Photos, Notes and Anecdotes

A Christmas Visit to NYC

• • If you’d like someone to pull all the pieces of a NYC Broadway trip together for you, including insider extras like tours of theaters and chats with performers, you can’t go wrong with Custom Traveler Insider. we’ve traveled with them twice and they provide full service and high touch at a very affordable price for NYC by negotiating the price of the components (shows and hotels and meals) that individuals wouldn’t be able to score. We spent 4 days and took in 5 shows, including the Radio City Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes.

  We paid for our on trip and did not receive compensation from any travel providers.

• • To avoid crowds, we often walked a block over to 6th or 8th to avoid the crush in Times Sq when navigating around the area

• • Speaking of crowds and ergo, viruses- I’m no epidemiologist, but I’d imagine those crowds are a risk for any of several viruses circulating this winter

• • And yet, we noticed only 1:20 to 1:50 people masking in public including in theaters where announcements were made that they weren’t required but requested. I’m wondering if people are beginning to feel more comfortable, as we were, to be free of masks and take their chances with a viral illness as we have most other winters of our lives.

• Spotted the naked cowboy giving a few dollars to a man without a home in the street

• We went to the Christmas Market at Bryant Park early, when it first opened and were able to wander around easily, it got more crowded as the afternoon arrived. There was a very nice selection of local artisans and food booths

• • If possible make reservations through open table for restaurants to guarantee a table when you want to have a meal and use apps to pre order for pick up at fast food joints

• • And yet, we found Manhattan not to be suffering from the same “lack of staff” we’ve encountered elsewhere. Counter service establishments were efficient and full service restaurants still employed bus boys and seemingly idle men in suit jackets whose only job is to open your wine or add parmesan cheese to your dish.

• • Eating at “off times” 11 AM lunch or 5 or 10:30 PM dinners allowed us to find reservations or walk into restaurants.

• • One of the restaurants where we ate was feeding a woman without a home, at the end of their bar. She was wearing open toed dress sandals on a rainy raw December night and muttering “look at all these people”. I’m not sure what her rant was about, but we chatted about the book she was reading about yoga.

• • Not all our experiences with folks in the street went well- we were called the N word by an apparently colorblind man after my husband caught him trying to lift my thermal tea mug from an outside pocket of my bag while I was snapping photos of the Macys windows.

• • And yet police presence was very high, including a young officers we overhead saying to his partner after assisting some tourist with directions “I’m getting better at small talk!” And his buddy agreed and when I smiled and laughed at their comment, he said “he’s kinda of a shy guy”

• • Which reminds me to share that whenever we are doing street photography in any city in the world; one of us always watches the back of the other while shooting. This “awareness” usually results in us having almost not trouble wherever we are.

• • And yet, this part of NYC seemed to have fewer folks hassling people or living in the streets than other US cities we’ve visited. And it seems local establishments do take some care of the people in their own neighborhoods

• • You can’t rely on GPS to navigate while walking on the street, we used it in our hotel room to preview the route, then on the street used the easy grid pattern in Manhattan to navigate because the GPS has trouble

• • I made a list of all our show and restaurant reservations including the street addresses and put it on my phone to allow for easier navigation around the area.

• • The stands in Times Square were filled to the brim with Moroccans celebrating their advancement to the World Cup finals.

• • We noticed almost no Chinese tourists. While in Quebec City in Oct they outnumbered all other tourists 2:1, their absence was keenly noticed here - whether that’s by choice due to publicity reaching China about the safety of US cities or China’s own travel policies at the moment, I’m not sure.

• • And yet, the crowds were so thick over the weekend that one could barely move on the side walks, and for safety several roads around the largest attractions (such as the tree at Rockefeller center) were closed to vehicle traffic by local officials

• We found our weekend in the city at Christmas to be busy, but full of good cheer and joy and as a “bucket list” event to see NYC at Christmastime, it was very special!