Rockwood Hall State Park in winter

Rockwood Hall State Park on the Hudson River, in Sleepy Hollow, New York, is a beautiful park to walk around in. I have mostly photographed it during the summer months, but when I was in NY last week, I visited this park to find some peace during a difficult and sad time, on a beautiful sunny winter day. As these photos show, the park is lovely in all seasons, and all those who frequent this park know that they are lucky that it exists.

So much wild beauty at Rockwood

This past August, when I was driving around in Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow, I revisited Rockwood Hall State Park, which was simply Rockwood to us when we hung out there as teenagers. The park, which is located in the town of Sleepy Hollow, faces out onto the Hudson River; you can read more about its history here: http://www.nynjtc.org/hike/rockwood-hall-sleepy-hollow. I've written about Rockwood before in this blog, about how beautiful it was many years ago, and how if we just wanted to get away from it all for a few hours, that was the place we drove to so that we could walk and talk, especially during the summers. One of my last hikes through the park before I moved away from Tarrytown was during the early spring, when the grounds and trees were just starting to recover from a cold winter. The park hasn't changed much in all these years; in fact, if anything, it's more overgrown and wilder than it was before. One thing that was new was that there were wooden benches placed here and there for those who want to just sit and rest or read, as I saw one young man doing. But it's the wildness about it that I love--the overgrown bushes and trailing vines, the many trees, the open meadows, the lush greenery, and the gorgeous views of the Hudson River. I met one or two other visitors on my walk, but otherwise I had the park mostly to myself on this sunny August afternoon. I enjoyed being alone on a warm summer day, happy to be outdoors and to be back in a place that meant a lot to me as a teenager. I'm including some photos of Rockwood as it looked in August, as well as a photo collage of Rockwood from over thirty years ago, taken during the month of March.

Hudson River and view of the lovely Palisades

Tappan Zee Bridge in the distance

Summer memories

As promised, photos of my recent trip to New York, Maryland and Virginia. As I was going through my photos, I realized once again how lovely my country is. The order of the photos follows the timeline in my previous post, Summer Moments in New York, Maryland and Virginia. Enjoy.

 

one of two reflecting pools at the Memorial site

The Survivor Pear Tree 

The new One World Trade Center

New Jersey skyline

The North Cove Marina in NYC

view of surrounding area in Gambrill State Park, Maryland

Hunting Creek Lake in Catoctin Mountain Park, Maryland

Hunting Creek Lake

A marsh in north Virginia--photo taken through train window

approaching New York City---photo taken through train window

New York City--photo taken from train

Garrison, New York, on the Hudson River

Garrison, NY

Guinan's Pub (the subject of Gwendolyn Bounds wonderful book 'Little Chapel on the River') in Garrison

Jim Guinan, owner of the pub, passed away in 2009

view of West Point across the river from Guinan's pub

the lovely Hudson River, facing north from the walkway

view of the Hudson River facing south from the walkway

Things I didn't know about the Hudson River

I’m reading a very good book about the Hudson River entitled The Hudson: America's River by Frances Dunwell, and it’s been a real eye-opener so far. I’m only about a fifth of the way through the book, and am amazed at what I have learned about the river’s history as well as about American history. The river’s usefulness as a strategic waterway coincides with the early history and development of New York and neighboring states. You might think that I would remember what we were taught as students about the founding and evolution of America, the American Revolution, and the importance of the Hudson River in those occurrences. I cannot remember much emphasis being placed on the importance of the Hudson River by our teachers. The focus was rather on Revolutionary war heroes such as George Washington and the early American presidents, the Constitution, and so forth. As a companion piece to help me when I forget my American history, I purchased Paul S. Boyer’s American History—A Very Short Introduction; in the preface he writes “This brief introduction to the vast topic of U.S. history avoids either an excessively upbeat, rose-tinted approach or an unduly negative one”. That’s exactly the sort of book I want, so I’m looking forward to delving into it. Just give me the facts and let me make up my own mind about what transpired at that time in my country’s history.

Dunwell’s book presents a very complete picture of the historical events at that time as well as interesting facts about the river. So what have I learned so far that I never knew about the Hudson River before? I didn’t know it was a fjord, nor did I know that it was a tidal river. I also didn’t know how many different types of fish there are in the river. It was an important strategic waterway during the American Revolution, for both the British and the Americans. It also has a reputation as a pirate river (!), since the famous pirate Captain Kidd made his home along the Hudson. Here are just a few of the many excerpts from the book that I’ve highlighted: 

• Geologists refer to the Hudson as a fjord—a valley cut by glacial ice, then flooded by the sea.
• The Hudson is a mere 315 miles in length………A traveler from the Hudson’s marshy source, at Lake Tear of the Clouds, to its briny chop in New York Bay can witness the full sweep of American history and ideas and the relationship of people to the environment with which this heritage is so deeply intertwined.
• The Hudson is the last estuary on the East Coast of North America and perhaps in the entire North Atlantic drainage that still retains strong spawning stocks of all its historical fish species.
• …….the river…..welcomes seasonal oceanic visitors: Atlantic sturgeon, American shad, blueback herring, and striped bass.
• Resident fish, like perch, share the river with ocean fish that require fresh or brackish water to spawn—such as alewives, shad, herring, striped bass, and sturgeon.
• On the Hudson, tidewater extends more than 150 miles inland, nearly half of the river’s 315-mile length. Twice a day, the Hudson flows downstream like any other river would do. However, at slack tide, the tidal portion becomes still, and during flood tide, the flow of water actually reverses, moving north.
• The Mohican people called the Hudson Muhheahkunnuk, or Mohicanituck, meaning ‘great waters or sea, which are constantly in motion, either flowing or ebbing’……
• During the decades that the Dutch claimed the river as the central waterway of their colony (1609-1664), they emerged as the world’s leading sea power…….
• The reputation of the Hudson as a pirate river would become deeply imprinted with the story of Captain Kidd. …..Captain Kidd, a respected Manhattan sea captain who had a history of trading with pirates and knew where to find them. Kidd set sail from New York in 1696 and headed for Madagascar, the gathering place of pirates, but he soon turned to piracy himself……..Kidd and his crew raided many merchant ships…….On the island of Santo Domingo, Kidd left the Quedah Merchant and purchased a small sloop, which he filled with gold and jewels before setting off for his home port on the Hudson. However, Lord Bellomont, one of the investors in Kidd’s mission, turned the captain in when he landed at Boston and sent him to England to stand trial. Kidd was hanged in England in 1701. The fate of Kidd’s treasure remains a mystery.

I’ll be adding to this list from time to time, as I come further in the book. Needless to say, I’m enjoying learning about this river that was a major part of my growing up. We spent hours as teenagers walking around the estates that overlook the river--Rockwood Estate and Lyndhurst, or going to the beach at Kingsland Point in North Tarrytown (now Sleepy Hollow). I’m including a photo I took of the river when I visited the West Point Military Academy in the summer of 2011 together with my sister Renata and her husband Tim. It will give you an idea of how lovely the river and its surroundings really are.

Reading about and remembering the Hudson River valley

Whenever I think about the state and town where I grew up—New York State and Tarrytown respectively, I feel blessed. Blessed to have grown up there, blessed to have the memories I have of growing up there. It’s perhaps hard to understand for those who have never moved from the place where they were born, but as I’ve gotten older, it is the positive recollections about the place of my birth that override the negative memories. I am beginning to forget the reasons why I wanted to move from it in the first place, especially when I visit Tarrytown in the summertime on my annual visits and walk along familiar streets in the baking heat, savoring my time there. Much of the town has changed since I was a child; in most cases for the better. It’s a prettier town than when I lived there. That seems to be generally true for many towns and cities, including Oslo. Oslo is a much prettier and nicer city now than when I moved here over twenty years ago. That is because there is more attention paid to urban planning and design—to how buildings, parks, and recreation areas look. The esthetic component attached to urban/suburban development and progress has become more important, and that’s positive.

When I was a teenager, I couldn’t wait to get out into the world at large and to explore it. And I’ve done so. I especially wanted to travel around Europe, and have visited many Western European countries during the past twenty years that I’ve lived in Norway. That wasn’t the reason I moved abroad, but it strikes me now that I was not at all averse to moving abroad when the opportunity to do so arose. I am perhaps a bit nostalgic these days for all things familiar from my youth, including my hometown, and that does not strike me as unusual after more than twenty years abroad. But what strikes me as most true is that the area where I grew up in New York State is beautiful; I am not remembering it wrong or seeing it through rose-colored glasses. The Hudson River Valley is lovely; likewise many of the small towns that have grown up along it and that are an indelible part of its landscape. I have traveled along most of the Hudson River by train, from Grand Central Station in Manhattan as far north as Poughkeepsie. It’s a beautiful relaxing ride, especially when you get out of the city area and into the suburbs; if you want to read more about it, here is a good link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_Line_(Metro-North).

So it won’t be surprising that I am recommending two books that I have so enjoyed perusing and that have stolen my heart with their beauty and warmth. Both of them are about the Hudson River and/or the towns along it—one is a book of photography, the other is a warm and lovely tribute to a small pub in the town of Garrison (across the river from the West Point military academy)—Guinan’s--and its owner Jim Guinan (who passed away in 2009). The first book is a book of photography published in 2006 that I recommend to many people who ask me about New York State and the area where I grew up; it is entitled The Hudson River: From Tear of the Clouds to Manhattan by Jake Rajs; you can find it on Barnes and Noble: http://tinyurl.com/ckb5f35 and on Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/cjeeb8p. So much of the photography in this book is stunning; it is a collection of photos that portrays the Hudson River and the river towns and landscapes as they really are, in all seasons. The second book, published in 2006, is entitled Little Chapel on the River by Gwendolyn Bounds; it too can be found at Barnes and Noble: http://tinyurl.com/cqclprc and on Amazon:  http://tinyurl.com/cl7xdyh. It was recommended to me by my friend Stef who read it and loved it; I share her sentiments. The author writes in a heartfelt style about her meeting with Jim Guinan, his family, and the patrons of the pub, all of whom have their individual stories to tell, and all of whom become her friends over time. If you’d like to see photos of Guinan’s pub, you can find them here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gwendolynbounds/2050518523/in/photostream/. I never thought reading about a bar could be so interesting, or that it would make me want to visit it the next time I am in New York. Unfortunately, it closed its doors in 2008 and its owner passed away in 2009. I can relate to the author’s way of writing and to her attention to detail; but mostly I was glad to read about a place that connects me in some way to my first home—a Hudson River town in the state of New York. It brings me back to a time and a place that are close to my heart. Guinan’s pub was in Garrison, but it could have been in any of the small towns on the Hudson River, where the locals gather to drink a few beers after work in the evening and to shoot the breeze. As they used to say in the TV series Cheers—a ‘place where everyone knows your name’. That’s what this book manages to impart—the message that what counts in life is the connections we have to other people and how we deal with the people who grace our daily lives.

The unbelievable storm

I was up until 4 am Oslo time last night watching super storm Sandy make landfall on the eastern coast of the USA. It chose the area around Atlantic City as its entrance, and the video footage of the Atlantic Ocean pouring into this casino city was just unbelievable to watch. The Atlantic Ocean has never been the enemy before. Not until last night. Watching it flood these coastal towns was kind of like watching a mini tsunami—scary, unbelievable and fascinating at the same time. I can understand why people want to get close to the fury of a storm to film what it does to everything in its path, but you would have been completely foolhardy to have done so yesterday. I’ve been in Atlantic City, walked along its boardwalk, and enjoyed its shopping and luxurious hotels. Last night it did not look luxurious at all. It made me sad to see the destruction, as it did to see the flooding and destruction in Manhattan and Queens. This is not supposed to happen in these areas. But it did. The monster storm from hell made sure that we will not take anything for granted ever again, not where nature is concerned.

I grew up in Tarrytown, a lovely little town on the Hudson River, about a thirty-minute train ride north of Manhattan. In all the years I lived there, I cannot remember this type of storm occurring. Yes, there were intense storms, with resultant minor flooding here and there. I can remember the Saw Mill River and Bronx River Parkways being flooded and becoming impassable. Once I tried to drive through one of those parkway floods with my car, but had to back out of it as I could not steer my way through it. Luckily I managed to back out of it; not everyone was so fortunate. I was together with a friend of mine; we were commuting home from college that day. Water seeped into my car through the doors, and we had to bail out pails of water from the car afterward. It was a stupid decision on my part to attempt to drive through the rising water, and I learned an important lesson that day for the future about not taking unnecessary risks. But in Tarrytown (and other Hudson River towns) yesterday, there was unprecedented flooding. The Hudson River rose higher and higher due to the storm surge further south. Boats floated inland, having broken free of their moorings. In the town of Ossining, a few miles north of Tarrytown, a boat floated onto the railroad tracks, blocking passage in both directions. The pictures tell the story—proof that the unbelievable happened. I am including two links to online storm photos here. I am sad to see the destruction and flooding, and only hope that most people have come through the storm safely. http://www.businessinsider.com/at-least-16-dead-75-million-without-power--heres-what-hurricane-sandys-destruction-looks-like-photos-2012-10?0=bi

and

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mtaphotos/8138916414/

New York moments

Each year I return to Oslo after my annual trip to New York with so many impressions and memories of what I have experienced and seen. I guess because I am now a tourist in my home state, that each New York moment has become dear to me, no matter how small, mostly because I am together with good friends or with family when I experience them. I capture a lot of those moments in photos, as I am wont to do whenever I travel. I have already written one post about wandering around SoHo and lower Manhattan with Gisele, stopping in at small bakeries and cafes, shopping at Tierra, and photographing graffiti. Other moments included dinner with Debby and Eric on Long Island, lunch with Bernadette in Manhattan, visiting my brother Ray and his family, and spending time with Edith--my elderly woman friend who used to work together with me in my first Manhattan job. Photographically speaking, a major moment was photographing a large spider web (and correspondingly large spider) outside the kitchen window of my friend Jean’s house. On one of the evenings I was there, we stood watching the web and the spider’s activity for quite a while. This spider has built a web a short distance away from a wasp’s nest; nature doesn’t ignore golden opportunities. This spider was definitely big enough to tackle a wasp in its web.

Spider and its web

Closer view of spider

I also attended the Peekskill Celebration at the Riverfront Green Park on Saturday August 4^th (http://www.peekskillcelebration.com/) together with Jean and Maria; there was some great live music—one of the R&B bands particularly stood out—New York Uproar (http://newyorkuproar.com/home/). Lots of great old songs from my growing-up years from the likes of Average White Band, Blood Sweat & Tears, Chicago, Ides of March, and many others. You can find the complete song list on the New York Uproar website. The height of this evening had to be the fantastic fireworks that went on for nearly half an hour, sponsored by Entergy (see my short film of some of the fireworks here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-wXGNf02vs). I’m including the information from the website about this event:    

      

The Entergy Fireworks Extravaganza is the largest fireworks display north of the Macy's annual Fourth of July display and is one of the signature activities that make Celebration unique in the Hudson Valley. The pyrotechnic display is synced with music provided by WHUD 100.7 Radio. Whether from land or on water, the fireworks are an amazing sight to behold.

And then on Sunday evening, Jean, her sister Barbara, Maria and I ended up at the beautiful Boscobel Hudson River estate in Garrison (http://www.boscobel.org/) for the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival (http://hvshakespeare.org/), which has been an annual event for us for at least the past five years or so. This year Romeo and Juliet was on the menu—a modernized version of this tragedy—and it was very good. Much of the first act was played for laughs, which was unusual but not at all irritating. But I would guess that Shakespearean purists might find some bones to pick with this production. Nonetheless, it has a lot going for it, especially with the younger lead actors and actresses, who bring their youthful enthusiasm to their roles. It wasn’t hard to remember, when watching them, how absolutely overwhelming, giddy and confusing it was to really and truly fall deeply in love. You never forget those moments even though they get buried in the stuff of daily life, but watching this version of Shakespeare’s play really brought them back, a testament to the fine acting jobs.

View of the Hudson River from the Boscobel estate in Garrison

Tent where the Shakespeare plays take place

I always enjoy my time in New York visiting friends and family. Friends have commented on my packed schedule when I’m there, and the fact that I travel quite a bit around from one place to another, but it doesn’t feel rushed or stressful. I feel free, and that’s a great feeling. It’s summer, the sun is shining, the warm weather beckons, I’m on vacation, and life is easy. I found time to walk from Tarrytown to Irvington to meet my good friend Laura for lunch, and marveled at the beauty of these two adjoining river towns. I know I was privileged to grow up in Tarrytown, along the beautiful Hudson River. I talked about this with my friend Stef on my recent visit with her and her husband John. (Stef also grew up in Tarrytown but now lives in New Jersey, as I did for four years in the 1980s). It’s not something you understand as a child; mostly you just want to get away from small-town life when you are a young adult, and it wouldn’t have mattered how beautiful any aspect of that life really was then. You need to get out and see the world. I am speaking for myself, but I know of others who felt the same way as I did when they were younger. Stef picked me up at the New Brunswick train station in New Jersey, and drove me to where I used to live, an apartment complex in Somerset; it was interesting to see how much has changed since I moved from there. What was once open farmland that stretched for miles along Route 27, has been built up with shopping centers and housing complexes. I hardly recognized the area. However, my apartment complex looked the same, if a bit older and in need of a few renovations, but what I noticed most were the numbers of trees that had grown up around it. Lovely tall trees, providing shade in the summer’s heat. That’s the kind of progress I like, because it contributes to the creation of beauty. 

Somerset New Jersey apartment complex