OPINION: Plenty to do in New York without spending a lot

On a travel Web site, a woman asked what she could do in New York without spending lots of money.
The answer: plenty. Responses agreed with my position. Although you can, you don’t need to spend lots to enjoy New York. Here are a few ideas:
The Staten Island Ferry is free. Take the subway down to South Ferry and hop aboard. The ride offers great views of the downtown skyline and the Statue of Liberty. If you time it right, you can ride across in late afternoon and return to Manhattan viewing lights in the big buildings.
Here’s another great deal. Walking the Brooklyn Bridge is free, offering one of the great views anywhere. You look one way out onto the harbor with Lady Liberty looking back at you, or turn and get a great view of the New York skyline.
You might as well ride the subway over to the Brooklyn Borough Hall neighborhood and walk in Brooklyn Heights, a very nice neighborhood (where Cher lived in “Moonstruck”) until you reach the Brooklyn Heights Promenade.
The Promenade runs several blocks along the waterfront with possibly the greatest of all views of Manhattan across the East River. It is on a bluff, so you have an unobstructed view of the skyline with the Brooklyn Bridge to your right. Then you can go down and walk the bridge and visit the City Hall area where you reach land again.
After 7 a.m. for a few hours, you can join the crowd outside the Today Show studio. This is free, too, and sometimes you see stars. Unless the weather really is bad, the regulars do some segments outside.
While there, you can view the Rockefeller Center ice rink (a restaurant during the warm part of the year), and I always walk through its flower garden to Fifth Avenue and visit St. Patrick’s Cathedral .
St. Pat’s is a glorious building, a great place to cool yourself and rest or warm yourself and rest. It’s good for contemplation, too. I always make an extremely modest contribution for their charitable work, but it’s not mandatory.
You also can join the crowd outside the CBS Early Show and/or Good Morning America.
Just walking around Times Square or Lincoln Center is good, and there is always the United Nations to visit. I make it a point to take a walking “Victory Lap” around Times Square the morning we are coming home.
Walking through Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s and all of the other big Midtown stores is great entertainment and free. (This does not mean, of course, that you can take merchandise out for free.) Grand Central Terminal is a great building and worth a visit just to see the inside.
Down around Wall Street you can witness the behavior of the people who have nearly wrecked the country. Really neat is a visit to Trinity Church at Wall Street and Broadway. Reading inscriptions on tombstones in the very old cemetery is interesting. Robert Fulton and Alexander Hamilton were among those buried at Trinity.
The Little Church That Stood on 9/11, St. Paul’s Chapel, is a few blocks up Broadway from Trinity. It is a meeting place for people visiting Ground Zero and worth a visit.
The World Trade Center site is a few blocks away and worth visiting. Battery Park nearby has great views.
Subway fare has jumped to $2.25, but unless the deal for oldsters has been scrapped, people over 65 can ride for half price. Show your Medicare card, and the booth operator will give you a pass for another ride. You can ride to the end of the line, often elevated in the outer boroughs.
Broadway shows are pricey, but you can get reduced rates, usually about half-price, at a booth at Broadway and 47th Street.
Now there is the High Line. That was an elevated railroad freight line that ran along the West Side but was abandoned years ago. Instead of tearing it down, they are making it an elevated park, reaching from the West Village to about 34th Street. It has recently opened from Gansevoort Street to about 20th Street, and it is a destination for my next trip.
There’s much, much more, ranging from cheap to free.

— Thom Anderson is a retired journalist who has 40 years experience with South Carolina newspapers, including the Morning News. He can be reached at .