We always take regular Amtrak. If you book a few months ahead, it’s very affordable (we recently paid less than $200 roundtrip for a family of 4).

Anonymous wrote:We found that the train was so expensive if you want to take it at a reasonable time that it's much cheaper for a family of 4 to drive and park in NJ.

This is what we did when we went to NYC just before Christmas. We parked at a friend's house in north Jersey and took NJ Transit in (about 40 minutes) so not helpful on where to park.

For OP and two people, the bus should be fine.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We found that the train was so expensive if you want to take it at a reasonable time that it's much cheaper for a family of 4 to drive and park in NJ.

Where do you park in NJ?

The best station to park at is Hamilton, IMO. Easy access off the highway, safe.

Then you get on NJ transit. It isn’t as frequent as PATH service but also not as far to drive.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We found that the train was so expensive if you want to take it at a reasonable time that it's much cheaper for a family of 4 to drive and park in NJ.

Where do you park in NJ?

The best station to park at is Hamilton, IMO. Easy access off the highway, safe.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we go as a family of 4, we drive up and park at Metro Park in NJ, then hop on a NJ Transit train into Manhattan so we don't have to deal with the hassle of tunnel crossing.

When it's just me or I'm taking one kid, we take regular Amtrak

Which metro park do you park at?

NO, but it’s called Metro Park. It’s in Iselin, NJ.

The PATH train from Hoboken is our preferred method.

Should have said NP, not NO. And I forgot to add that I’ve done Acela (to Boston) and even getting as far as NY involved delays. I have no interest in doing it ever again.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we go as a family of 4, we drive up and park at Metro Park in NJ, then hop on a NJ Transit train into Manhattan so we don't have to deal with the hassle of tunnel crossing.

When it's just me or I'm taking one kid, we take regular Amtrak

Which metro park do you park at?

NO, but it’s called Metro Park. It’s in Iselin, NJ.

The PATH train from Hoboken is our preferred method.

We do the bus regularly from Union Station, with no problems except sometimes traffic getting into NYC. It's way cheaper than Amtrak, so worth the savings for us, but others may have different money/comfort tradeoffs.

Regular Amtrak for sure. It’s only like 30mins longer.

I live in Northwest DC and always just take the bus from Bethesda. I prefer not having to drive downtown to Union Station, the bus has been perfectly comfortable, and lets me out right near Penn station. Easy and inexpensive.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Have you looked at flying? It's often quite inexpensive, and almost always less expensive than the Acela. It's my first choice for work. For personal trips I usually drive.

No. Don’t fly. There is usually a delay and traffic getting into Manhattan is horrible. Acela or Amtrak.

Np. We have had flights cancelled so agree with pp. Amtrak is the only way we will travel.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When we go as a family of 4, we drive up and park at Metro Park in NJ, then hop on a NJ Transit train into Manhattan so we don't have to deal with the hassle of tunnel crossing.

When it's just me or I'm taking one kid, we take regular Amtrak

Which metro park do you park at?

That's the actual name of the station.

https://www.njtransit.com/station/metropark-station

Anonymous wrote:We found that the train was so expensive if you want to take it at a reasonable time that it's much cheaper for a family of 4 to drive and park in NJ.

Where do you park in NJ?

We found that the train was so expensive if you want to take it at a reasonable time that it's much cheaper for a family of 4 to drive and park in NJ.

Anonymous wrote:When we go as a family of 4, we drive up and park at Metro Park in NJ, then hop on a NJ Transit train into Manhattan so we don't have to deal with the hassle of tunnel crossing.

When it's just me or I'm taking one kid, we take regular Amtrak

Which metro park do you park at?

Op here. Thanks. I just hadn’t scrolled enough to find Sunday afternoon trains back home- the train definitely has the right times for us. Probably because I waited too long, it looks like it will be like $500/RT for the two of us. I might do the bus. Plus the bus picks up closer to where we live (Bethesda).

Thanks again.