Eight Ideas for This Summer

The High Line, top, bicyclists (the author and a friend) on the Brooklyn Promenade, center, and a room at the Tenement Museum. TOP PHOTO: Michael Datikash

Wheel Life: Midtown to  Coney Island Bike Ride

Most city bike shops open by 10 a.m. and offer bicycles for rent for the entire day for $30 or less. Make sure to pick up a free city bike map, available at almost any bike store. Start your ride southbound down Hudson River Park toward the Brooklyn Bridge, where you’ll see panoramic views of New Jersey and compete for space with racers, Rollerbladers and runners.

Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge on a bike isn’t easy; pedestrian tourists are inclined to use bike lanes to take commemorative photos. So be careful on the bridge’s steep incline, as well as the breezy downward slope. At the bottom, head past the “Welcome to Brooklyn” sign etched in the road, and follow the blocks of brownstones until you reach Prospect Park — Brooklyn’s sprawling green refuge and wildlife conservatory. Ride around the western bend of Prospect Park, where you’ll pass by heavily wooded forests, expansive fields and lakeside picnickers, and exit at the southwestern corner, toward the tree-lined bike path on Ocean Parkway. As you ride toward the sunny boardwalk of Coney Island, you’ll see many a black-hatted bochur and a string of yeshivot.  

Once there, enjoy a Brooklyn Cyclones game, a rollercoaster ride or the sandy beach that was once home to so many Jewish-owned resorts. Or head east along the promenade to the traditionally Russian — and heavily Jewish — neighborhood of Brighton Beach. 

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