Energetic, eclectic tours of Brooklyn and beyond, from a veteran guide.

Why tour with Norman Oder of NY Like a Native?

Why visit Brooklyn neighborhoods?

Brooklyn tours with guide Norman Oder

See reviews on TripAdvisor, Yelp, and Google.

"Fast walking, fast talking Brooklynite Norman Oder"
--Rough Guide to NYC.

"The thinking person's tour guide"
--TripAdvisor reviewer

"Their favorite day of class over the semester"
--College professor

"Mr. Oder has an encyclopedic knowledge of the borough..." --Wall Street Journal

"...incredibly knowledgeable, dynamic, and engaging."--Trip Advisor reviewer

Veteran Brooklyn tour guide Norman Oder aims these private tours--mainly walking and public transit--to be wide-ranging and briskly-paced. (Please note: a private tour can go at your preferred, slower pace!) Most tours involve 2+ to 5 miles of walking, but can be adapted, Vehicle tours range farther.

Please click on section headings in menu for full list of tours.

These tours, all led and booked by Norman--no substitutes or third-party sellers--are geared to energetic, curious people, and have attracted enthusiastic visitors of all ages, from student groups to seniors, as well as New Yorkers and Brooklynites interested in learning more.

They are generally for visitors who've already visited city highlights and want to go deeper.

While exploring neighborhoods, we aim to understand the history of what we see, what's changed, and why. I typically bring a binder with relevant images (some old, some relatively recent), and sometimes photo books.

The idea, as one tour guest aptly put it, is to get the gestalt of a neighborhood, recognizing the gains and pains of change.

What I offer

Decades of experience as a tour guide (and journalist)
Two introductory tours of Brooklyn, which can be further adapted
Tours in more than 15 Brooklyn neighborhoods
Tours in three key neighborhoods of Queens
Tours in two fascinating Manhattan neighborhoods
Private tours year-round, scheduled at our mutual convenience
Transparent pricing, for standard tours

Please note: these tours were originally conceived for people visiting the neighborhoods after starting in Manhattan. If you already live in or are visiting Brooklyn (or Queens), I may be able to adapt the routes to take advantage of your specific starting point.
See a map of the neighborhoods where I lead tours (Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan) here.
Below: a very general outline of Brooklyn neighborhoods, indicating where I lead walking tours. (I have taken people to other neighborhoods!)

Map of Brooklyn neighborhoods, with my annotations, By Peter Fitzgerald [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Brooklyn, the most populous (2.6M+) of New York City's five boroughs, would be the nation's fourth-largest city if it were independent. When you explore with me, you learn about the ebb and flow of Brooklyn's history and neighborhoods, especially its fascinating and uneven rebirth, and witness its diversity, complexity, charm, and challenges. I aim neither to sugarcoat nor to denigrate.

My private tours can focus on Brooklyn highlights, specific neighborhoods, or multiple areas, including parts of Queens and Manhattan. I try to be more wide-ranging than a purely academic or architectural tour, but mindful of history and more substantive than a tour, say, focused on food (though we can eat!). I'm intrigued, enthused, and sometimes confounded by what we see. I can work with you to customize tours.

A visit to Brooklyn means looking at neighborhoods, some of which are quite large, but are the building blocks of the city. We should gain clues from the landscape and built environment--buildings, parks, businesses, signage, murals--to help us understand what we see and how things might have changed.

I can introduce you to some of Brooklyn, but, remember, it's larger and more populous than the City of Paris (within the peripherique), and it "contains multitudes." You can't see everything in a day!

A message to international visitors: you are welcome!

First steps to your tour

Nearly all my tours are private tours, and mostly on foot. My listed tours usually are conceptualized at at least 2.5 hours, but can be modified. The tours rely mainly on walking, sometimes adding public transit or taxis. A tour relying mainly on a vehicle can cover much more ground, with a customized route.

Brooklyn is a borough, not a neighborhood. It consists of many neighborhoods, some with more than 100,000 people.

New to Brooklyn? Start at the waterfront near the Brooklyn Bridge. with Brooklyn 101 (3+ hours), which includes classic neighborhoods and borough highlights. The expanded Brooklyn 202 adds more neighborhoods. For a less-demanding 2-2.5-hour tour, choose a variation of Brooklyn 101.

There are many other neighborhood options, though not as central to Brooklyn's history. (These are better for people who've already seen some of Brooklyn.) Also, you could go beyond Brooklyn, to the Lower East Side and East Village in Manhattan, or maybe Long Island City or Jackson Heights in Queens.

I can also combine neighborhoods for themes; many but not all have interesting architecture; some have waterfront views; some have more food options; others help tell the story of different immigrant groups; some show recent redevelopment. It's best to approach neighborhoods that are relatively close to each other.

To save time, please first check tour pages, fees, my list of "top misconceptions" about Brooklyn, as well as the maps linked from this page. (My FAQ is long but, I hope, enlightening.)

Also see some of my Blog posts, such as:

Then get in touch with your preferences and questions.

Bonus plug: How to save on restaurants and cafes using the InKind app (it's a deal!)

I suggest using a desktop or laptop to read this text-heavy site.