Poets House, Mercer Labs, Printemps & Fraunces Tavern

Poets House

Poets House has occupied this choice spot on River Terrace in downtown Manhattan since 2009. The river in question is the Hudson,  and we enjoy watching it flow by while standing at large windows facing west, the skyscrapers of Jersey City on the other side.  A noncirculating library, Poets House contains a large assortment of poetry to be read on the premises.  Comfortable chairs, tables and couches array along the main reading room, and it’s a quiet place for us to escape the hubbub of the city.

Mercer Labs

From the sublime to maybe the ridiculous, depending how you feel about immersive art exhibits, we leave Poets House on foot for Mercer Labs. Our path meanders along the Hudson to Brookfield Place, then up the grand marble staircase and back down the other side and beneath West Street, continuing underground to the Shops at the Oculus (don’t call it a mall!) and then back to street level and Mercer Labs on Dey Street.

Immersive art exhibits combine light, sound, mirrors and other sensory tricks to disorient the viewer, and Mercer Labs effectively makes this happen within 15 display rooms, some vertigo-inducing but many worth lingering in. It takes us nearly an hour to complete the journey, a series of visual, audio, and tactile experiences.

Printemps

Next we try to visit the luxury Parisian shopping complex (don’t call it a department store!) Printemps, which has opened a New York outpost at the fitting address of 1 Wall Street. We love browsing through things we can’t afford, but our arrival is one day short of the grand opening, so we content ourselves with looking in the windows like peasants. Let them eat cake.

Fraunces Tavern

Then on to simpler colonial roots for dinner at Fraunces Tavern, which has been a Pearl Street tavern since 1762. The ubiquitous George Washington dined here. We expect it to orient toward tourists because of a museum attached to the restaurant, but Fraunces Tavern is a delightful place to dine, with dark wood and candles in two dining rooms. Some foodies diss the cuisine here, but we enjoy the chicken potpie and lobster, mac, and cheese. Don’t tread on me, we say.

Grounds for Sculpture, Herrintown Woods & the Meeting House

Grounds for Sculpture

The brainchild of artist (and Johnson & Johnson heir) Seward Johnson, Grounds for Sculpture has occupied this Hamilton site since 1992. We’ve visited many outdoor sculpture parks, and Grounds for Sculpture’s 42 acres provide an excellent walking space, not too big and beautifully landscaped with surprises around every corner. Bamboo groves sprout throughout, and imaginative sculptures of different sizes populate the terrain.

It's a cold, windy day on our visit, so we have the place mostly to ourselves, but Grounds for Sculpture can get crowded in nice weather, so reservations are recommended.

Though our plans will take us farther north this day, pairing Grounds for Sculpture with the adjacent, and unfortunately named Rat’s Restaurant makes a good day trip also. You can walk between the two facilities, and Rat’s is beautifully decorated in French chateau style, with cuisine to match.

Herrontown Woods

The sun beams down, mitigating the wind. We need to rid ourselves of cabin fever, and after Grounds for Sculpture we drive a half hour north for a hike in Herrontown Woods outside of Princeton. This nature preserve — the oldest in Mercer County, dating from the 1950s — recruits a large volunteer force who build and support the trails with boards and large stones over the muddy parts. We choose the 1.3-mile red trail, which forms a loop with some elevation rise at the beginning but fairly easy. It takes us 45 minutes to complete the path, and we vow to return later in the year when the trees have leafed out.

The Meeting House

We then drive a few minutes to a new restaurant on Witherspoon Street just north of downtown Princeton. In addition to an a la carte menu, the Meeting House offers a three-course $45 prix fixe menu that is a great value considering the quality of the food. The bar bustles with young people, and wide windows pull in plenty of light. A good choice when in the Princeton area.

Liberty Science Center, Maddy Rose & Liberty State Park

Liberty Science Center

Liberty Science Center, the 300,000-square-foot interactive science complex adjacent to Liberty State Park, houses 12 exhibition halls, a planetarium, and a 3D movie theater—a mecca for schoolchildren. We haven’t been here in a long time and decide to do so today sans children to see if this site also works for adults.  The answer is yes! We scheduled a one-hour visit but easily could have stayed for two.

Kids swarm the 35-foot-high climbing gym, observe a robot solving a Rubik’s Cube, and point out details of the elaborate train set. Marching ants, twisting pythons, and hungry turtles among other creatures also command our attention. For a reasonable additional price, we could have seen one of four special features, like the show about the recent and rare nighttime planetary parade.

The seemingly air-borne gym floats within the atrium.

Gravity-defying ball that kids can remove from or place in the air stream coming from the fan below.

Maddy Rose

A short drive from Liberty Science Center and inside Liberty State Park, the charming Maddy Rose restaurant offers spectacular views. While enjoying an excellent lunch, we view, across a wide tree-lined field, the intersection of the Hudson River and New York Harbor with the Manhattan skyline as a backdrop. We plan to return one evening as the sun goes down and the lights come up.

Liberty State Park

Just 2,000 feet from the Statue of Liberty, Liberty State Park holds  several postlunch options. Ferries to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island shuttle to and fro just down the street. And families fly kites in the open fields beneath the sunny skies. We opt to follow the two-mile promenade skirting New York Harbor. Along the way we scan the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, and an impressive panorama of lower Manhattan—all of which we vow to see on our return nighttime visit.

New Year’s Eve in New York City—MOMA, Tree at Rockefeller Center, Grand Brasserie & Oyster Bar in Grand Central

One of our favorite traditions is to spend New Year’s Eve in Manhattan while the city is all decked out and relatively unpopulated, then to exit in the early evening before the madness begins.

MOMA

First, we walk uptown to the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA), past huge crowds on the west side of Sixth Avenue, waiting to be let into Times Square, which is blocked off. It will be ten hours before the ball drops at midnight, so this will be quite a wait for them, so good luck!

MOMA, on the other hand, is open but lightly populated. We tour miles of artwork that was revolutionary in its time and in many ways still seems so.

The highlight for us is Otobong Nkanga’s tapestry titled Cadence, which hangs ceiling-to-floor against the tallest wall of the atrium, 60 feet long.

Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center

The Christmas tree still stands at Rockefeller Center. Although a few feet shorter than last year’s Norway spruce, this 2024 giant reigns supreme over the ice-skating rink and photo-shooting tourists. We approach beneath the trumpeting angels, grateful that the crowds have thinned since before Christmas. Always nice to see the tree!

Grand Central terminal

Grand Central, where we plan to spend the rest of our evening before heading home, beckons just a short distance from Rockefeller Center. The Main Concourse, as always, is bustling and beautiful—probably our favorite space in New York. We plan to have drinks and dinner in the terminal but decide to explore first, including the Grand Central Market, where we would shop every day if we lived closer.

Grand Brasserie

Occupying 16,000 square feet in Grand Central’s historic Vanderbilt Hall, the Grand Brasserie restaurant with towering ceilings seats 300 in the main room and another 100 in the Green Room in back. We choose the Green Room for our New Year’s Eve celebratory drinking. It’s more intimate and beautifully decorated. In fact, the whole of Grand Brasserie delights the eye.

The Oyster Bar

Then we head downstairs to the Oyster Bar for dinner. The food here gets deservedly mixed reviews, but it’s a night for tradition, and this tiled, arched space has been around since 1913. Gourmands recommend ordering a dozen oysters or clam chowder along with a martini if you want the best results. Agreed!

And with that, we’re done, safely exiting the festivities by 8 pm. Happy New Year!

New York Botanical Garden Holiday Train Show & Hudson Garden Grill

New York Botanical Garden Holiday Train Show

Normally we visit the Botanical Garden in warm weather so we can walk the grounds, but this year the Holiday Train Show beckons. (It continues through January 25.) The temps have barely cracked 20 degrees by the time we arrive, but inside the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, it’s nice and warm.

Here, the sprawling train display meanders through three glasshouses and an exhibition tent. More than 25 G-scale model trains rush past hundreds of scaled New York City buildings, trundling over and under bridges and churning through tropical, desert, and temperate plant habitats. It takes nearly a magical hour (but who’s counting?) to wind our way from beginning to end.

Trains trundle under and over bridges near a miniature Central Park.

Hudson Garden Grill

Another norm breaks when instead of wandering down nearby Arthur Avenue to our favorite restaurant, we walk next door to the high-ceilinged Hudson Garden Grill. The hungry preschoolers among us are grateful. Tucking into cauliflower steak, cobb salad, and (the reportedly excellent) chicken fingers, we feel cozy and warm by the huge windows that frame a scene of snowy lawn and trees.

A spacious dining room and a member of the excellent wait staff

InfoAge Science & History Museum, Asbury Park Boardwalk & Kimchi Mama

InfoAge Science & History Museum

In the planning stage, the trip to the InfoAge Science and History Museum in Wall, New Jersey, seemed like an afterthought, an add-on, a place to visit in cold weather where we could view some decommissioned military equipment and then head for lunch. So wrong! We could have spent a day here and not seen everything.

First, the trains. With two large rooms filled with active train sets, there’s lots of noise and plenty to see. Some tracks even allow kids to operate the locomotives.

Then on to the military stuff. This museum is heavily oriented toward early stage military communications, like radio.  The buildings were originally constructed as Camp Evans during World War One by the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company as part of a project to wirelessly surround the planet. The equipment on display in this museum is the ancestor of all the wireless gadgets we use today.

The museum is stocked with a small army of retired guys who are dying to impart their knowledge. We let them tell us everything they know—good for them and good for us.

Five Sullivan brothers enlisted in the Navy and requested to serve on the same ship, which sank with all them onboard.

Exhibits include the 1940s-1960s mainframes, 1960s-1970s minicomputing, 1970s-1990s microcomputing, and modern technology.

The M-209 converter was a small and rugged machine that required no batteries to encipher and decipher messages in the field during WWII.

A wedding dress constructed from parachute material.

Asbury Park Boardwalk

Asbury Park is a short drive away. Our original intent was to Christmas shop in historic Convention Hall. The shopping there is somewhat disappointing, though, but it’s a brisk, beautiful walk along the boardwalk (one of the best boardwalks on the Jersey Shore) to get there. Most of the stores along the way are closed for the winter, but not the Silverball Retro Arcade, well worth a visit if you’re into pinball machines.

Kimchi Mama

We heard about this Korean restaurant on Asbury Park’s Main Street, and it does not disappoint. A family-run operation, they serve bowls of kimchi and piping hot tea both before and during the meal. The Korean pancakes and chicken hot stone bowl counter the cold and satisfy our tastebuds. We also like the décor, subdued and a world apart from the street scene outside.

In sum, a surprisingly interesting museum, a great lunch, and a good walk on the boardwalk.

The Strand Bookstore, Henry Street Galleries, the Bar Room at the Beekman Hotel, the Mysterious Bookshop & Frenchette

The Strand Bookstore

The Strand was founded in 1927 and has occupied this choice spot on lower Broadway since 1957. Iconic doesn’t describe the half of it. The Strand used to boast of “18 miles of books,” and we have fond memories of meandering through its disheveled, dusty rows that had everything you could possibly want — and then some. The store has been remodeled in recent years, with  a more modern floor design, lots of light and space to browse. We won’t wax nostalgic about the old Strand. This bookstore is still great!

The Galleries of Henry Street

Artists and those who display their works need cheap rent, and although nothing is cheap in Manhattan anymore, the best value might be on Henry Street, down here on the southern edge of Chinatown hard by the Manhattan Bridge.

We go to 56 Henry Street because that is the name of the gallery that is displaying ceramic pots we want to see, but the display — called Pot Shop — is not at 56 Henry Street for some reason but rather at 105 Henry Street, which we have difficulty finding because there is no signage outside.  When we do find the gallery, the two employees who work there, once we get them to look up from their laptops, tell us that they put a sign outside a week ago but it was quickly covered with stickers from Chinatown street entrepreneurs.

Here is nostalgia, finally, washing over us as we recognize the unique dysfunction that once was New York City. Could Henry Street be the next Spring Street, raffish and underpopulated now but soon to be cool and impossible to afford?

And Pot Shop? Very interesting. We almost buy a pot.

The Bar Room at the Beekman

It’s time for a drink after all that runaround. The Beekman Hotel is close by in the Financial District, styling itself as a taste of old New York, but it’s really a modern sort of place, with a large area serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner at low, casual tables (though nothing casual about the prices) and a bar along one wall dishing up craft cocktails. Farther from the entrance is the cool section, above which rises a nine-floor atrium. Much is made of this space with its used books and throw pillows, but we think it would benefit from more separation from the rest. Still, a good place for a drink downtown.

The Mysterious Bookshop

We’re early for our dinner reservation at Frenchette, which is a 20-minute walk away in Tribeca, so we dawdle along the streets and accidentally stumble on a place called the Mysterious Bookshop on Warren Street, selling mystery and suspense books exclusively, with an entire section devoted to Sherlock Holmes. We hang out for a few minutes and then continue to the restaurant.

Frenchette

Something has gone awry with our dinner reservation. The restaurant thinks we cancelled it but seats us anyway because we’re early. We get the perfect server, experienced and quick to share the information he’s stored over the years, though we do miss the New York servers from our youth, haughty and arrogant, as if we weren’t quite good enough to dine there. They amused us no end.

 The menu gets a complete rundown (“the steak is good but where else are you going to get duck au poivre?”), and we settle in, enjoying both the food and the bustle of servers and fellow diners.

A day well spent.

Ringing Rocks County Park, ArtYard, Gemstone Gallery, Modern Love, Frenchtown Bookshop, FiNNBAR

Ringing Rocks County Park

We are drawn to this park on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware by tales of a strange field of rocks that ring loudly when struck. “Bring a hammer!” the marketing people advise. The field of rocks is visually arresting, but our hammer produces a dull sound much like hammers do when hitting rocks. Apparently the children roaming the middle of the boulder field are having better luck, or so we’re told. But our mature ankles aren’t going to complete that trip in one piece, so we head elsewhere for natural entertainment.

Fortunately, there’s also a nice loop trail that leads down to a ravine and back again. No false advertising here. We were warned that the ravine’s waterfall would be dry this time of year, and it is, though the ravine itself floods our eyes with autumn color.

ArtYard

Next we drive a short distance to Frenchtown, NJ, and park just off Bridge Street. A stroll along the Delaware, beautiful as always, brings us to an exhibit space called ArtYard. We remember ArtYard when it was little more than an unfinished building with a few sculptures in it. Still free to enter, it now occupies a grand structure, at least by Frenchtown standards, with two floors of galleries and a small auditorium for lectures and concerts.  We enjoy, among other things, Unfinished Verses, a set of rectangular boxes hanging from the ceiling with peep holes for viewing pages from sketchbooks. The idea, according to the artist, is for the viewer to seek out the artwork rather than passively view it on a wall.

Shopping

We return to Bridge Street, bustling with small shops, including  Gemstone Gallery, seller of every type of gemstone imaginable, a specialty gift shop called Modern Love, and the Frenchtown Bookshop (always a good sign when a town supports an independent bookstore). Our ambition is to limit ourselves to window shopping, but of course we end up buying something from every charming store we enter.

FiNNBAR

We end our day at FiNNBAR, also on Bridge Street. This fine restaurant is run by chef and co-owner Cal Peternell, previously of famed Chez Panisse in Berkeley, where local sourcing was practically invented in America. The farm-to-table menu at FiNNBAR changes daily.  Our pasta in a delectable pumpkin sauce does the trick, and we leave Frenchtown with satisfied appetites, several gifts, and a hammer.

FiNNBAR exterior

FiNNBAR interior dining area. The restaurant’s profits benefit Studio Route 29, which aims to strengthen the art community at large by extending resources and access to those historically dispossessed of them.

Carriage House at Culver Lake, Glacial Trail at Kittatinny Valley State Park & Hope, New Jersey

The Carriage House at Culver Lake

We travel to beautiful northwestern New Jersey, stopping first for lunch at the Carriage House at Culver Lake, a nice little German restaurant overlooking the southern tip of Culver Lake. Our preference would have been dinner at the Carriage House, taking advantage of its full bar, but the prospect of an inebriated long drive home in the dark decides lunch for us.

There’s an expansive view of the lake from the tables along the back windows where we sit. The waitstaff is friendly, the interior pleasant, the cuisine outstanding, with classics like Hungarian beef goulash and wiener schnitzel on the menu.

Glacial Trail at Kittatinny Valley State Park

Fortified, we head south to Kittatinny Valley State Park, which sits adjacent to Lake Aeroflex (named very unromantically after the company that acquired the lake in 1957).  It is the deepest natural lake in New Jersey at 110 feet, carved out by glaciers. We choose to walk the Glacial Trail, which runs along the shoreline for half a mile before turning inland. Here we wind past enormous, house-size boulders that were deposited during the last Ice Age.

Hope

There’s still plenty of light by the time we finish our hike, and so we keep up the German theme by stopping at Hope on the way home, a small town of fewer than 2,000 that was founded by Moravian Germans in 1757. The Moravians only lasted about 50 years at this site but left behind wonderful stone architecture that still stands today, including a grist mill, distillery, church, bridge and meetinghouse, most of which are still in use, though for more modern purposes like the charming Inn at Millrace Pond, a popular spot for weddings.

With headstones so old they cannot be read, the cemetery sobers us. Lives lived and seemingly forgotten, even by the elements. But then we find markers with women’s names who died in their twenties possibly from childbirth. Just steps away are stones for children who lived for so few years we can count them on one hand.

It’s been a rich, meaningful day as we ponder the opposite poles of glacial deep-time against the transitory nature of human existence.

Artechouse, Mast Books, Apotheke Nomad & Libertine

Artechouse

It’s time again for a New York City splurge, and we start our day at Artechouse on West 15th, an immersive art exhibition space that features digital artworks, essentially color-in-motion plus sound displayed on walls, ceilings, and floors. Note to psychedelics users: there’s no need for medicinal help at Artechouse. The shows do the trick.

Mast Books

Then it’s across town to Mast Books, which specializes in photography but also has a wall of older used books, many of them first editions. We try to support local bookstores wherever we go, and Mast Books, though small, is fun to browse.

Apotheke Nomad

The original Apotheke on Doyers Street in Chinatown doesn’t open until 6:00pm, too late for our schedule, and so we visit instead at Apotheke Nomad on West 26th, their expansive bar with a beautifully lit downstairs space and an airier bar upstairs with outdoor seating. You know this place is cool because there isn’t any sign at the entrance. The drinks are complex, matched only by the surroundings, and we vow to visit the Doyers Street location soon.

Libertine

Then on to dinner at this West Village restaurant that opened this spring to great fanfare as an authentic neighborhood French bistro. Libertine restricts its menu to a small number of French classics, all made to perfection. The oeufs mayo is highly recommended by food blogs, but we choose instead saucisse purée (fantastic) and monkfish (also very good). We’re fans of neighborhood restaurants with limited menus, and Libertine checks all the boxes

Little Acre Farm / Rocky Point Trail / Twin Lights State Historic Site / Mule Barn Tavern

Little Acre Farm

Potted bamboo dapples the fiercest rays of summer sun on our patio, but not all. To expand the protective effect, we need one more plant.  So back we go to Howell, NJ, where we purchased the first two leafy specimens. At Little Acre Farm, we select a sibling, so tall its branches reach into the front seat for the rest of our journey.

Rocky Point Trail

Forty-five minutes later we land in Hartshorne Woods, northeast of Little Acre Farm on a high point above the inlet to the Navesink River. We choose the Rocky Point Trail, a 2.3-mile loop with overlooks of the Navesink where it meets Sandy Hook Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. It’s a fine warm day for a walk in the woods.

Twin Lights State Historic Site

A short driving distance from Hartshorne Woods is the Twin Lights State Historic Site. The discontinued  dual lighthouse rises on a bluff in Highlands, a spot we are surprised to learn is the highest point on the Atlantic coast from Maine to Florida. After climbing both towers and enjoying the dramatic views, we inspect the magnification lenses. Back in the day, they projected light from the equivalent of a 60-watt bulb to seafarers 20 miles away.

Mule Barn Tavern

Then we drive north to the tip of Sandy Hook, where the remnants of a Coast Guard station are slowly being converted to civilian uses. The old mule barn is now Mule Barn Tavern, with casual food served both indoors and out. After lunch, we stroll past former officers’ houses, a movie theater, and the occasional cannon, on paths with expansive views of the harbor and Manhattan.

Café Sabarsky, Neue Galerie, Dashwood Books, New York Public Library & Bookmarks

Café Sabarsky

We begin our day with lunch at Café Sabarsky, which adjoins the Neue Galerie on Museum Mile in Manhattan. Or rather, we begin our day by waiting in line at the popular Café Sabarsky, which takes no reservations. The expected one-hour wait passes quickly as we people-watch and enjoy park views.

Inside the café we are transported to early 20th-century Vienna. With banquettes upholstered in Otto Wagner fabric and a grand piano in one corner, with every seat taken and a bustle of wait staff, the room serves as a reminder of how artists and intellectuals used to gather at the time.

The café serves purportedly the best wiener schnitzel in the city along with an impressive array of German/Austrian desserts and rich kaffee creme.

Tickets to the café enable entry into the Neue Galerie, three floors of primarily German and Austrian Expressionist art, including Gustav Klimt’s Woman in Gold.  We get around the gallery fairly quickly, and it is well worth the visit.

Cafe Sabarsky

Detail of Berlin Street Scene by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

Dashwood Books

New York City is full of small, independent shops (still), and after the Neue Galerie we head downtown to Dashwood Books, a basement-level store on Avenue A in the East Village that deals exclusively in photography books. We buy an oversized volume for our nonexistent coffee table and then head to the mother of all New York book repositories, the New York Public Library.

Dashwood Books

New York Public Library

When visiting the NYPL, we always pop into the Rose Main Reading Room, the largest uncolumned space in America, but our real destination is the Polonsky Exhibition on the ground floor. It features rotating selections from the library’s vast collection of treasures that connect our species’ first written words to modern-day media. 

While seated at this desk, Charles Dickens may have written chapters of Great Expectations.

Leaving via the front steps of the library and crossing Fifth Avenue to 41st Street, we mosey down the sidewalk enchanted by bronze plaques underfoot. Each rectangle speaks to us from a different author, all the way to Park Avenue (actually, they are meant to lead you from Park Avenue to the library).

A word is dead/ When it is said,/ Some say./ I say it just/ Begins to live/ That day. —Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), “1212”

Bookmarks

We follow these plaques one block to Madison Avenue and our final destination (completing today’s art-and-book theme), the Library Hotel. The hotel, whose name trades on its proximity to the NYPL but doesn’t resemble a library at all, has a nifty little rooftop bar called Bookmarks.

New York hosts loads of glitzy rooftop bars, but this one is our favorite with its open-air seating and stone parapets. Drinks in hand, we time-travel back to the 1920s.

The Bookmarks bar atop the Library Hotel

Cliff’s Homemade Ice Cream, Jockey Hollow & Jockey Hollow Bar & Kitchen

Cliff’s Homemade Ice Cream

It’s still ice-cream season, and where better to visit than Cliff’s, where this sweet treat has been homemade since 1975. Cliff serves it rich and creamy with a menu divided between Original Homemade Flavors and Fantasy Flavors (Whiskey Turtle Fudge, anyone?), along with popular varieties of soft serve. We stick with the original menu and enjoy our repast at one of the shaded picnic tables in back.

Jockey Hollow

Less than a half-hour drive from Cliff’s is a jewel among national historical parks—the 1,400 acres of Jockey Hollow that housed the Continental Army during the “hard winter” of 1779-1780. We pass numerous preserved farm buildings from the era, along with recreated soldier huts, facsimiles of those built by the army that required felling 2,000 acres of trees for construction and firewood.

We follow the yellow trail, starting out behind the visitor center and at the back of the preserved farm. Following the trail counterclockwise through forest for about a mile, we reach the huts, returning to our car via a paved road.

Jockey Hollow Bar & Kitchen

Though not affiliated with the Jockey Hollow historical site, this Morristown restaurant trades on the name partly because it is housed in the historic Vail mansion. Built in the early 20th century, this Italian Renaissance palazzo-style structure now contains luxury condos in one half of the mansion, with the Jockey Hollow Bar & Kitchen in the other.  

The elegant white-tableclothed Washington Room was closed for an event on the evening we visited, but we had an enjoyable meal in the light-filled Oyster Bar. Surrounded by marble, we sip our drinks and then tuck into cuisine offered by Michelin-star recipient Chris Cannon.

Old York Cellars, Leonard J. Buck Gardens, The Frog & The Peach

Old York Cellars Winery & Vineyards

Driving through Hunterdon County on a glorious afternoon, we turn onto a dirt road that leads to a favorite winery. We sit under a large tent, drink local wine, listen to live music, and gaze over the vineyards to distant hills beyond. The food is reportedly excellent at Old York Cellars, but we stick to the tapas menu, saving our appetite for dinner and enjoying the warm light.

Leonard J. Buck Gardens

One-half hour away near Far Hills lies a hidden New Jersey treasure—the 33-acre Leonard J. Buck Gardens.  The layout represents the combined expertise of geologist Leonard Buck and landscape architect Zenon Schreiber. Built in the 1930s, this naturalistic environment offers peace and tranquility (with the exception of traffic noise from nearby Interstate 287) to the public, free of charge. We get some good exercise walking the pathways, enjoying the many vantage points from different elevations of the central pond and surrounding rocky outcrops that were scoured out by glaciers over 20,000 years ago. It is a good place to ponder the vast expanses of time that surround the brief moments we exist here.

The Frog & the Peach

We like businesses that endure, and this New Brunswick restaurant has been one of New Jersey’s best since its inception in 1983, known for an extensive wine list and locally grown ingredients. We park and walk around downtown bathed in early evening light and then arrive at the restaurant and sit in its mezzanine section with a view of the bar area below, where we enjoy a sumptuous meal and savor a day well spent.

Southern Catskills (Kenoza Lake), Max Yasgur’s Farm, Narrowsburg & Roebling’s Delaware Aqueduct

We’re on another trip to the Catskills, this time to the southern side, less mountainous and way less populated. In the early 1900s, thousands of Eastern European Jews bought the farmland and let out rooms to city dwellers looking to escape the summertime heat. The enterprise turned into big business after WWII, giving rise to the Borscht Belt where 2 million people vacationed annually. Inexpensive airplane travel made other destinations more attractive in the 1960s, and the resorts went out of business, leaving this section of the Catskills relatively unpeopled.

Kenoza Hall and the Stone Arch Bridge Historical Park

We wake up in Kenoza Hall beside Kenoza Lake, a lovely B&B brought to you by the same people who built the DeBruce in the nearby “hickster” hamlet of Livingston Manor.

After breakfast on the porch overlooking the lake, we drive to the Stone Arch Bridge Historical Park that features a grass-covered bridge, small waterfall, and an adjacent park where we idle away the time watching two boys fish (very Norman Rockwell).

Max Yasgur’s Farm

Then on to Max Yasgur’s farm in the southern Catskills, the actual site of the 1969 Woodstock Music and Art Fair, miles from the town of Woodstock. On the former farm lies the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts and a museum we found well worth a visit. Its exhibits comprise a comprehensive history of the music festival, plus you can walk the land where the festival took place, which is cool, comparing the current bucolic hillside to the mud-soaked Woodstock photos that are an indelible part of counterculture mythology.

Narrowsburg

Then we drive to the hamlet of Narrowsburg on the Delaware River, so named because it sits on a bluff above the narrowest (and deepest) part of the Delaware.  The main street bustles with shoppers of antiques, clothing, and books, and there’s a good lookout spot where you can view the river far below. We opt for lunch on the outdoor porch of the Tusten Cup, a café with a view of the bridge that connects this part of New York to Pennsylvania

Roebling’s Delaware Aqueduct

Lastly, we drive south along the Delaware to Roebling’s Delaware Aqueduct, the oldest existing wire suspension bridge in the U.S. Originally designed to help transport Pennsylvania’s highly prized anthracite coal to New York City and environs, the bridge, now restored, serves as a one-lane roadway across the Delaware. It also makes for an enjoyable walk above the river.

USGA Museum, Buttermilk Falls (Bridgewater) & Salted Lime Bar & Kitchen

A summer day filled with golf history, a walk in the woods, and local dining

USGA Museum

The United States Golf Association (USGA), which regulates all amateur golf in the United States (including the US Open), has its headquarters in pastoral Liberty Corner, New Jersey. Extending from the main building is a fine museum with a new wing that walks us through the history of golf.  Superbly lit, the spaces and displays spark interest even in those who aren’t golf fans.

The toddlers among us delight in the massive putting green behind the museum. Called the Himalayas (as a tribute to a similar putting green at St. Andrews, Scotland), the green may be used by the public. Admission to the green comes with putters and a souvenir golf ball. With its extreme slopes, the course reminds us of miniature golf without the windmills. We walk away from the putting adventure like most golfers do from theirs—disgruntled with our performance but in a good way.

Buttermilk Falls, Bridgewater

Next, we drive to Bridgewater’s 1.4-mile trail called Buttermilk Falls. They can be hard to find. If approaching from the north on Vosseler Avenue, take a right turn on Miller Lane and follow that to the end.

 Not to be confused with the more famous and more robust Buttermilk Falls in northwestern New Jersey, these waterworks form only a glorified spillway. They hale from an earlier industrial project, now fenced off to prevent local daredevils from diving in.  The walk down to the falls is somewhat rocky, but the return trip offers a trail enveloped by trees. It is well worth the effort to get there.

Salted Lime Bar & Kitchen

Tired, hungry, and thirsty, we end our day at the Salted Lime Bar & Kitchen in Somerville’s lively restaurant scene.  The restaurant’s plentiful natural light, good tacos, and craft margaritas do not disappoint.

Upper Hudson River Valley: Art Omi, Café Mutton & Olana

So many places to visit, so little time.

Art Omi

We begin at the outdoor sculpture park Art Omi, a few miles north of the town of Hudson. Overshadowed by the larger Storm King Art Center (located closer to New York City), Art Omi’s 120 acres offer a more walkable space with sparser crowds.  Our favorite exhibit is Orange Functional, almost two dozen basketball hoops sprouting from a single trunk. Basketballs lie about, begging to be picked up by visitors and shot at odd angles.

Café Mutton

After working up an appetite, we drive to Café Mutton, a Hudson farm-to-table restaurant open from 10-3 (dinner available on Fridays). We’re not joking about the farm origins of this eatery. You can order lamb head porridge, if the mood strikes. There are scrambled egg and crepe options for those who want to stick to a more traditional brunch.

Olana

Then we’re off to Olana and its 250 acres of sweeping views of the Hudson River. The 1870s house, designed by architect Calvert Vaux (whose protégé and junior partner was Frederick Law Olmstead) and painter Frederic Edwin Church, is a marvel of towers, balconies, recessed porches, and Persian-inspired interiors.

The grounds incorporate Church’s advanced ideas about the integration of architecture, landscape, and environmental preservation.

Olana is popular, so be sure to reserve a tour, otherwise you may not be able to view the interior.

Wildflowers, Antiques & Dinner

Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve

Our daytrip begins at Bowman’s Hill Wildflower Preserve south of New Hope, Pennsylvania, along the Delaware River. The brainchild of two 1930s visionaries, the preserve encompasses meadows, forest, and creek banks rich in native wildflowers. The paths are wide, smooth, and mostly flat. Its current 134 acreage features over 700 native species  viewable by the public year-round.

Lambertville Antiques & dinner

Next we travel up the river a few miles and cross the Delaware River into New Jersey on the historic New Hope-Lambertville Bridge. Most tourists and weekend visitors are drawn to New Hope because of its shopping and dining reputation, but we prefer the smaller-scaled, walkable Lambertville. The quiet town offers interesting architecture and diverse shopping and dining destinations.

A popular stop is the People’s Store, a three-story antiques and design center, loaded with affordable and eclectic items for sale and painters working on the top floor. A great place for browsing.

We  get in some walking with a stroll uptown for hand-crafted, premium ice cream at the Owowcow Creamery, then return for a drink at the unique Boat House, a nautical-themed bar written up in magazines like Conde Nast Traveler. The small two-storied structure has been known to fill quickly, so we arrive soon after opening time at 4 pm.

Afterward we walk a few blocks to Anton’s at the Swan for dinner— a lovely restaurant serving “new American comfort food.” The dinner and bar menus feature grilled meats and fish as well as crabcakes and risotto. We sink into comfy chairs along the wood-paneled walls to enjoy an intimate dinner that caps off our day.

Inwood Hill Park, Harlem Renaissance Exhibit & La Sirene Restaurant

Inwood Hill Park

Our New York City jaunt begins at Inwood Hill Park in upper Manhattan where artist Rose B. Simpson has planted her sculpture “Seed” on the alleged spot where Dutch governor Peter Minuit  “purchased” New Amsterdam from the Manhattan Indians for $24 ($900 in today’s money) worth of trinkets. This seminal North American moment is disputed by native historians, and Ms. Simpson’s sculpture captures the tension, with one face turned inward to the woods which represents native land, while the other face points outward towards Spuyten Duyvil, the trade route that brought the Europeans.

The park shines after spring showers, gold and green, full of life. On the way to see the sculpture we spy the striking Henry Hudson Bridge in the distance.  In 1936 it reigned as the longest fixed arch bridge in the world.

The marker honoring Peter Minuit’s “purchase” of Manhattan from the Lenape in 1626.

The Harlem Renaissance & Transatlantic Modernism

Next is the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see the Harlem Renaissance and Transatlantic Modernism show. It is a spectacular celebration of African American life developed during the Great Migration (1910-1970).

Pulled to the North, Midwest, and West Coast, Southern Blacks left the fields and small towns of Dixie to replace the white industrial workers fighting in the World Wars and the immigrants banned from entering the US.

Harlem became a Black city, with a pulse of its own. The art that erupted from its residents impacted artists across the globe. On the museum walls visitors can compare works by African American artists with European paintings depicting a similar subject.  On view through July 28, 2024.

Woman in Blue by William H. Johnson, 1943

Scottsboro Boys by Aaron Douglas, c. 1935

Blues by Archibald J. Motley, Jr., 1929

La Sirène SoHo

We close our day with dinner at La Sirène SoHo, a charming French restaurant on Broome Street. The setting is intimate, the lighting romantic, the food classic and exquisite. The hangar steak is cooked to perfection, and the fish balanced and flavorful. (La Sirène prefers American Express over MasterCard or VISA.)

Sunday Motor Co., Raptor Trust, Bamboo Brook Education Center, Taylor’s Ice Cream Parlor

Sunday Motor Co.

We begin our adventure at the Sunday Motor Co. in Madison, New Jersey. Now a popular eatery, the location used to house a gas station. Look no further than the battered Mobil sign for proof of vintage. The menu transforms old favorites like toast to new heights (heirloom tomato, lemon ricotta, everything avocado) while offering newbies like shakshuka and miso ginger salad.

We arrive at 10:30 am midweek to avoid the crowds. We are served quickly at one of the umbrellaed picnic tables. The coffee is memorable.

Sunday Motor Co. outdoor seating

Sunday Motor Co. indoor bakery selection and menus

Raptor Trust

Fueled up, we then drive fifteen minutes to the edge of the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge where we visit an array of predatory birds at the Raptor Trust. The quiet helps to rehabilitate injured hawks, owls, and bald eagles, which are then returned to the wild. The facility is free and open to the public.

Bamboo Brook Outdoor Education Center

It’s barely noon by the time we travel thirty minutes away to our next destination—The Bamboo Brook Outdoor Education Center in Chester Township. This 687-acre expanse was purchased by Martha Brookes Hutchinson and her husband in 1925, slowly emerging as a showcase for Martha’s landscape designs, which are important enough to be on the Women’s Heritage Trail. The terraced grounds welcome a stroll, perfumed by lilac bushes. We advance to a running brook, birds serenading us along the way to a large circular pond and smaller structures below. A quick dial-in at the numbered plaques details the property’s history and horticulture. For a longer walk, take the perimeter trail.

Taylor’s Ice Cream Parlor

The sun and exercise inspire a taste for something cold and sweet, so we drive to nearby Chester (the center of Chester Township) for a scoop at Taylor’s Ice Cream Parlor. This town fixture since 1960 offers over 50 flavors. We share the peanut butter fudge variety, deciding that it makes for a perfectly good lunch.