Those of us who are fortunate enough to call NYC home have enjoyed a particularly wonderful summer. The temperature has been balmy but never too hot – while our equally chic counterparts in the UK are struggling through 58 degrees for a high, on a good day – and the culture has been abounding! I have a few suggestions for enjoying this coming weekend, one of the last before the summer season officially ends on Labor Day, September 1st.

• Explore Battery Park City and its surroundings. It’s a rarely visited side of Downtown Manhattan, with tourists choosing to stop at the South Street Seaport instead. What this means is that your stroll down the Promenade next to the Hudson River will be undisturbed by the thousands of clueless families wandering aimlessly instead through the generic mall atmosphere of the Seaport. While in Battery Park, check out the Manhattan Sailing School, offering a full weekend course which guarantees a certification test after only a few hours of instruction. Sailing is a wonderful luxury and a fantastic way to see NYC in all its glory, from its harbor.

• Discover the best kept secret of the summer in NYC –  the Annual Downtown Dance Festival, which ends with this weekend’s free performances, starting at 1 p.m., on The Lawn at Battery Park, near State Street. Guaranteed to put an extra spring in your step, the festival closes on Sunday, with a piece by Festival Director and Battery Dance Company Founder and Choreographer Jonathan Hollander. I’ll let the words of Mr. Hollander tell you more about his choreography: “I have remounted ’Where There’s Smoke’, a work choreographed in 2005, especially for the Downtown Dance Festival.  Set to music by the French composer Francis Poulenc, ‘Smoke…’ is a spiritual quest employing a neo-classical movement vocabulary and choreographic architecture on an ensemble of four dancers.  I am thrilled with the way that the work coalesced with its current cast of Robin Cantrell, Bafana Matea, Carmen Nicole and Sean Scantlebury.” With performances that have run the full spectrum, from Flamenco to modern to Indian classical dance, this festival is the perfect way to enjoy an afternoon in the city.

• Stop to enjoy a meal in this uncharacteristically green part of Manhattan. My favorite choices of the neighborhood are Battery Gardens and Steamers Landing. The first is on the southernmost point of Battery Park and has a fantastic view, right from your seat. The menu is simple and pricey. Steamers Landing has a slightly more varied menu and better prices. But both have their own worth and while nothing beats the view you get from Battery Gardens, the cozy atmosphere of Steamers Landing is quite lovely on a lazy summer Sunday.

• Watch the sun setting over NJ from the Esplanade – the boardwalk that runs directly parallel to South End Avenue. It’s a romantic setting closed to car traffic, has nearly no foot traffic and sports breathtaking views of Jersey City and the Statue of Liberty. You can even walk to the north end of the Esplanade and find some glorious Ciao Bella ice cream on Liberty Street, to make your sunset viewing experience even more pleasurable. With flavors like Amaretto or Coconut ice cream and Chocolate or Mojito sorbetto, there is definitely something for everyone.

• Take a free cruise of the New York Harbor. How, you wonder? Well, thanks to the Ikea Water Taxi, which leaves from Pier 11 at Wall Street, on the east side of the island, near South Street Seaport, that’s how! It’s magnificent in the early evening, just when the sun has gone down and downtown glistens like a mirage of sparkly diamonds. It’s totally worth the return trip on their free shuttle, as you might want to stop for drinks in Park Slope, before heading home – mind, body and spirit equally satisfied!