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The main street of Borough Park, home to America’s largest Orthodox Jewish community, bustles with shops filled with religious articles, tempting baked goods, children’s clothing, and linens.

A five-story, Japanese-owned townhouse filled with unusual and tasteful jewelry, clothing, home furnishings and accessories.

Well-known for its wide selection of high quality handbags and accessories, most at a discount.

Women’s knits, clothing, and shoes by American, Italian, and French designers sold at discount.

Whatever your size, you will find it at these adjacent shops stocking brand-name women’s fashions at discount prices.

Set up like a series of boutiques, Bendel’s displays innovative, fun women’s fashions for glamorous shoppers. The sales staff are particularly friendly. The signature brown and white shopping bag is such a status symbol that the pattern is used for accessories.

The colorful townhouse home of a well-known Hong Kong retailer, selling luxury fashions and home furnishings.

The 20–30-something crowd does its shopping in trendy SoHo boutiques such as Anna Sui, A.P.C., Miu Miu, and Cynthia Rowley. Shops are concentrated between Thompson Street and Broadway, between Prince and Greene streets, though any block in this area may yield a special find. This is also prime hunting ground for home furnishings at stores such as Portico and Armani Casa.

Headquarters of an old-world Italian community, the street is lined with coffee shops, bakeries, and delis.

New York’s Indian community’s shop windows are filled with ornate gold jewelry and rich saris. Food stores are redolent with spices.

“Bon chic, bon genre ,” (good style, good attitude), is the motto of this hot designer. Fans of his sexy fashions include many young Hollywood stars.

Known as “Little Odessa,” Russian is the first language on this busy street selling everything from smoked fish to Russian dolls. A boardwalk stroll by the sea is a bonus.

Astoria has the largest Greek community outside Greece, with restaurants, coffee shops, and bakeries on Broadway.

The largest department store in Chinatown has two locations and a fascinating potpourri of goods for sale. There are Chinese musical instruments, paper lanterns, kites, dried herbs, embroidered silk tops, dresses and pajamas with mandarin collars, purses, dolls, pillows, and sandalwood and jasmine soaps.

Sample a delicious soft bun filled with roasted pork or beef for less than $1, then try almond cookies, red bean cakes, custard tarts, or cream buns for dessert.

Constant lines attest to the talents of Cecilia Tam, who sells the neighborhood’s best custard cakes at a little red street stand.

Rockefeller Center is the hub of midtown New York, alive with activity day and night, integrating shops, gardens, dining and office space, and countless works of art.

A four-minute tram ride is the route to this East River enclave. Once known as “Welfare Island,” when it was home to a prison, poor house, and hospital for the insane, the 147-acre island was renamed and redeveloped in the 1970s according to a master plan drawn up by Philip Johnson and John Burgee, intended to create a quiet, almost traffic-free residential community. The plan has not been fully developed, although more than 3,000 apartments have been built, and while there is a subway stop from Manhattan, the only auto access is via a bridge in Queens.

Flea market junkies throng this school yard every Sunday, hoping for finds from among the piles of vintage clothing, crafts, books, jewelry, prints and all manner of memorabilia. Less glamorous, new merchandise, from socks to T-shirts, is also sold here. On a good day as many as 300 booths crowd the premises. A weekly green market shares the same space.

Here, at the heart of the city’s wholesale flower district, you can hardly see the sidewalk for the masses of greenery, shrubs, and flowers. Manhattan’s largest concentration of shops selling houseplants, trees, blooming plants, and all manner of flowers, fresh, dried, and artificial can be found here; if you can’t find what you want, it probably doesn’t exist. The district extends along 6th Avenue roughly from 25th to 30th streets.

The end of SoHo, the beginning of TriBeCa, and a world of its own, no street better shows the contrasts of New York. Canal Street is crowded with peddlers selling fake Rolex watches and Gucci bags, electronics that may or may not be new, and bargain stores offering sneakers, jeans, and flea-market finds. Keep walking east into Chinatown, and the sidewalk goods shift to vegetables and displays of fish.

Expect to be awed by this ultimate toy store selling giant stuffed animals to the last word in action toys. This wonderland of fun was founded by German immigrant Frederick August Otto Schwarz in 1862 and is now the flagship store for over 40 U.S. locations. Kids love looking, but be prepared to be wheedled into a purchase.

Jewels glisten in every window of this block, the center of the city’s retail and wholesale trade. It handles 80 percent of the diamonds coming into the U.S. Developed largely by Orthodox Jews, the district grew in importance during the World War II when thousands fled the diamond centers of Antwerp and Amsterdam to settle in New York. Above the shops are offices and workshops where the stones are cut and set.

An attractive setting and the inventive Italian fare created by TV chef Mario Batali make this a very popular spot. Reserve in advance to ensure a table.

This enormous, glittery room is packed on weekends for the amazing selection of dim sum. Point at your choices as the carts roll by and ignore the din.

Savor a pastrami sandwich on rye here, and you’ll understand why New York delis are famous.

The place to sample Korean stews, noodle dishes, or do-it-yourself Korean barbecue cooked at the table. Meals begin with Panchan , small dishes of hot and cold, sweet and sour foods.

The no-reservations policy at this restaurant means you might get to taste the famous Nobu black cod with miso.

Hot, hot, hot is this straight-out-of-Paris café; order steak frites or escargots, and get into the spirit of things.

Beef lovers flock to Peter Luger’s gritty, beer hall-style location for what has long been considered New York’s best steaks. Reservations are necessary.

Dim sum is the star but all the dishes are well prepared in this crowded, third-floor restaurant. Go in a large group to enable more sampling.

Head for this out-of-the-way block in SoHo to discover an absolute gem: a raffish bar with polka dot walls, reasonably priced drinks, and Spanish tapas to be enjoyed with a choice of sherries, fruity sangria, or Spanish wines. Flamenco music adds to the atmosphere. Get there early to get a seat: this place is small and popular.

Stand on the top deck to watch Manhattan’s skyscrapers recede as you sail past Liberty, Ellis, and Governors Islands. Take the car deck coming home for close-up photos of the skyline (see Staten Island Ferry).