New York City, the big apple, one could easily get lost in a fast-paced high priced place as this city. Even people who live in the suburbs of New York can experience a sudden culture shock when they enter the city limits. There's the concrete, crowds, Times Square, museums and just about any kind of information overload you can imagine. If you want you can see the softer side of the city by touring small grocery shops, and walking Central Park or you can get a taste of the corporate business world or walk along Wall Street for a ways.

It's established that it's very easy to overload the itinerary on a New York vacation. So you're going to have to decide before you go what you want to see and be discriminating and brutally honest with yourself. Do you really want to spend all day for a week pounding the pavement in effort to try and reach destinations all over town? You're stay in New York will be a rat race.

Here's a sample itinerary of things you can do in New York;

On day one you check into the hotel and get comfortable. Don't have any major treks planned, but if you can't sit still use this time to wander around the hotel and the local streets to get familiar with your location. For later on in the evening you've all ready secured tickets to a Broadway Musical. How about an industry staple like Cats?

Later on you take a trip to Central Park. Bring the kids and a picnic, and $1 each for a spin on the Carousel at 64th St. mid Park. There's also a Wildlife Conservation Center where kids will literally spend hours looking at the Sea Lions. On Tuesdays, from 5-9 pm the Cooper Hewitt Museum has pay what you wish admission. On Thursdays, Guggenheim Museum has pay what you wish hours from 6-8 pm. There are also lots of other museums in New York that have free hours and pay what you wish hours and those that don't have free hours do have times with very good admission rates. So it's fairly easy to see the sites in New York on a budget. Hey the New York Library is free and it's a wonderful piece of architecture.

As for good and exotic food it is everywhere in New York. You visit a different ethnic restaurant, deli, street vendor, or cafe for lunch each day.

When you head home you will have plenty of memories of the sites and sounds from your New York City vacation and there's certainly plenty of New York left for you to see on another trip.