New York City 2023: Remembering How To Travel Again Post-Pandemic

Easing back into air travel after years of abstaining due to the pandemic, my husband Rich and I decided to return to Manhattan, a city that we knew well and felt comfortable with.  Each time we visited in the past, we stayed in different areas including the Garment District (before we knew better), Times Square, Soho, and Midtown East.  These trips allowed us to explore many of the districts south and east of Central Park, and always included at least a couple Broadway or Off-Broadway shows.  The one area we had not spent any time in so far was the Upper West Side.  This became the focus of our latest excursion to New York City. We decided to stay in the centre of the area known as Hell’s Kitchen which starts at 8th Avenue, just west of Central Park. This was a great location from which to explore some museums on the west side that were new for us.  It was also still close enough to walk to the five (yes five!) Broadway shows that we planned to watch during our stay.  It was incredible how much quieter and less touristy it was on the west side of 8th Avenue compared to the hubbub caused by the theatre crowds to on the east side of the street.

We selected the Belvedere Hotel, located on 48th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues.  Completed in 1926 as a 16-storey Art Deco-styled apartment, the Belvedere was restored and converted into a hotel in 1961 but retains many of its deco features both outside and inside the building.  We admired the circular windows and arches decorated with terracotta carvings of animals on the façade as well as the stunning design of the main lobby and elevators.  Unfortunately, these beautiful elevators were more flash than function, as they moved at a snail’s pace and we spent long periods of time waiting for the elevators to arrive, or to move from floor to floor.  It did not help that they seemed to stop at every floor, just to reveal no new passengers since people must have pushed the call button, then got tired of waiting and left.  Having no coffee machines in the rooms exasperated the issue, even though free coffee was offered in the lounge each morning.  Needing to travel down 15 flights to get the free coffee and bring it back to our room almost made the effort not worthwhile.  Despite these two shortcomings, the location of the hotel was fabulous as it was steps away from many great, non-touristy restaurants, funky shops and only 2 blocks from the A and C subway lines that brought us north and south to locations that we wanted to visit during our trip.  It was also within a few blocks from almost all of the theatres on  Broadway.  Our room was spacious, the WIFI was excellent, and we had the use of a safe to store our passports and extra cash, a mini fridge and microwave.  There were several grocery stores within a few blocks so that we could buy fruit and yogurt for a quick breakfast before heading out each day.  We would consider staying here again on a future trip if it makes sense for our itinerary.

As we had done for the past few years before COVID, we flew Porter Airlines from  Billy Bishop Airport to Newark, New Jersey and then took the AirTrain to Manhattan’s Penn Station.  It had been so long since we traveled on an airplane that I seem to have forgotten all the rules of engagement.  When purchasing our airline tickets for myself and my husband, I wrote down “Rich” which is how I refer to him.  I totally forgot that the name on the e-ticket needed to match exactly to his proper name listed on his passport.  No one seemed to notice the difference in names even as Rich went through security, or when he presented his eTicket to the gate attendant who was checking for proof of vaccination.  It was not until we were actually boarding the plane and Rich presented his eTicket and passport to get onto the plane that an issue arose.  I had already made it through the final check and was on my way to the plane when I saw that he was turned away.  I was in a panic since I had no idea what happened, whether he would make it onto the plane, and if he did, whether there would still be room in the overhead bin to take his carry-on bag. Fortunately, Rich just had to go back to the gate agent to get his name changed on his ticket and when he eventually made it onto the plane, he was still able to put his luggage in the overhead bin above our seats.

Even before this point, I encountered some “excitement” during the security check.   I had placed my jacket, properly-sized carry-on bag, purse, plastic bag with liquids and laptop on the conveyor belt.  I walked confidently into the full body scanner wearing a mock long-sleeved top over a t-shirt, jeans and running shoes. I even made sure to empty my pockets of Kleenex and was wearing a rubber headband as opposed to my usual metal hairclips and was confident that I could waltz through the scanner.  To my surprise, a big “mass” showed up on my body scan.  When the female security guard asked what I was wearing underneath, I lifted my mock shirt to reveal little plastic decorative beads on my t-shirt.  She hesitated for a second, then asked if I was wearing anything underneath my sparkly top.  Luckily, I was wearing a spaghetti-strapped tank top underneath, so she asked me to remove the offending top, as well as my plastic headband (?!?) and return to the scanner.  This time I successfully scanned and was allowed through.  It might have been a much bigger deal had I had not worn a tank top on underneath!

Getting data on our cellphones has become much easier now that we each have an iPhone 13 which supports the electronic SIM (eSIM) technology.  In the past when we landed in a new country, we would search for a local Telcom store like Virgin or Orange and purchase a physical SIM card for that location.  We would wait while the salesperson installed and configured on our phones, while safely storing away the SIM card that we use at home.

With the eSIM, you choose a provider, download and configure their mobile app in advance, and can pre-purchase a data plan for the desired country.  Your physical “home” SIM card remains in your phone.  We went with Airalo, whose U.S. plan gave us 1GB data over 7 days for $4.50 US, with the option to top up another 1GB for another $4.50 each.  We were able to pay for it with Paypal using my US credit card.  Once purchased, under the Cellular setting there are now two items under “SIMs”.  The primary SIM represents our home SIM card while the Travel SIM contained our new US eSIM, which, for Airalo, is sourced by Verizon.  When we landed in New York, we turned off the primary SIM and turned on the Travel one.  Within seconds the new SIMs connected, and we were off and running.  Towards the end of our week stay, we were both running low on our 1GB data.  We elected to top-up and paid another $4.50US.  Immediately, we received another 1GB of data.  Had we planned better, we would have bought 2GB of data each right off the bat and paid only $8US for 15 days.  Either way, this is a much less expensive solution than the US Roaming fees that we wracked up on previous trips to the U.S. or the 20-30 Euros (or English Pounds) that we used to spend on local SIMs when we traveled to Europe, never mind the time it took to get to a local Telco provider.

The only downside is that there is no cell phone service attached to the SIM and we could not use the iOS Messages app.  However, we could still text using Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger, and for the one toll-free phone call that we needed to make (see below), we were able to use the hotel phone in our room. These eSIMs work internationally as the application partners with a Telco provider in each supported country.  Next year if we return to Europe and resurrect the Portugal trip that we had to cancel one week before COVID shut down all travel, we can use Airalo to buy an eSIM for that country and the price is still $4.50US for 1GB/7 days, or $19US for 30GB/15 days.

On my retirement blog, I wrote at length about my strategy to save currency exchange fees by accumulating US cash from my US dividend paying stocks, depositing it into my TD bank US-fund chequing account, paying for all travel expenses using my TD US-fund VISA credit card, and paying off the credit card fees from my US cash.  I augmented the plan once EQ Bank started paying 3% interest rate on their US currency accounts.  Now I move all of my US dividend cash to EQ Bank to accumulate interest until I need to use it and then transfer over to TD when I need to pay off my US credit card (unfortunately EQ Bank won’t let me do this yet).

I finally had all this set up and accumulated a large enough repository of US cash to fund a vacation when COVID hit.  This trip to New York became the first opportunity for me to execute this plan.  From home, I was able to purchase tickets to our Broadway shows and pay for our hotel accommodations using the US credit card.  We withdrew a small amount of US cash from our TD US bank account, but for the most part, we planned to put everything on the US VISA.

Imagine our shock when our first attempt to use the card at the New Jersey Air Train station failed!  We could not tap or use our PIN to make the purchase.  Not wanting to waste time, we paid in US cash for our return train tickets to/from Manhattan. This was really worrisome since we only brought enough cash for emergencies and small purchases and now we already unexpectedly used up almost 15% of our allocation.  Hoping for the best, we dropped our bags off at the hotel because it was too early to check in and went for our first Upper West Side walk.

Wanting to test our credit card again on something small and inexpensive (so as not to burn through much more cash if before we had a chance to call TD Bank if the card failed again), we stopped at Levain Bakery on West 74th Street to buy a walnut chocolate chip cookie.  This turned out to be one of the best cookies ever, not only because it was delicious but because Rich tapped on the machine and our credit card worked!  We continued to use the card for the rest of the day, and it worked at a museum and with some difficulty, at the subway station.  In all these cases we were able to tap, so it became apparent that the issue was the PIN on the card.  By the way, in order to buy or top-up a Metrocard (subway pass) at the machines using a credit card, you need to enter your Zip Code which being Canadian, we did not have.  We asked the transit attendant who told us to enter 99999.  When we finally got checked into our hotel room after our walk, I called the toll-free number for TD Bank Customer Support and got the PIN reset.

We were able to successfully use our credit card for the rest of the trip but found the processes followed in various restaurants to be antiquated and non-standard. In Toronto, we are used to servers coming to our table with the credit card machine which we use to pay for our bill by tapping or entering our PIN, all while our card stays in our possession.  At our first New York restaurant, the server took away our credit card (presumably to swipe it on the old-styled manual machines) and returned with a paper slip and pen for signature and a line for the tip which would be added later.  While the charge was pending our online statement, the amount without the tip showed.  When the charge was finally posted, the amount with the tip showed up. I must admit that we felt a bit taken aback to have our credit card leave our possession, since this doesn’t happen anymore in Toronto, where the machine is always brought to our table.

At the next restaurant, once again our card was taken from us but this time it was returned along with a device where we had to provide a digital signature.  At a third restaurant, they wanted photo ID before accepting our credit card.  At a fourth establishment, they had devices like we have back home, and we were able to tap to pay.  When we asked why all the restaurants were so different and had such old-fashioned processes, we were told it is because there are so many little banks that all handle transactions differently.  Who would have thought that a major cosmopolitan city like New York would be so backwards in this regard?

After our few initial hiccups while reacclimatizing ourselves to the art of international travel (and this was just to the US .. we have not tried to return to Europe yet!), we had no further issues or surprises and the rest of the trip proceeded smoothly.  When we returned home, I made sure there was nothing on my t-shirt and I wore nothing in my hair!