Visiting NYC

[Heather Smith]

Aside from the obvious places to visit does anyone have any hidden treasures they would like to share? Jon and I are going in a week to NYC, are staying at a YMCA hostel and planning to see as much as we can. Food suggestions are welcome as well!

[Lucy Wang]

The Cloisters at MoMA

The Irish Hunger Memorial (it’s really awesome, and oft-missed) link: http://www.nyc.com/arts__attractions/irish_hunger_memorial.1379/editorial_review.aspx

The abandoned smallpox hospital on Governor’s Island (take the tram over, technically you’re trespassing if you go into the hospital grounds but everyone does it anyway and there is a hole in the fence…it is pretty cool)

Not obscure, but definitely rent bikes and bike down the Hudson River Greenway, it’s like a bike highway in Manhattan

Brooklyn Bridge Park & Prospect Park (not really hidden, but I feel like they get passed over in favor of Manhattan parks…)

Go eat at one of the Momofuku restaurants. Go to Flushing for really good and cheap Chinese food (take the 7 line all the way east, it’s the last stop). My favorite restaurant is ‘A Taste of Shanghai’

You can PM me if you want more suggestions, these are just off the top of my head, have fun!

[Tosh K]

Paley Park / Greenacre Park, Gantry Plaza Park, The Hudson River Park and the piers.  I’ll second the Irish Hunger Memorial.  New FDR memorial might be worth looking at.

Food – Joe’s Shanghai & Pho Bang are 2 of my regular spots in Chinatown; Yelp reviews are very helpful in the city.

[Trace One]

Walk over from Brooklyn to Manhattan, as everyone has said, on the Brooklyn Bridge, (it’s a really dramatic walk,  really awesome) and then go on up the west side, through Battery Park, to all the incredible parks on the West Side, one after the other, on the waters edge – including the High Line, of course, which is a couple of blocks or so in from the waters edge. Some really excellent Tom Otterness sculptures in the west side sequence of parks…..

I think Prospect Park is hard to appreciate for the out-of-towner – it’s pretty  big, and pretty run-down compared to midwestern standards – but it IS Olmsteds masterpiece…IMHO....

The Carnegie Deli  if you like MEAT, Chinatown, The Oyster Bar, a slice of pizza anywhere..

Paley Park IS really famous and reallly beautiful so I second that vote..The New York Botanic Garden in the Bronx is I think just about the best in the world. I would go see a Daily Show or a Colbert Report, on West 55th St or so, 9th Avenue..

The Met! gorgeous, Egyptian rooms, the Frick! The Guggenheim, MOMA… The Cloisters is very lovely, but it takes forever to get there..

Ug, I’m so jealous. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden (next to Prospect Park) is lovely but not as lovely as the New York Botanic in the Bronx..

and of course, FAO Schwartz, in it’s ‘new’ location! Not as nice as the old, but still the best toy store in the world.

Am I right, or what!?

it’s endless. One thing that never seemed worth it to me are Broadway shows..Really pricey, tourist traps….try some off-broadway, if you need theater..And if you want the full subway experience,  take the D train all the way to Coney Island, for a day at the beach..But I am predjudiced – I love Brooklyn.

It’s endless, in new York.. I think the well-groomed south end of Central Park (the sheep meadow, the zoo, etc.) is probably easier to deal with than a trip out to Prospect Park, but it depends how intrepid and thirsty you are for landscape history…

sorry this is my favorite topic!

oh, well, back to my world – the flat, polluted highway-cities of the Central Valley of Callifornia – Fresno!

Have fun, Heather, tell us how it goes!

[Lucy Wang]

Oooh one more thing I just spotted: http://mindyourgarden.tumblr.com/post/33300566720/lent-space-is-a-privately-owned-development-site

Lent Space is a privately-owned development site in Lower Manhattan (New York, USA) that is temporarily being made open to the public. The space serves as an exhibition space for large sculptures, an event space and public space as well as a tree nursery. When Lent Space closes, the trees grown on the site will migrate to the streets of the surrounding neighborhood, turning into street trees for the emerging Hudson Square BID.
A moveable sculptural fence can enclose or open the site to different degrees and also serve as a public amenity in the form of benches and wall panels for exhibitions.

by Interboro

[Heather Smith]

Thank you so much! I will definitely add these items to my list. I have several of them, but hadn’t heard of a lot of them! I am super excited!

[Author]

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