. Neither of them has been to NYC before. My wife is a high school Social Science teacher, and her friend is an English teacher.
They are not interested in things that are “too touristy.” On the list:
Holocaust Museum
Ground Zero WTC
Off the list:
Statue of Liberty
Top of the Empire State Building
UN Building
They are interested in some good old pubs and perhaps some things of historical significance. Thanks!
-Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge
-Grab a beer at McSorley’s-the oldest pub in the United States
-Top of the Rock-shorter waiting time than at the Empire State Building
-Chinatown and Little Italy for lunch and cheap souvenirs
-A stroll through Central Park-printable map on the park’s website
-Times Square
I’ve never been to the Holocaust Memorial Museum on 42nd Street, not have I heard anything about it. I don’t think it’s as large or well-known as the one in DC. Skip it and try the Museum of Sex!
Ground Zero is less a construction site that an enormous concrete foundation. I don’t know how interesting it’s going to be, and the immediate neighborhood is kind of a dud. If you can find a place that rents bikes, there’s a very nice bike path that runs up the Hudson River from Battery Park all the way uptown to the Cloisters. (It also goes along to East River to around 38th Street, but you need to hits the streets to get all the way around, which is a little hair-raising.) If they like to bike (and it’s not pouring), you could quickly bike past Ground Zero and see a lot of the things that most tourists don’t – the marina, the various parks along the river, West Harlem, the GWB from underneath (and the Little Red Lighthouse). Anyway, I always found it interesting, and it’s completely flat.
There are several sunset cruises around New York Harbor – the Circle Line runs one – and though it’s a bit on the touristy side it’s also a great way to see the city.
I second McSorley’s and, if it’s a nice day, Central Park. That could be worked into the biking plan.
I visited the Museum of Sex on a lark one summer day a few years ago and found that it had too little “bang for the buck” (pardon me). By that, I mean that the museum was rather small and was somewhat lacking in exhibits for the price of admission. As always, YMMV.
That being said, perhaps they’d enjoy strolling around in the Village if the weather is pleasant; it’s a lovely, older area with plenty of art galleries. That said, the streets aren’t laid out in a grid, so I’d advise perusing a map beforehand.
ETA: Typed some more.
I’m assuming that Bearflag means the Museum of Jewish Heritage, down at the bottom of Manhattan. It’s well done, certainly, although I found that it wasn’t really targeted at me, the yeshiva-educated granddaughter of Holocaust survivors, but more at the average person who hasn’t grown up with the Holocaust always in the background. It’s also something meant to be seen once, because nearly all of the exhibits are permanent and unchanging. Ground Zero isn’t far away, but I’d skip it, as everybody’s said above, since there’s truly nothing to see.
If they don’t want to do things that are ‘too touristy,’ skip Times Square, which exists purely for large crowds of slow-moving tourists.
I’m always a fan of walking the Brooklyn Bridge if the weather’s good. Take the subway to the first stop in Brooklyn, then walk back into Manhattan for the skyline view.
And Grimaldi’s if you’re hungry and have the time, and the taste for thin-crust pizza. (No slices, no plastic.) You could argue it’s overrated, but it was pretty good when I was last there.