Insight Guides: Experience New York City - Insight Guides (2016)

NEW YORK OVERVIEW

Getty Images

New Yorkers tend to think of their city as the center of the universe, and even if you aren’t 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 everyone’s 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 city’s 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.