Mid-range · 6-hour walk · New York City
The High Line to Washington Square in six hours
The Vessel, the park on the old railway, Chelsea Market, Little Island, the Whitney, the Stonewall and the arch at the end of Fifth Avenue.
New York has not had a six-hour route on this site before. This is the one: the West Side from Hudson Yards down to Greenwich Village, on foot above the traffic for the first mile and a half, then through the old meatpacking blocks and the Village streets that the rest of the grid was never allowed into. Everything is free except the Vessel and the Whitney.
The route, stop by stop
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The Vessel
A honeycomb of staircases at the heart of Hudson Yards, reopened in 2024 with netting along the rails. The climb is ticketed; the view up at it from the plaza is not.
20 min here Walk here → -
The High Line
A freight railway of the 1930s turned into a park in 2009, running above the street along the West Side. Walk it south with the Hudson on your right and the art between the planting beds.
60 min here Walk here → -
Chelsea Market
Lunch in the old Nabisco factory, where the Oreo was invented in 1912; the food hall runs the length of the block below the High Line.
60 min here Walk here → -
Little Island
A park on 132 concrete tulips in the Hudson, opened in 2021, with lawns, an amphitheatre and a view back at the whole West Side.
30 min here Walk here → -
Whitney Museum
American art of the 20th and 21st centuries in Renzo Piano's building at the foot of the High Line. The outdoor terraces on each floor step down towards the river.
80 min here Walk here → -
Stonewall National Monument
Through the West Village to the Stonewall Inn and Christopher Park opposite, where the riots of June 1969 began the modern gay rights movement.
20 min here Walk here → -
Washington Square Park
Down Waverly Place to the arch of 1892 at the foot of Fifth Avenue, with chess players, buskers and the whole of NYU passing through.
30 min here Walk here →
More in New York City
Every walking route in New York City, or the full New York City guide for where to stay and what a day costs.