Across the Kill van Kull in New Jersey, you can see what I believe is the metropolitan area's first large-scale wind turbine. (We saw a much smaller rooftop array in the Bronx last year.) Operational since June 2012, the 262-foot-tall turbine was built by the Bayonne Municipal Utilities Authority to power two of that city's sewage pumping stations. (Compare to Washington.)

of the Staten Island Railway's abandoned North Shore branch. That's the beautiful Bayonne Bridge spanning the Kill van Kull off in the distance.

I'm standing on Fillmore Street, looking at Van Buren Street, with Buchanan Street running two blocks behind me.

That's Bayonne on the other side of the Kill van Kull, with the hazy skyline of Newark barely visible off in the distance at left. On the right side of the background, just behind the various storage tanks, you can see the clubhouse and the man-made hills of the exclusive Bayonne Golf Club. Here's a closer look at everything.

This Little Free Library is installed outside the Unitarian Church of Staten Island. It's a fitting location: in 1886, the church established the Castleton Free Circulating Library, one of Staten Island's first public libraries. (Two of the church's founding members were the parents of Robert Gould Shaw, the guy Matthew Broderick played in the film Glory.)

Snug Harbor's one-acre Healing Garden commemorates the Staten Islanders killed on 9/11. Among other features, the garden contains — or at least did when it opened — "saplings from a pear tree that was rescued from ground zero".

of the Connie Gretz Secret Garden

This Snug Harbor fortress was built by a Staten Island man as a memorial to his wife, who died of a rare and incurable form of cancer at the age of 46, less than two months after being diagnosed. Inside the walls is a hedge labyrinth that leads to a small, enclosed garden in the center, inspired by the novel The Secret Garden. According to a sign near the entrance, the labyrinth "is meant to teach children and remind grownups that although life's path is never straight, we should look for the magic and joy in each step of the journey. For it is only through life's journey that we each find the peace and beauty of our own secret garden."

This building is one of five identical cottages that originally served as living quarters for Snug Harbor staff members. In the late 19th century, the institution's secretary, engineer, gardener, baker, and farmer each got their own cottage. The buildings (four of the five, I believe) are now used to house resident artists. Edith Susskind, the impressively coiffed "grande dame of Staten Island", who recently passed away at the age of 93, operated her gift shop out of one of the cottages for a few years prior to the residency program being reinstated in 2012.

There's scarcely any signage here at the New York Chinese Scholar's Garden. One exception, however, is a somewhat surreal plaque identifying this spot as the Moon Viewing Pavilion Terrace of Crispness, sponsored by Bell Atlantic.

Here's a video tour of the garden; pardon the loud music.