We have just got back from NYC with a 12 and 14 year old. We had a fab time. These are a few things we did:
*Tour of United Nations. Really interesting, take you passport to get a UN stamp in it!
*Big Bus tour of Central Park/Harlem area, downtown tour, Brooklyn tour and river cruise - expensive, not always great, but gave us our bearings and was valid for 48 hours so we did not use the subway for 2-3 days.
- we walked over the Brooklyn Bridge. It takes about 45 minutes each way. Great ice cream and pizza at the other end!
*Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island (we booked this 3 months to the day before we visited and managed to get tickets up to the crown... Only 500 available a day so these sell out quickly. The tickets were about £15 adult and £9 for the children which included the ferry over to Liberty island, entry to the statue, museum and crown, ferry over to Ellis Island, entry to the museum and return ferry back to Manhatten.)
*Highline tour. This was the highlight of NYC for 3 of us. The Highline is a 1.4 km park which is built along the old freight railroad through the meat packing district and Greenwich village. We discovered tours called 'free tours on foot' where locals take groups of about 20 people round various parts of NYC. We had a lady called Ellen who gave us a 2 hour tour of the Highline and told us the history, and explained about the project had evolved and all the buildings and sights along the Highline. At the end you pay a tip(what you think the tour was worth, but there is no pressure to pay anything)
*Mid town Manhatten tour by night (free tours on foot again) from 8pm -10pm taking in Grand central station, Time Square all the way down to The Flat Iron building (they tour used the subway so you got an beginners guide to how the subway system worked too)
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Cycle tour of Central Park. (Organised by free tours on foot- you pay for the bikes but they organise everything) Great fun and a big hit with the children.
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Ground Zero memorial. There are Two museums, a small 9/11 Tribute Centre and the new large 9/11 memorial museum. We booked a tour with the tribute centre ($5 each for 75 minute tour)which took us on a tour of the area with either a survivor, a emergency worker or a family member affected by 9/11. We were guided by two fire fighters who survived the attack. Their story really put the day into perspective and was so moving. One told how he survived as it was his day off but he lost 15 members from his fire house alone. He also told us that 81 fire fighters have died since 9/11 from the effects of the dust cloud. We then visited the large museum which was very moving and meaningful after hearing the fire fighters' stories.
*we ran out of time to do Empire State Building which was our only regret. We did get great views from Statue of Liberty though.
We had 5 nights and 4 very full days in NYC. We then went to Washington DC for 6 days. Our bargain of the holiday... Megabus NYC to Washington DC $3 each for a 4 hour journey on a luxury coach!