A New York day from Brooklyn Heights to DUMBO

A small bakery on Dean Street with vintage patterned tiles and a wide pastry case. Order a cappuccino and a ginger molasses cookie. Sit at the window and watch the quiet brownstone street wake up.

A half-kilometre public esplanade cantilevered over the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. The Manhattan skyline is directly across the East River; Brooklyn Bridge to your right, Governors Island to your left. Benches the whole length.

Walk north through DUMBO — Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass. Cobblestone streets, brick warehouses turned into galleries. Stop at the corner of Washington and Water for the Manhattan Bridge-framed Empire State Building photo.

Patsy Grimaldi's original coal-oven pizzeria in DUMBO (the one next door is the newer one). The Margherita is the classic; order it 'extra charred'. Queue is manageable at 12:00; unmanageable after 12:30.

Enter at the Brooklyn side. The pedestrian walkway sits above the traffic, framed by Gothic stone arches. Thirty-five minutes at a steady pace; longer with photo stops. Keep to the pedestrian side — cyclists own the other.

Once across the bridge, keep walking north into Chinatown. Canal Street, Mott Street, Mulberry Street. Dim sum at Nom Wah (the oldest), soup dumplings at Joe's Shanghai. Graze for an hour.

Missy Robbins's pasta restaurant in a converted auto body shop in Williamsburg — Uber or L-train east. Agnolotti with sheep's milk and saffron. Impossible reservations but the bar seats open at 17:00; arrive by 18:30 to be first.