Randall's Island
On Saturday my friend Jim and I decided to check out the Fall Festival on Randall's Island. Neither of us had been to the island before, and celebrating fall seemed like the perfect excuse to finally go. Turns out, the "festival" was a total bust, but seeing the island was still worth the trek.
It's accessible by car, but since neither of us have one of those anymore we used the footbridge at e. 103rd street. Everyone knows I love a good bridge walk, and the footbridge is short but fun. Randall's Island is a weird mix of professional buildings (psychiatric hospital, fire dept. training academy, wastewater treatment plant), homeless shelters, nature preserves and athletic complexes. The athletic fields were definitely the first thing we noticed, especially on a Sunday afternoon. It seemed like half of New York's children were there, playing soccer, baseball and various other sports.
The waterfront is really nice, although the views of Manhattan aren't as picturesque as points south. You get great views, however, of both the Triborough and the Hell Gate bridges, and I'm never one to turn down a good bridge view. Jim pointed out that the Queens-Ward Island span of the Triborough looks a little like a mini George Washington Bridge and he's totally right. Both are still on my list of bridges I'd like to walk across, but I'll get there one day.
When we finally made it to the fall festival we immediately knew that the event had been way oversold. There was a table where you could sample applesauce (?), a lady dressed as a pirate giving away free pumpkins (??) and...not much else.
It was held at the Urban Farm, which was basically a tiny garden near the edge of the island. It's quite an overstatement actually calling it a farm, but I guess to a city kid a few chickens and a row of tomato plants is about as country as you can expect. Needless to say, this Ohio girl was not impressed, but Jim did grab a pumpkin and, in an admirable display of perseverance, carry it all the way back to his apartment in Brooklyn.
Randall's Island (and the adjoining Wards Island) is quite large, so we only saw about half of it, and I'd love to go back. It's probably getting a bit late in the season to visit the wetlands and other nature-heavy sections, but I'm glad we now know a little more about the island. It seems like a great place to bring a picnic and chill out on a hot summer day, but it could also be interesting to see the area in the winter. I'm actually looking forward to the city calming down and emptying out a bit, and of course SNOW.
We're going apple picking in a few weeks, then to a corn maize in Queens and finally to Tarrytown/Sleepy Hollow at the end of October, so the fall adventures are just getting started. No offense to Randall's Island or the Urban Farm, but as far as fall festivals are concerned, there's really no where to go but up.