Manhattan is a hard act to follow, and the four outer boroughs - Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Staten Island - inevitably pale in comparison. But while they lack the glamour of Manhattan, and life in them, essentially residential, is less obviously dynamic, they all offer uniquely unexpected and refreshing perspectives on the city.

Most visitors never set foot off Manhattan, but if you have more than a few days there's much out here to be recommended. In Brooklyn, there's salubrious Brooklyn Heights and beautiful Prospect Park , along with the evocatively run-down, carnivalesque seaside resort of Coney Island . Queens features the bustling Greek community of Astoria and Flushing Meadows , a vast park that played host to the 1939 and 1964 World's Fairs. The Bronx has in recent years begun to conquer its reputation as a vast danger zone; the notorious South Bronx - whose highlight is Yankee Stadium - has been largely rehabilitated, and the borough contains one of the country's best zoos and several historic private estates. And while a trip on the Staten Island ferry affords a grand view of New York Harbor as well as the downtown skyline, there is little on the island itself to detain most visitors from the immediate return voyage to Manhattan.