What do you see on a New York helicopter tour? Every landmark, in order

The first thirty seconds. The pad drops away and the helicopter swings out over the East River. This is the moment everybody talks about afterwards: Lower Manhattan stands up all at once on one side of the cabin, and the three bridges — Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg — line up to the north in a row you have seen in photographs and never from this angle.

Two to four minutes: the Upper Bay. South past Governors Island and out into open water. The Statue of Liberty arrives on her own island with nothing behind her, and the helicopter passes at roughly her own height. She is ninety-three metres from the base of the pedestal to the torch, which sounds small until she fills a window at close range. Ellis Island sits just beyond, red brick and white roofs.

Four to seven minutes: the west face. The turn north puts Manhattan on your right and the flight runs up the Hudson. The financial district goes past first, with One World Trade Center at 541 metres standing clear of everything around it. Then the gap where the island narrows, then the Midtown wall arriving tower by tower: the Empire State Building at 443 metres, the Chrysler spire behind it, the new pencil towers on Billionaires’ Row above the park.

Seven to fifteen minutes: how far north you get. This is what the extra minutes buy. Fifteen-minute flights turn around Midtown. Twenty-five-minute flights carry on to the George Washington Bridge, the 1,067-metre span at the top of the island, and come back down the other side. Westchester departures arrive from the north instead and do the whole thing in reverse.

The last two minutes. Back down the harbour with the whole skyline behind you. People who have flown say this is the view they wish they had photographed rather than the Statue: the island as a single object, which is the thing you cannot see from anywhere on the ground.

Central Park, on most flights. This is the big one. Sightseeing departures from the Manhattan heliport follow water routes and do not cross the island, so the park appears only as a gap in the skyline from the side. If you want to look straight down into it — the reservoir, the Great Lawn, the rectangle cut into the grid — you need a departure from New Jersey.

Times Square and the middle of the grid. Same reason. From the Hudson you see the west face of the island; the interior is behind it.

The inside of anything. Obvious, and worth saying because the photographs on some listings are taken from observation decks rather than from aircraft. A helicopter shows you the shape of the city, not its detail.

Brooklyn and Queens in any depth. You cross the East River and see the bridges and the waterfront, and then the route turns. The outer boroughs are context rather than content.