We Are Going To New York City!

I have been very excited these past several weeks. God has been so good to us. Praise God! Many good things seem to come our way lately. One of them was something dear hubby and I have been waiting for quite sometime. We got positive result on it just recently! So you bet how excited we can get ……haha! NO! We are not expecting another baby. I better rule that one out before you flood me with congrats and trigger another excitement on me..…haha!

There is another reason why I am so excited right now. We are going to New York City in several weeks. Yeah!!! Finally I am going to step my foot at the Big Apple. Dear hubby hates big cities so no surprise New York City was not in his ‘Must Go’ list. I have been giving hints to dear hubby to reconsider a trip to NYC for many years and only gotten the ‘nay’ answers. The best answer I have gotten were ‘you can go there with your sister when she comes visit’ or ‘maybe someday, hon.’

However, he seems to have changed his mind recently. As we are going to Pennsylvania in several weeks, he has given me some hints that he would not mind traveling to NYC for a couple of days afterward. And the best thing was he has given me the job on looking for hotel for us to stay while we are there. Of course without any hesitation, I took the job….haha! Since neither of us had been to NYC, it was quite a challenge to find the hotel that we would like. The key is the hotel must be at least 3 stars, good user reviews and close by to Times Square, Rockefeller Center, Central Park and other major attractions.

After searching at several popular hotel reservation sites such as Quikbook, Hotels Combined and All Hotel, I have found four hotels that I am interested at.
The first hotel is The Hotel At Times Square I found through Quikbook. The rate is only $215 per night, quite cheap considering it is a boutique hotel and the location is almost what we are looking at. Times Square and Rockefeller Center, Grand Central Station and many more attractions are within walking distance from the hotel. They also offer varieties of amenities and services including free Wi-Fi, continental breakfast, personal safes at the front desk as well as in each room, cable TV, laundry and many more.

I found the second hotel, Hampton Inn Manhattan Times Square New York through Hotels Combined. It’s a three stars hotel with a very good user reviews and the rate is just $220 per night. Yeah, I am pretty cheap…haha! So I was searching for the best yet the lowest price I could get. This hotel is only three blocks away from Times Square and Rockefeller Center and five blocks from St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Central Park is only about 0.5 miles away. So we would probably take public transportation to go there, if we stay at this hotel. One more thing I like about this hotel is they offer a buffet-style breakfast as complimentary. Dear hubby would definitely love this.

Another hotel at Hotels Combined that caught my attention is Murray Hill East Suites Hotel New York. This hotel is located in the heart of the historic Murray Hill section of Manhattan. All rooms are furnished with full equipped kitchens with free coffee and tea. Sounds great! Our little one is a picky eater and to be able to make him food while we are on the trip would be great. I also like the fact that the hotel is within a walking distance from Grand Central Station. At least we would not have to think about the transportation problem. There are also a variety of fine dining, shopping and entertainment venues that are only minutes away from the hotel. Oh yeah, the lowest rate for this hotel is $308, not bad for all the features it offers.

I searched at another site called All Hotel and found Excelsior Hotel. This is a 4 star hotel, located on the trendy West Side between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue. Their rate is quite cheap with the lowest price is $239 per night. I like this hotel because it’s close by to a museum such as American Museum of Natural History, Metropolitan Museum of Art and Children’s Museum of Manhattan. It would be nice to be able to bring Billy to one of the museum particularly the Children’s Museum of Manhattan. Dear hubby would probably insist that we visit the museum if we decided to stay at this hotel.

Then I get to the hard part, to decide which of these hotels is the best for us. After looking at these hotels, I decided to choose the Hampton Inn Manhattan Times Square New York that I found through Hotels Combined. Other than the great price, I like what most of the visitor say about this hotel. I am hoping that dear hubby would not have any objection so we could make the reservation soon. That’s one exciting job!