Hudson Valley in New York

19 October 2022 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  12 minutes

Empire State Plaza in Albany © UpstateNYer/cc-by-sa-3.0

Empire State Plaza in Albany © UpstateNYer/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Hudson Valley comprises the valley of the Hudson River and its adjacent communities in the U.S. state of New York. The region stretches from the Capital District including Albany and Troy south to Yonkers in Westchester County, bordering New York City. In the early 19th century, popularized by the stories of Washington Irving, the Hudson Valley gained a reputation as a somewhat gothic region characterized by remnants of the early days of the Dutch colonization of New York (“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow“). The area is also associated with the Hudson River School, a group of American Romantic painters who worked from about 1830 to 1870. Following the building of the Erie Canal, the area became an important industrial center. The canal opened the Hudson Valley and New York City to commerce with the Midwest and Great Lakes regions. However, in the mid 20th century, many of the industrial towns went into decline.   read more…

Mohonk Mountain House

10 November 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Hotels Reading Time:  6 minutes

© Fred Hsu/cc-by-sa-3.0

© Fred Hsu/cc-by-sa-3.0

The Mohonk Mountain House, also known as Lake Mohonk Mountain House, is an American resort hotel located on the Shawangunk Ridge in Ulster County, New York. Its location in the town of New Paltz, New York, is just beyond the southern border of the Catskill Mountains, west of the Hudson River. The National Historic Landmark Program’s “Statement of Significance”, as of the site’s historic landmark designation in 1986, stated:   read more…

Hyde Park, the Heart of the Hudson Valley in the State of New York

30 July 2021 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  10 minutes

Culinary Institute of America - Roth Hall and Colavita Center for Italian Food and Wine © Pascal Auricht

Culinary Institute of America – Roth Hall and Colavita Center for Italian Food and Wine © Pascal Auricht

Hyde Park is a town in Dutchess County, New York, bordering the Hudson River north of Poughkeepsie. Within the town are the hamlets of Hyde Park, East Park, Staatsburg, and Haviland. The Hudson River defines the west town line, which is the border with Ulster County. Hyde Park is bordered by the town of Poughkeepsie to the south, Rhinebeck to the north, and Clinton and Pleasant Valley to the east. Gilded Age properties can be found throughout the central Hudson Valley (Mid-Hudson). Here some of the rich and super-rich from the economic heyday of the USA have (summer) residences built to bring sufficient distance between themselves and the mob from New York City. In parts, it still works today. Hyde Park is known as the hometown of Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd president of the United States. His house there, now the Home of Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic Site, is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places, as are the homes of Eleanor Roosevelt, Isaac Roosevelt, and Frederick William Vanderbilt, along with Haviland Middle School (formerly Franklin D. Roosevelt High School). Hyde Park is home to the main campus of the Culinary Institute of America, a four-year college for culinary and baking and pastry arts, and the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum, the first presidential library in the United States.   read more…

The Narrows in New York

11 September 2020 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  5 minutes

One World Trade Center, Upper New York Bay, Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and Staten Island © flickr.com - Anthony Quintano/cc-by-2.0

One World Trade Center, Upper New York Bay, Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and Staten Island
© flickr.com – Anthony Quintano/cc-by-2.0

The Narrows is the tidal strait separating the boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn in New York City. It connects the Upper New York Bay and Lower New York Bay and forms the principal channel by which the Hudson River empties into the Atlantic Ocean. It has long been considered to be the maritime “gateway” to New York City and historically has been one of the most important entrances into the harbors of the Port of New York and New Jersey.   read more…

Hell’s Kitchen in Manhattan

29 June 2020 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  24 minutes

Vintner Wine Market © flickr.com - Jazz Guy/cc-by-2.0

Vintner Wine Market © flickr.com – Jazz Guy/cc-by-2.0

Hell’s Kitchen, sometimes known as Clinton (named for Governor George Clinton), is a neighborhood on the West Side of Manhattan in New York City, west of Midtown Manhattan. It is traditionally considered to be bordered by 34th Street to the south, 59th Street to the north, Eighth Avenue to the east, and the Hudson River to the west. Until the 1970s, Hell’s Kitchen was a bastion of poor and working-class Irish Americans. Though its gritty reputation had long held real-estate prices below those of most other areas of Manhattan, by 1969, the City Planning Commission’s Plan for New York City reported that development pressures related to its Midtown location were driving people of modest means from the area. Since the early 1990s, the area has been gentrifying, and rents have risen rapidly. Home of the Actors Studio training school, and adjacent to Broadway theatres, Hell’s Kitchen has long been a home to fledgling and working actors.   read more…

Hudson Yards in Midtown Manhattan

21 February 2020 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, Architecture, Living, Working, Building, New York City Reading Time:  8 minutes

Vessel sculpture © flickr.com - Ajay Suresh/cc-by-2.0

Vessel sculpture © flickr.com – Ajay Suresh/cc-by-2.0

Hudson Yards is a neighborhood on the West Side of Midtown Manhattan, bounded roughly by 30th Street in the south, 43rd Street in the north, the West Side Highway in the west, and Eighth Avenue in the east. The area is the site of a large-scale redevelopment program that is being planned, funded, and constructed under a set of agreements among the State of New York, City of New York, and Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), with the aim of expanding the Midtown Manhattan business district westward to the Hudson River. The program includes a major rezoning of the Far West Side, an extension of the New York City Subway‘s 7 and <7> trains to a new subway station at 34th Street and 11th Avenue, a renovation and expansion of the Javits Center, and a financing plan to fund the various components. The various components are being planned by New York City Department of City Planning and New York City Economic Development Corporation.   read more…

Upper New York Bay

20 January 2020 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  7 minutes

Governors Island © Antony-22/cc-by-sa-4.0

Governors Island © Antony-22/cc-by-sa-4.0

Upper New York Bay, or Upper Bay, is the traditional heart of the Port of New York and New Jersey, and often called New York Harbor. It is enclosed by the New York City boroughs of Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Staten Island and the Hudson County, New Jersey, municipalities of Jersey City and Bayonne.   read more…

Harlem in New York

28 December 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General, New York City Reading Time:  20 minutes

Cotton Club © Gotanero/cc-by-sa-3.0

Cotton Club © Gotanero/cc-by-sa-3.0

Harlem is a large neighborhood in the northern section of the New York City borough of Manhattan. Since the 1920s, Harlem has been known as a major African American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands. Harlem’s history has been defined by a series of economic boom-and-bust cycles, with significant population shifts accompanying each cycle. Since New York City’s revival in the late 20th century, Harlem has been experiencing the effects of gentrification and new wealth.   read more…

Fort Lee in New Jersey

13 April 2018 | Author/Destination: | Rubric: General Reading Time:  7 minutes

Fort Lee Historic Park © Hudconja/cc-by-sa-3.0

Fort Lee Historic Park © Hudconja/cc-by-sa-3.0

Fort Lee is a borough at the eastern border of Bergen County in New Jersey in the New York City Metropolitan Area, situated atop the Hudson Palisades, with a population 37,000. The borough is the western terminus of the George Washington Bridge and is located across the Hudson River from the Manhattan borough of New York City. Named for the site of an early American Revolutionary War military encampment, it later became the birthplace of the American film industry.   read more…

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