Travelrific® Travel Journal
Picture postcards in prose.™ Check out the blogroll on the front page for official merchandise and other resources!Archive for new york
The Joys of Commuting
By Linda Tancs
Mass transportation has its ups and downs. Just ask any commuter, especially in the New York metropolitan area. Maybe a trip down memory lane would lessen the pain, like the bit of nostalgia preserved at the New York Transit Museum. Housed underground in an authentic 1936 subway station in downtown Brooklyn, the museum’s working platform level spans a full city block and is home to a rotating selection of 20 vintage subway and elevated cars dating back to 1907. You can learn about fare collection, the evolution of the subway and the history of buses and trolleys. It might foster an appreciation for the current system, however flawed it might be.
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A Village for Book Lovers
By Linda Tancs
Imagine a village with barely 500 residents becoming a center for arts and literary culture. There aren’t too many, worldwide, but one of them is in the Northern Catskills—Hobart, New York, to be precise. The only book village east of the Mississippi, the tiny hamlet boasts five independent book stores featuring second-hand and antiquarian books, prints and other works. You’ll also find art galleries, antique shops and a calendar full of writing festivals, book signings and lectures. This Thanksgiving weekend the town hosts one of two semi-annual sales drawing hundreds of book lovers and collectors.
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A Slice of Life in New York
By Linda Tancs
Statistics reveal that about 21,000 slices of pizza are sold each minute in the U.S., or 30 million every day. No wonder it’s one of the nation’s go-to comfort foods. A food that iconic should have its own museum. And it does, a pop-up variety currently exhibiting in New York City. The Museum of Pizza is an immersive experience featuring textile sculpture (Mystic Pizza), a pizza guitar, giant photographs and explosively colorful installations. In short, you’ll learn all about the fine art of pizza, literally and figuratively. Located on the street level of Brooklyn’s William Vale hotel, the museum is open until November 18.
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The Tenor of Things in Brooklyn
By Linda Tancs
Italian operatic singer Enrico Caruso is widely regarded as one of the greatest tenors of all time. A worldwide sensation, he performed at the New York Metropolitan Opera over 800 times alone. It seems appropriate, then, that a New York collector would facilitate the creation of a museum in Caruso’s honor. The Enrico Caruso Museum opened in 1990 in Brooklyn with the Mancusi family’s collection of over 200 recordings. Other memorabilia include rare family photos of the Caruso family, books, letters, caricatures and the death mask of Caruso. A popular attraction in the museum is the 20-seat mini theater, with chairs and décor from the old Metropolitan Opera donated by famed soprano Licia Albanese.
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Eternal Rest in Sleepy Hollow
By Linda Tancs
When it comes to historic places on the national register, cemeteries don’t necessarily come to mind. That is, unless you’ve visited historic Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in the village of Sleepy Hollow, New York. Listed on both the New York State and the National Register of Historic Places, numerous headstones and mausoleums boast the work of famous American sculptors and artists. You’ll see their work among William Rockefeller’s imposing mausoleum, Henry Villard’s exquisite sculpture, the Washington Irving Memorial Chapel and the stained glass windows in the Helmsley mausoleum. Over 85 acres in size amidst rolling hills and Hudson River views, the luminaries buried there include Brooke and Vincent Astor, Major Edward Bowes, Andrew Carnegie, Walter Chrysler, Samuel Gompers, Oswald Villard, Thomas Watson and, of course, author Washington Irving.
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New York’s Salmon Capital
By Linda Tancs
The quaint village of Pulaski is the salmon fishing capital of New York and one of the premier salmon fishing destinations in the world. This time of year there’s potential for a major daily run of 1,000 to 3,000 king and coho salmon in the Salmon River. Charter boats will take you where the trophy fish are biting.
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An Ancient Forest of the Northeast
By Linda Tancs
Located in western New York, Panama Rocks Scenic Park is an imposing world of towering rocks, deep crevices, dens and small caves. Its impressive geology extends over 300 million years. After the Ice Age a forest grew over the site, eventually producing the maple, beech, black ash and hemlock seen today. In fact, the forest at Panama Rocks is recognized and included in The Sierra Club’s Guide to the Ancient Forests of the Northeast, and its hemlocks are over 500 years old. Open from May through October, the park’s formations are easily hiked via a Class 1 trail.
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Confectionery Bliss in New York City
By Linda Tancs
Now appearing in New York City, the pop-up exhibition Candytopia is a bit of confectionery bliss in The Big Apple, featuring interactive art installations in over a dozen environments, from flying unicorn pigs to a marshmallow tsunami. Think of it as Pablo Picasso meets Willy Wonka, courtesy of Hollywood “candy queen” Jackie Sorkin and design expert Zac Hartog. Reservations are required; get your tickets before the show moves on after November 15.
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Hudson River Valley Heritage
By Linda Tancs
The Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area stretches from New York City to Albany, New York. One of the gems along that route is Wilderstein Historic Site in Rhinebeck. Sporting an exquisite Queen Anne mansion and Calvert Vaux-designed landscape, it’s widely regarded as one of the Hudson Valley’s most important examples of Victorian architecture. Home to three generations of the Suckley family, it was Thomas Suckley who named the site Wilderstein (wild man’s stone) in reference to a nearby Indian petroglyph. The regular season for guided tours of the elaborate mansion is May through October, featuring the 1888 interiors of the first floor of the mansion, the exterior architecture and the landscape. The grounds and trails, located on a wooded bluff overlooking the Hudson River, are open year round and offer spectacular views.
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A Castle in the Hudson
By Linda Tancs
Pollepel Island (popularly known as Bannerman Island) is a nearly seven-acre island in the Hudson River in New York. The island’s original name derives from a romantic legend involving a girl named Polly Pell who was rescued from breaking river ice by her sweetheart and delivered to the island, where they married. The site’s contemporary name derives from one of its owners, Francis Bannerman, a Scotland-born munitions dealer who built the island’s signature castle in 1901. Tours of the island (May through October) are conducted from nearby Beacon, New York, on weekends with meetups at the dock opposite the train station.
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