Fort Tryon Park

The experience

Sixty-seven acres on the ridge above the Hudson in upper Manhattan, laid out by the Olmsted Brothers on the grounds of C.K.G. Billings's Tryon Hall estate, given to the city by John D. Rockefeller Jr. in 1931 and opened in 1935. Its three-acre Heather Garden is the largest public garden in New York with unrestricted access; Linden Terrace, built on the earthworks of the Revolutionary-era Fort Tryon, stands 268 feet above sea level; the Cloisters, the Met's medieval branch, sits at the north end. Eight miles of paths run through more than 650 kinds of plant, and the park stays open from 6am to 1am.

The one Manhattan park where the view is cliffs and river rather than towers, and the best garden in it is free and unfenced.

What a membership adds.

Everything above is free: the name, the photo, the rating, the exact spot. What members get is the part you can't Google: the sourced insider tip for this place (what to order, when to go, what to skip), every day of your trips unlocked in full with the insider tip on every researched stop, and the concierge at full strength, answering with your own insider tips, no daily meter.