Your New York Itinerary at a Glance
A hotbed of culture, New York City boasts some of the best arts and culture in the world, and your travelers will have a chance to intellectually indulge on this three-day New York itinerary. They’ll also experience inviting green spaces that provide little escapes from the urban frenzy. All five of the city’s boroughs—Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, Bronx and Staten Island—abound with irresistible things to see, do and eat.
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Enjoy These Great Attractions and More:
- Museum of the City of New York
- Museum of Broadway
- Jackie Robinson Museum
- Central Park
- New York Botanical Garden
- Bronx Zoo
- Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Day-to-Day Finger Lakes, New York Itinerary
Day 1 of New York Activities
Start your morning at the Museum of the City of New York, which engages visitors by celebrating, documenting and interpreting the city’s past, present and future. Today, the museum’s collection contains approximately 750,000 objects and hosts educational and cultural programming, private events and tours.
Another popular stop is the Museum of Broadway. Named one of the Best Museums in NYC by Condé Nast Traveler, the museum is an interactive and experiential museum that celebrates Broadway’s rich history, starting in 1732. Walk through history and see hundreds of rare costumes, props and artifacts. You’ll experience Broadway like never before.
The Jackie Robinson Museum is a museum and educational center in Manhattan that honors the legacy of famed baseball player Jackie Robinson. The museum is the city’s first to primarily focus on the Civil Rights movement. Its collection includes more than 4,000 artifacts, some from the Robinson family’s own collection, highlighted by Robinson’s original National Baseball Hall of Fame plaque.
American Museum of Natural History is the largest natural history museum in the world. First, head to the fourth-floor’s famous dinosaur exhibits, which include a massive T. rex. Other highlights: dramatically lit dioramas of African and North American mammals, the planetarium’s space show and, in the Hall of Gems, the 563-carat Star of India, the largest star sapphire in existence, and the newest exhibit, the Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education and Innovation.
After lunch, spend some time in Central Park, strolling past the sculptures, monuments and groves of trees that line the meandering paths. In this manicured green oasis covering 850 acres in the heart of Manhattan, it’s hard to believe you’re in a crowded city.
Next, travel to the Bronx for some more green space at the New York Botanical Garden, home to indoor and outdoor gardens and a 50-acre native forest. The world’s largest Victorian-style conservatory houses re-creations of misty tropical rainforests and arid African and North American deserts. And don’t miss the authentic Japanese garden.
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden connects people to the world of plants, fostering delight and curiosity while inspiring an appreciation and sense of stewardship of the environment. Whether you’re looking to learn something or just want to soak up 52 acres of natural beauty, the garden inspires visitors with more 12,000 kinds of plants from all over the world. It is open year-round and has plants for every season, plus indoor tropical gardens and bonsai trees.
Another option in the borough of Bronx is the Bronx Zoo, the largest metropolitan zoo in the country. Its Congo Gorilla Forest re-creates a lush African rainforest with western lowland gorillas, okapis and other species. The Wild Asia Monorail affords views of Asian elephants, Indo-Chinese tigers and Indian rhinoceroses.
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Day 2 of Things to Do in New York
Begin today at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. A colossus of culture on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, the largest museum in the Americas counts more than 2 million works of art representing 5,000 years of human creativity. Treasures include masterworks by Rembrandt and Van Gogh, impressive Greek and Roman galleries, musical instruments, armor-clad knights on horseback and an ancient Egyptian temple guarded by a moat. View Louis XIV’s state bedroom at Versailles and other re-creations of period rooms. The American Wing galleries, boasting the world’s most comprehensive collection of American art, showcase everything from Colonial furniture to works by masters like Gilbert Stuart, John Singleton Copley, John Singer Sargent, Winslow Homer and Thomas Eakins. Fashion lovers will like the Anna Wintour Costume Center.
Opened in 1938 as a branch of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Met Cloisters is America’s only museum dedicated exclusively to the art and architecture of the Middle Ages. Including a museum and gardens within a single complex, it picturesquely overlooks the Hudson River in Fort Tryon Park in northern Manhattan and derives its name from the portions of five medieval cloisters incorporated into a modern museum structure.
Spend the afternoon in the borough of Queens, where the Museum of the Moving Image captivates fans of movies, television and video games. Besides getting a peek behind the scenes of the craft and technology behind these arts, visitors can view Hollywood and TV memorabilia, experiment with sound effects, create a short computer animation, play vintage video games and dub their voice into classic movies like My Fair Lady and Mary Poppins. A crowd favorite is The Jim Henson Exhibition, which explores the groundbreaking puppetry from the team that created Miss Piggy, Kermit the Frog, Big Bird and Elmo. Interactive experiences allow visitors to try their hand at puppeteering on screen and designing a puppet character.
Queens itineraries also may include the Queens Museum, which features the Panorama of the City of New York scale model. The world’s largest such model consists of nearly 900,000 buildings. Made for the 1964 New York World’s Fair, it has been updated since. The museum takes pride in its collection of stained glass by Louis Comfort Tiffany, whose factory resided nearby in Queens’ Corona neighborhood. Corona is also home to the Louis Armstrong House Museum, the modest two-story home of the legendary mid-20th-century jazz musician. Across the street, exhibits at the newly constructed Louis Armstrong Center spotlight his career.
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Day 3 of Final Attractions in New York
For a fresh perspective on Manhattan, take a morning stroll on the High Line, a landscaped promenade built atop an elevated railroad track that once serviced factories on the Lower West Side. Dotted with public art, the 1½-mile walking park is great for people-watching, offering fine views of the Hudson River and city skyline.
Next, head to the borough of Brooklyn and its cultural crown jewel, the Brooklyn Museum. New York City’s second-biggest museum boasts one of the world’s finest Egyptian collections, plus enviable holdings of American, European, African, pre-Columbian and Native American art. The Decorative Art Galleries feature re-creations of important rooms from different eras of American history. A sculpture garden has salvaged architectural elements rescued from New York City demolition sites.
After lunch, head to the borough of Staten Island. Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden is made up of 26 landmarked buildings, nine botanic gardens, 10 acres of wetlands and a 2-acre heritage farm. Snug Harbor also is home to the Staten Island Museum and Staten Island Children’s Museum, plus museums devoted to maritime history and contemporary art. Another Staten Island attraction is Historic Richmond Town, a living history village with a Gothic Revival courthouse, general store, homes and other historic buildings. Costumed interpreters demonstrate early American crafts and trades like tinsmithing, blacksmithing, basket making and open-hearth cooking.
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