Manhattan, New York

It is universally acknowledged that a woman in want of a proper evening must eventually find her way to a French bistro, and Tout Va Bien on the Upper East Side answered admirably, its onion soup a fitting reward after a day spent traversing Manhattan's endless, glittering blocks. For anyone assembling a list of the best French restaurants in Manhattan NYC, it merits a firm underline.

The King Cole Bar at the St. Regis, famous both for its Maxfield Parrish mural and its role in a rather beloved film about a certain fashion magazine, is precisely the sort of establishment where one orders a drink primarily to have an excuse to linger. The evening carried on to Broadway, where Two Strangers Carry a Cake Across New York proved a charmingly odd, thoroughly modern romance, a fine double bill for anyone planning a classic New York City date night.

A stroll down Seventh Avenue requires no particular occasion, only comfortable shoes and a willingness to be jostled pleasantly by a city that never quite slows down. It is, in its unglamorous way, one of the truest ways to experience Manhattan, better than any guided tour of things to do in NYC.

Central Park in winter empties of its usual picnicking crowds and takes on a hushed, almost Brontë-adjacent solemnity, bare branches lacing the sky above paths I have walked in every other season. It remains one of the most romantic, unmistakably free things to do in Manhattan during the colder months.

The Museum of Modern Art rewards even a modest attention span, its galleries arranged so that one may move from Monet to Warhol in the length of a single corridor. An afternoon at MoMA is, I would argue, chief among the best indoor things to do in NYC when the weather refuses to cooperate.

Bryant Park's Winter Village, all string lights and small wooden chalets selling mulled cider and mittens, is New York at its most determinedly cozy. A slow lap around the ice rink's edge is a reliably delightful stop on any Manhattan holiday itinerary.

Times Square at night defies most sensible description, a wash of neon so total it erases the very concept of darkness, and yet it remains, against all pretensions to sophistication, an essential stop for anyone visiting Manhattan for the first time.

The night before Thanksgiving finds Herald Square given over entirely to enormous, half-inflated balloons and the crews wrangling them into shape, a strange and wonderful preview of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Watching the preparations felt like a backstage pass to one of New York's most cherished holiday traditions.

Radio City Music Hall at Christmas, marquee lit and the Rockettes' kicks visible even from the sidewalk in spirit if not in fact, is exactly the sort of unapologetic spectacle the holidays require. It belongs on any respectable list of the best Christmas things to do in NYC.