Activities Outside the Newark and Milwaukee Airports During a Long Layover

In each trip, our layover was actually an overnight short-hop. We arrived mid-morning or near noon on one day and left the next morning. We stayed in the airport overnight. But, the trip to New York can work for a several hour layover. We didn't go to the surrounding towns near the airports. We took the train from Newark to New York and from Milwaukee to Chicago. We took a bus tour on one trip into New York and a UN trip on another trip. In Chicago, I walked through town and did some sightseeing and shopping.

We already knew that Newark is a friendlier and easier airport to deal with than JFK, and we've never been to La Guardia. Newark is actually the closest airport to New York City. By taking NJ transit trains, the travel from Newark Airport to Penn Station in Manhattan is around 30 minutes. We like to use Penn Station since it's in Korea Town where our favorite 24 hour restaurant is, and is easily found and is very accessible. The train was $28 per person each way. Penn Station is at 33rd St near 8th Ave, which is what we walked up until we got to between 47th and 48th St near Times Square, where the tour office is. It takes about 15 minutes. We used MapQuest to route ourselves around.

The Grey Line's Downtown Loop tour takes around two hours to complete, if you don't get off the bus. But you can get off the bus at every stop and get back on as long as the buses are running. Their hours are roughly 8am-7pm. I say roughly because they do change the times without warning. On the day we went, their last bus to leave was at 6pm instead of 7pm.

We chose to take a tour instead of taking public transit or rent a car for several reasons, even though the other two choices may have been cheaper. 1-Although mid Manhattan is fairly simple to navigate, lower Manhattan can be very confusing and easy to get lost in. 2-Traffic in Manhattan can be truly impossible to navigate. 3-The tour operators know the best ways to go and to get us there in the least amount of time. And 4-We took the tour to get more familiar with lower Manhattan in a fairly safe way.

The line offers a lot of different tour options which are longer and shorter in duration than the one we took. We made our reservations on-line at http://www.coachusa.com, which cost $35.00 per person. We took the voucher and exchanged it for tickets at the tour office. There are also tour maps on-line at the same site.

We ended up getting off five times and taking six buses, adding another 3 1/2 hours to the original tour time. We got to hear six different tour operators tell a very informative and entertaining history of not just New York, but also the history of our country, since a lot of our country's early history took place in Manhattan. This is where our Nation's Capitol was located for a while, near the museum of the American Indian and the Wall Street Bull statue.

We visited Greenwich Village, just to look around, then China Town to look around and to do some serious shopping at Pearl River on Walker off of Broadway. Our next stop was the World Trade Center site. We walked around it and looked through the cracks in the construction screen to see the rubble that was left and took pictures. Our next stop was the Museum of the American Indian and the Wall Street Bull. We also found out
that behind the Museum was an earlier site of our National Capitol.

Our last stop before returning to the tour office, was Rockefeller Center/Radio City Hall. Since it was late October, the weather was on the cool side, so we saw skaters on the ice. We walked around the block and stopped in at H&M where I bought a new winter jacket. It's difficult to get a winter jacket in Florida that can be used in the colder areas of the world. These are the spots that we visited. There are around 22 stops to choose from, that are included on this tour.

After we left the tour, we walked around Times Square and did some shopping and just looking around at the sites and taking pictures. Then we walked down Broadway, stopping in at Macy's on the way to the Korean restaurant and did some more shopping. The Korean restaurant, Woorijip, is on 32nd St between 5th and Broadway. Then, we walked back to Penn Station, and took the train back to Newark Airport.

If you don't have an overnight layover like we did, you could possibly do what we did in about 4-5 hours, by staying on the bus for the entire tour and not making any of the stops that we made after the tour, or making the stops without the tour.

Another suggestion for a layover in or near New York, would be to go into the city as with the previously mentioned suggestion and walk to the UN and take their tour. The walk would take about an hour from Penn Station, along 32nd St until 3rd Ave where you may turn left until 46th St where you would turn right until you come to the UN. The facility is also on several subway and bus routes as well as the Grey Line's Downtown Loop tour. The visitor's entrance is at 1st Ave and 46th St.

The UN's guided tours run every half hour for about an hour long with a wait of maybe 15-30 minutes. Their tour hours are Monday-Friday, 9:30am-4:45pm and Saturday and Sunday, 9:30am-4:30pm, except for January and February when there are no weekend tours. Their tour information line is (212)963-8687 and the tour costs $11.50 per person. They also have a nice gift shop in the basement, where the tour ends which also includes all of the major meeting rooms. This would take around 5 hours total.
http://www.un.org/tours

Since we had successfully done an overnight trip to New York, I decided to do the same with a trip to Chicago. I was going to fly into O'Hare until I found how complicated and expensive it would be to get to Chicago. So I looked around until I found that the Milwaukee Airport was a lot cheaper and much easier to navigate. They also have
an uncomplicated AMTRAK commuter train that runs from near the airport into Chicago's Union Train Station. I ordered my AMTRAK voucher on-line for $39.60 for round-trip tickets which I got at the airport terminal. The train trip is 1 1/2 hours each direction.
https://tickets.amtrak.com

I got my information and maps, for Chicago, from http://wikitravel.org. which helped to keep me from getting turned around.

Union Train Station is nearly 100 years old and is a large and impressive building. The station is located on Canal St. I took the Jackson exit out of the station to Wacker Drive which goes through the financial district and then along the Chicago River in an area which is called the River Walk. It's a very scenic area along the river. It
was fun seeing a parking garage on top of an underground boat anchorage. I took Wacker around to Michigan Ave, which took me over the river to the Tribune Tower.

This building gets your attention even without the additional items that have been embedded into three sides of the building. The owners have acquired stones and pieces of masonry from a wide range of international sites, including the pyramids, China's Wall, the Berlin Wall and many more places from all over this country also. Eighty-eight states and countries are represented, some with several locations placed on the walls.They also have a moon rock which they've not been allowed to place on the wall.

I walked further down Michigan Ave. Which is also called the Magnificent Mile, from the Chicago River to Lake Michigan. I was there in March and the Dutch bulbs were in full bloom, all over the area in all kinds of planters and window sill gardens. It was really beautiful. The people were friendly and helpful. I walked among a crowd of people who were out shopping and having a good time. I shopped at Macy's for their chocolates and at H&M for their quality and good prices. I also shopped at Poster Plus on Michigan, Dollar Daze on Jackson and at one of the train gift shops at the train station. There are a lot of shops and restaurants along the Magnificent Mile. There are all kinds of sights to see along Wacker and the River Walk and to take pictures of, which I did.

I walked back down Michigan Ave to Jackson Ave, then back to the train station. Where I waited for the 7:30pm train, since I'd missed the 5pm one by about a 1/2 hour. I ate in the train station. There were a lot of people doing the same thing I was doing. The train station has several cafes and pubs and places to sit and eat, along with several gift shops.

I, originally, arrived at the train station at 12:30pm and, later, returned at 5:30pm. You can shorten the time
considerably by taking a taxi to and from the Magnificent Mile. But then you would miss some of the sights along the way. The total trip would have been eight hours if I'd made the 5pm train. Instead the trip was ten hours. With a taxi ride, the trip could have been maybe six hours, or less if I'd spent less time in the stores, less time shopping and sightseeing.

It depends upon how much time you have between flights as to what you're able to do and where you're able to go. I've given three suggestions with different time allocations. But this way of going is also a possibility for when you might want to go somewhere but you may not have enough time to stay, but do have enough time to go see and do some things, then to go back home, like we did.

Sources:

http://www.coachusa.com

http://www.njtransit.com

http://www.mapquest.com

http://www.un.org/tours

https://tickets.amtrak.com

http://wikitravel.org/en/Chicago/Loop

http://wikitravel.org/en/Along_the_Magnificent_Mile

http://wikitravel.org/en/Chicago

http://wikitravel.org/en/Chicago/Near_North