Lower Manhattan

Lower Manhattan, or in the parlance of New Yorkers emphatically giving directions to tourists, "all the way downtown," has long been where the action—or transaction—is. Back when the neighborhood was the village of New Amsterdam (1626-47), its director-general, Peter Minuit, made the quintessential deal on behalf of the Dutch, trading knives, tools, and cloth to an Algonquin tribe, the Canarsees, for all of Manhattan (that he bought it for $24 is more or less an urban myth). In 1789, a year before New York City lost its title as America's capital, George Washington was sworn in as the nation's first president at Federal Hall, where, two years later, Congress ratified the Bill of Rights.

Little is left from Manhattan's colonial era, however: apart from a precious few structures built in the 1700s, the 19th-century brick facades of South Street Seaport are about as old as it gets here. As you'll notice immediately, the neighborhood has largely given way to the sometimes intimidating (and on weekends, seemingly deserted) skyscraper-lined canyons of the Financial District on Wall Street and lower Broadway. Bounded by the East and Hudson Rivers to the east and west, respectively, and by Chambers Street and Battery Park to the north and south, this is an area you can fully and best appreciate by walking its streets.

You'll want to see what's here, but above all you'll want to see what's not, most notably in that empty but evolving gulf among skyscrapers: The World Trade Center site, known as Ground Zero.

The southern tip has often served as a microcosm for a city that offers as many first shots as it does second chances, so it's appropriate that it's the key point of departure for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. This experience should never be dismissed as too touristy. Like nothing else, the excursion will remind you that this is a city of immigrants and survivors.

The city's downtown neighborhoods give you a close-up of the many cultures of Manhattan. Tucked to the west, south of Canal Street, residential TriBeCa (triangle below Canal Street) has a quieter vibe and owes some of its cred to Robert De Niro, whose investments in the area include the TriBeCa Grill and the nonprofit TriBeCa Film Center. Unlike nearby SoHo (south of Houston) and NoLIta's (north of Little Italy) in-your-face commercial presence, TriBeCa keeps more to itself. And although TriBeCa's money is hidden away behind grand industrial facades, you can get a taste of it at one of the posh neighborhood restaurants or when the stars turn out for the annual TriBeCa Film Festival in spring.