There's Nothing Like the Big City: New York
Home Base
Rooms at Hotel Gansevoort, in the popular Meatpacking District, come with down duvets, feather beds, and 400-thread-count Egyptian-cotton sheets. And there's a spa downstairs when you need some TLC.
The Bentley Hotel has bright, airy rooms--and the hotel gets bonus points for being near Bloomingdale's.
The suites at the Doubletree Guest Suites Times Square overlook the Theater District and fit up to six with two beds in one room and a pullout sofa in the other.
What's for Dinner? Spice Market, Jean-Georges Vongerichten's popular Meatpacking District restaurant, attracts a high-profile clientele with its intense Asian-fusion flavors, like an appetizer of mango, crystallized tamarind, and cherry tomatoes, and its wooden-temple decor.
At the end of an easy-to-miss Lower East Side alley, Freemans is a reliable hipster hideaway in a former carriage house where the food is definitely better than it needs to be: The stuffed prunes wrapped in bacon, called devils-on-horseback, are an out-of-this-world appetizer.
Try Something New in New York
Fly through the air at Trapeze School New York. It's exhilarating, as anyone who saw Carrie do it on Sex and the City knows. 917/797-1872, newyork.trapezeschool.com, classes from $47.
- Hotel Gansevoort 18 Ninth Ave., 212/206-6700, hotelgansevoort.com, from $425
- Bentley Hotel 500 E. 62nd St., 212/644-6000, from $237
- Doubletree Guest Suites Times Square 1568 Broadway, 212/719-1600, doubletree.com, suite from $329
- Spice Market 403 W. 13th St., 212/675-2322, pork $16
- Freemans Freeman Alley, off Rivington St., 212/420-0012, trout $16
- Sarabeth's Three locations, including 40 Central Park South, 212/826-5959

Summer 2007 Girlfriend Getaways