Airports in New York: my experience at JFK airport

The airports in New York are iconic, you can hear about them and see them in the majority of movies and tv series. Have you ever been in New York and experienced the NYC atmosphere in the airports? JFK airport is for sure the most well-known airport. I’m telling you my experience.

One of the most well-known airports in the world: JFK in New York City

Landing at JFK was one of the most exciting experience in my life because I have always dreamt about it! I have seen and heard about this airport since I was a teenager and finally I had the occasion to arrive there. You can see part of the skyline of the capital of the world, you can feel that you land in the Big Apple and that your adventure can start!

Millions of people arrive in this airport and it is normal that the employees are not always really welcoming with the strangers who arrive at the airport. Furthermore the queue to be checked is very long and the process can be even longer. However it depends on your documents. When you enter in the United States (and you are not an American citizen) you need to have the ESTA or the Green card, this depends on your type of visit.

Check-in process at JKF Airport in New York

First of all everything is electronic but it can happen that something goes wrong and you have to be checked “manually” by an employee. This happened to me and I had to wait more or less one hour before having the stamp on my passport. In the meantime the luggage was somewhere after the border.

In addition no one was able to help me in discovering the right tape with the luggage from London! Finally I found it! Another problem is that the signals in the airport are not really clear and people are not really helpful!

The process of the check in is very long and upsetting! The members of the staff yell all the time. I could notice the difference between the behavior at Gatwick and the one of the people who work at the airport in New York. I am sure that this is due to the amount of people, or maybe not? I was a bit scared at the check-in because or the rudeness of those employees!

How to get to Manhattan from JFK airport

It is very easy to arrive to Manhattan from the airport even if it could take longer than expected due to the traffic or other kind of problems.The cheapest way is by metro. Take the Air Train from the terminal and you arrive to the Jamaica metro station. The journey lasts no more than 15 minutes. The cost of the ticket is $5.

Be aware of that there are a lot of disruptions and metro that could be closed especially at the weekends. There are always free buses that replace the metro but the journey could become even longer. This is what happened to me. To get to Manhattan I had to take a metro plus a bus that went through the whole Queens district!

An alternative way is taking a taxi or a Uber car using the app. $70 is the price for the taxi and less than $60 for Uber.

The other airports in New York: La Guardia and Newark

The closest airport to Manhattan is La Guardia. It is in the district Queens as the JKF one but it’s closest to the core of the Big Apple. This airport is used only for American flights and for the ones from Canada. There is no metro station close to the airport and the best solution to reach your destination is the bus or the taxi.

Newark airport is in New Jersey. There is no metro to get to Manhattan but there is a train to Penn Station. You can book a taxi or call Uber as well.

For any problem with your flight or your luggage you can contact Flycare.