In October 2025, we set off on a trip across the United States – first New York, then Florida, and finally Dallas. It was a trip my daughter and I had been looking forward to, and New York was the perfect start.
Arrival and First Impressions of Manhattan
We arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport, which is located in New Jersey, on the other side of the Hudson River from Manhattan. Newark is one of the three major airports serving New York – alongside JFK and LaGuardia – and it is often a convenient choice for flights from Europe because it tends to be less crowded than JFK. Fortunately, immigration went relatively quickly – you sometimes hear stories about hour-long lines, but we managed to get through without any major complications.
We took an Uber from Newark and headed straight to Manhattan. The journey took about 40 minutes via the New Jersey Turnpike and the Lincoln Tunnel – or you can also go via the George Washington Bridge, depending on traffic.
I remember that the last time I was in New York, I traveled from JFK via the AirTrain, an automated train connecting the airport terminals to subway stations. And that was an experience you cannot forget – a carriage full of homeless people and strange characters, an atmosphere that immediately reminds you that this is not Europe. This time, thanks to Newark and Uber, we elegantly avoided all that.
Park Lane New York Hotel – Staying Right by Central Park
We stayed at the Park Lane New York hotel, located at 36 Central Park South, right on the southern edge of Central Park, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. You could hardly ask for a better location in Manhattan.
Park Lane has an interesting history. The hotel was built between 1967 and 1971 according to a design by the renowned architectural firm Emery Roth & Sons for real estate magnate Harry Helmsley. Helmsley and his wife Leona were among the biggest real estate players in New York at the time – they owned dozens of buildings throughout the city. The hotel had 46 floors and was part of a wave of luxury developments that sprang up along Central Park South in the 1960s.
In 2013, the hotel was purchased by the Witkoff Group for $660 million, with plans to build a supertall skyscraper more than 360 meters high on the site – which would have made it one of the tallest buildings in New York. Those plans ultimately fell through. In 2023, the hotel was acquired by the Qatar Investment Authority, the Qatari government's investment fund.
In 2021, the hotel underwent a complete renovation by the prestigious design studio Yabu Pushelberg. And I have to say, the result is truly impressive – the interiors feel modern yet elegant. Today, the hotel has 610 rooms and three dining concepts, including the Darling rooftop bar on the 47th floor, reportedly the only rooftop bar on all of Central Park South.
Our room was spacious, with two large beds and, most importantly, an absolutely amazing view directly over Central Park. When I opened the curtains in the morning, I could see the entire park in its autumn colors, ranging from gold and orange to dark green, with the silhouettes of buildings on both the Upper East Side and Upper West Side beyond it. The weather was not great – rainy and quite cold for October – but the view more than made up for it.
The Park Lane hotel stands literally just a few steps from another famous hotel – The Plaza – but more about that later.
I will write about Central Park itself in the next article because it deserves a post of its own.
The New York Subway – History, Chaos, and Homeless People
After checking in, we set out to explore the city. And the subway became our main means of transportation.
The New York subway is one of the oldest public transportation systems in the world – the first line opened on October 27, 1904. For comparison, the London Underground is even older (1863), and Boston had the first subway in the United States (1897), but the New York subway quickly became the largest American system. Today, it has 472 stations, more than any other subway system in the world, and operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week – something unique even on a global scale. More than 3 million people use it every day.
And what is the subway actually like? Honestly, it has its charm, but also its dark side. Some stations are really dirty, you encounter homeless people there, and in some places it generally feels quite neglected. Especially when you arrive from a modern airport and suddenly find yourself standing in a run-down station with broken tiles, the contrast is quite striking.
On the other hand, the subway is by far the most practical way to get around New York. Taxis and Ubers get stuck in Manhattan traffic, but the subway can take you anywhere in just a few minutes. So we used it constantly and got used to it very quickly.
Interestingly, the mosaic signs in the stations, such as the one at Fifth Avenue, are original decorations from the early 20th century. Their designs were inspired by the Paris Métro, and each station was intended to have a unique visual identity – which most of them still have today.
Times Square – The Crossroads of the World
On the day we arrived, we headed to Times Square. And despite being tired from the flight, it was worth it.
Times Square is a place you know from movies and photographs, but when you stand there for the first time, it is still overwhelming. The entire square – which is not really a square at all, but rather a bow-tie-shaped intersection where Broadway crosses Seventh Avenue between 42nd and 47th Streets – is literally covered in enormous illuminated advertising screens.
A little history: the area was originally called Longacre Square. In 1904, The New York Times moved here into the newly built One Times Square skyscraper, and the area was renamed in its honor. The funny thing is that the newspaper moved to a neighboring building just nine years later, but the name Times Square remained.
Today, approximately 330,000 to 400,000 people pass through every day, and on the busiest days the number exceeds 450,000. Around 50 million people visit Times Square each year, making it one of the most visited tourist attractions in the world.
And what truly makes Times Square unmistakable are the advertisements. Illuminated billboards have been here since the beginning of the 20th century – the first electric advertisement appeared just three weeks after the square was renamed in 1904. Today, the law even requires every building in Times Square to have a minimum amount of lighting – which is why the area glows so intensely that it is visible even from the International Space Station, the ISS.
How much does advertising in Times Square cost? Prices vary enormously. A basic digital spot on a smaller screen can cost from $300 per day. Mid-sized billboards cost between $5,000 and $50,000 per day. And the largest and most prestigious LED displays, such as those on One Times Square or the Nasdaq Tower? Those cost between $1.1 million and $4 million per year. The largest billboard in Times Square can cost up to $3 million per month. Companies such as Google, Samsung, Coca-Cola, and Apple advertise here.
By the way, here is an interesting fact: the average billboard in Times Square has a larger area than the average New York apartment.
Times Square is also the site of the famous New Year's Eve countdown – every year since 1907, on December 31, a crystal ball has descended from the top of One Times Square. Around a million people gather here on New Year's Eve, while billions more watch online and on television around the world.
We also had a meal at one of the local restaurants in Times Square, and the overall atmosphere – especially toward evening, when all the advertisements are glowing at full intensity – was truly unforgettable. We also came across an NYPD police car, which is something of a classic sight – the New York police are present in Times Square virtually around the clock.
The Plaza Hotel and Following in the Footsteps of Home Alone
After dinner in Times Square, we took the subway back toward our hotel. And on the way back, we could not miss a stop that was especially important to our daughter – The Plaza hotel.
The Plaza stands right next to Park Lane, at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Central Park South, by Grand Army Plaza. It is one of the most iconic hotels in the world. It opened in 1907, was designed by architect Henry Janeway Hardenbergh in the French Renaissance style, and has been owned by the Qatari company Katara Hospitality since 2018. The building is a U.S. National Historic Landmark.
But for us – and especially for our daughter – The Plaza was important for a completely different reason. This is where the 1992 film Home Alone 2: Lost in New York was filmed, in which young Kevin McCallister (Macaulay Culkin) books a room using his father's credit card and enjoys the luxury of a five-star hotel.
The exterior scenes were indeed filmed directly outside The Plaza hotel. The lobby is still open to the public today and looks almost identical to how it appeared in the movie. Interestingly, the hotel was owned by Donald Trump at the time of filming, and he reportedly requested a brief cameo in the film in exchange for permission to shoot inside the hotel – and he does indeed appear in the scene where he shows Kevin the way to the reception desk.
Home Alone 2 was filmed at a number of other New York locations – in Central Park (Gapstow Bridge, Bethesda Terrace, Wollman Rink), at Rockefeller Center, on Fifth Avenue, and near Carnegie Hall. However, some of the “New York" interiors were actually filmed in Chicago – for example, the luxurious hotel suite at the end of the movie was filmed at the Chicago Hilton and Towers. Altogether, filming took place at about eight confirmed real-life locations in Manhattan.
Today, The Plaza hotel offers a special “Home Alone" package for guests – it includes a four-hour limousine ride around the movie's filming locations, a large cheese pizza (like the one Kevin ordered in the limousine), an ice cream sundae served in bed, and, of course, a room with an “extra-large bed" and a mini-fridge “with a lock," just as Kevin described in the movie. The price per night naturally runs into the hundreds of dollars, but for fans of the movie, it is a priceless experience.
My daughter and I had our photo taken in front of the hotel's main entrance, and I have to say that the feeling of standing in a place you know from a movie you watched a hundred times as a child is truly special and wonderful. So if you are visiting New York with children and you like Home Alone, you should definitely stop by The Plaza.
That was our first day in New York. We arrived, checked into a hotel with one of the best views I have ever had, rode the subway, experienced the energy of Times Square, and followed in the footsteps of Kevin McCallister. And that was only the beginning – in the next articles, we will take a look at Central Park, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty, and other places we visited during our stay in New York.
