Damsel’s Guide to a Week in New York City (Part 1)

If you follow me on Instagram, you know that Ben and I flew over to the USA to spend a week in New York City. And what a week it was. New York is one of my favourite cities in the world and I love visiting. Because Ben’s never been,  the plan was to do as many touristy things as humanly possible before we die of either heat, exhaustion or starvation. Here’s my guide to spending a fantastic week in New York (with a little bit of shopping thrown in for the aspiring fashionista).

Before I start dishing out tips for a perfect week in New York, I’ll give you some information on getting there.

This was the first time we used a lounge at an airport. And we’ll be using them in the future. The benefit of booking yourself into one is that you get to relax before your flight, enjoy complimentary nibbles and drinks or get a manicure if you really want to. I don’t think we’ve ever boarded a flight feeling more relaxed and happy before.

 

If possible, always check for cheaper flights, airlines do sale as anyone else nowadays or use a tool such as SkyScanner to get the best price. Flying doesn’t have to be expensive. We booked our flights via BA and ended up flying American Airlines, which was OK with us. Food was alright for plane food, but they did run out of beer on the way there, so we couldn’t get any.

There’s plenty of options to book your accommodation, you can use Air BnB or like us, use Secret Escapes, for a cute little boutique hotel in Manhattan. Secret Escapes offer a number of hotels or holidays at a discounted rate and it works like a charm.

 

We flew to JFK and I find the yellow cab to be the best way to get from the airport. You walk out of the door, get in the line and are given a ticket for a cab. Perfect. And the rate to and from Manhattan is a set one, so you don’t have to worry about the metre. You can also tick one of the iconic NYC must-dos of your list, so what’s not to like. The set fare is $52, but you’ll have to pay the toll as well. On the way to Manhattan it cost us additional $0.80, it was an evening drive, on the way back it was $5.50. We tipped the driver 20%, although you can only tip a standard rate of $6.

 

 

We stayed at 6 Columbus, a hotel on the south western tip of Central Park. The location was great, but when we head over next time, we’ll most likely stay downtown, closer to all our favourite bars. 6 Columbus was one of the cleanest hotels I’ve ever stayed at (always an important piece of information) and it has a small rooftop bar overlooking the Time Warner Centre (full of shops I was able to sneak into). Hi-Bar has a funny mixture of your regular drinks and Japanese inspired ones, I think this is a result of the hotel boasting a Japanese restaurant as well. The nibbles at the bar, we had Fried Chicken Wings with wasabi honey, were faboulusly delicious. So delicious in fact I need to get my hands on some wasabi honey asap.

 

We stayed for a week, which made buying an unlimited 7 day Metro pass, well worth the $30. You can buy them from machines, you need to pay additional $1 per card, but you can use it to take any subway train anywhere around Manhattan or even Brooklyn and Queens.

If you don’t want to miss part 2 of Damsel’s Guide to a Perfect Week in New York, make sure you follow me on Bloglovin’. You’ll make my day 🙂