New York City: The Melting Pot Tour

The Lower East Side of Manhattan has been the primary point of entry – and first home – for newcomers for over two centuries. After Giovanni da Verrazzano first visited in the early 16th century, continuous waves of entrepreneurs, students and even fledging thespians have flocked here, seeking their fortunes in a city that's been more than a symbol of hope. Its concrete canyons provide a blanket of anonymity, its more than 8 million residents offer an enveloping embrace of humanity, and its "never sleeping" energy and constant flow of education and inspiration sustain those who call it home.

So if you find yourself with a free day in New York, you too can "be a part of it," as Sinatra advises, and get to the "very heart of it." After all, this is the place where it all began for so many.

Eschew the mega-hotels of Times Square, whose accommodations and surrounding streets offer a theme-park version of New York. Instead choose a charming boutique hotel on a residential block such as The Inn at Irving Place. Unmarked from the outside, this is actually two historic brownstones originally constructed in 1834 that have seen plenty of changes from private dwelling to speakeasy to the now-gracious hotel.

Pass up their complimentary continental breakfast and walk toward Uptown on Irving Place until you reach Gramercy Park, an urban jewel box on 20th Street. Turn right and continue two more blocks before taking a left on First Avenue, where you'll find the quintessential New York "breakfast-to-go." Ess-A-Bagel (from the Yiddish meaning "eat a bagel") has plenty of traditional favorites such as egg and bacon sandwiches, but try one of the thick, hand-rolled bagels made in the Austrian tradition, with a "schmear" of cream cheese and a paper thin slice of smoked Nova Scotia salmon.

Eat while you walk over to the subway station at 23rd and Lexington Ave and take #6 down to Broadway/Lafayette and transfer to the F to Delancey Street for the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. Even though many immigrants passed through Ellis Island at the turn of the 20th century, seeing the museum there is not practical unless you can devote at least half a day. The Tenement Museum serves up that same slice of history in a totally different, yet no less profound, way. The building that housed an estimated 7000 working-class people from more than 20 nations between 1863 and 1935 now offers guided tours through the restored apartments of 1870s German-Jewish, 1930s Sicilian-Catholic and Sephardic families.

This tour might inspire you to see that other icon whose uplifted torch pointed the way to a new life. But like Ellis Island, a trip to Lady Liberty takes a good chunk of the day. Don't get discouraged! There's another great way to see her, on the Staten Island Ferry.