1,000 Places to See in the U.S.A. & Canada Before You Die (45 page)

In 1927 Babe Ruth hit his 60th home run at Yankee Stadium.

The team began back in 1903 (though they wouldn’t be called the Yankees until ten years later), but it was in January 1920 that they acquired Babe Ruth from the Boston Red Sox, an event that turned the tide for the till-then unremarkable team. Their new Ruth-fueled popularity enabled them to move from an old stadium on West 159th Street to a new stadium of their own in the Bronx. The three-deck stadium they constructed, already known as “The House That Ruth Built,” was inaugurated on April 18, 1923, when 74,217 people showed up to watch the Yanks beat the Red Sox 4-1. The team went on to win its first World Series that year, a feat it’s achieved 25 more times since, and counting.

Except for the addition of lights in 1946, Yankee Stadium remained mostly unchanged until 1973, when it was essentially torn down and rebuilt, bigger and better. Now, that “new” Yankee Stadium is on the chopping block: In August 2006, the team broke ground on a brand-new four-level stadium just north of the current field. While the new stadium’s facade will mimic the look of the original 1923 stadium and its field will retain the same dimensions, the rest will be up-tothe-minute ballpark chic. Opening day is expected for the 2009 season.

W
HERE
: 161st St. and River Ave. Tel 718-293-6000; newyork.yankees.mlb.com.
C
OST
: tickets from $12.
W
HEN:
Baseball season is Apr–Oct.
B
EST TIMES
: late June or early July for Old Timer’s Day, with a friendly game between former Yankees preceding the real game; or any time the Red Sox are in town.

The Eighth Wonder of the 19th-Century World

New York, New York

Once upon a time, the island of Manhattan and Brooklyn were two distinct cities, Manhattan a bustling commercial metropolis, Brooklyn a mostly rural place separated from its neighbor by the turbulent, mile-wide
expanse of the East River. In 1855, John Roebling proposed a mighty suspension bridge whose roadway would soar 135 feet above the water, supported by steel cables anchored to two huge granite towers—a design that would leave boat traffic on the river unimpeded. Approval, planning, and construction took 16 years, during which John Roebling died and was succeeded by his son Washington, who was paralyzed while directing construction but continued to supervise work from his Brooklyn home while his wife, Emily, oversaw the engineers and builders on site. Work was finally completed in 1883, and the “Great East River Bridge” was officially opened by President Chester Arthur and New York Governor Grover Cleveland.

From the first, New Yorkers knew it was special. An editor for
Scientific American
called it “a marvel of beauty … [with] a character of its own far above the drudgeries of the lower business levels.” And so it remains today. In a city where two centuries of architectural styles (and lack thereof) wage a continual war against greed and the elements, the Brooklyn Bridge continues to soar gracefully above it all, a dignified, well-dressed visitor from another time.

Walking the bridge is a beloved experience for many New Yorkers, including joggers, lovers, and commuting businessmen. Walk from the Brooklyn side toward Manhattan for the full effect, traversing the boardwalklike central promenade between the iconic spider-web of the bridge’s supporting steel cables. First, though, spend some time in Brooklyn Heights, a colonial-era village that remains one of New York’s loveliest neighborhoods, with block after block of beautiful brownstone homes and even a few wood-frame houses—a rarity in this once very fire-prone city. The Brooklyn Heights Promenade, an overlook sitting on a rise above the East River, provides one of the city’s grandest views, taking in the sweep of New York Harbor, the Statue of Liberty, the great lower Manhattan skyline, and the bridge in all its serene majesty.

Right beneath the bridge’s Brooklyn tower, the River Café offers probably the best
restaurant view in all New York. The cuisine is reliably good, but most people come for the candlelit tables, the Woody Allen–sound track piano music, and the cinematic views of Manhattan and the bridge lights shimmering off the East River. Next door, at Fulton Ferry Landing, Bargemusic presents intimate chamber music concerts year-round aboard a 103-foot former coffee-delivery barge, with seating for only 170 people. A large picture window behind the performers lets onto a stunning Manhattan view. About three miles northeast, under the Williamsburg Bridge, Peter Luger is possibly the country’s finest steakhouse, drawing happy carnivores to its tavernlike, old New York premises since 1887. Each perfect, butter-tender prime beef steak is hand-picked and dry-aged onsite, then prepared to perfection and served by amiable waiters who aren’t half as gruff as the guidebooks claim.

The Brooklyn Bridge stretches 5,989 feet over the East River.

W
HERE
: The Bridge runs from Center St. in Manhattan to Adams St. in Brooklyn.
R
IVER
C
AFÉ:
Brooklyn Heights. Tel 718-522-5200;
www.rivercafe.com
.
Cost:
3-course prix fixe dinner $85.
B
ARGEMUSIC:
Brooklyn Heights. Tel 718-624-2083;
www.bargemusic.org
.
Cost:
tickets from $35.
P
ETER
L
UGER:
Williamsburg. Tel 718-387-7400;
www.peterluger.com
.
Cost:
dinner $75.
B
EST TIME
: July 4 for dinner at the River Café and a prime view of New York’s annual fireworks, which are launched from barges in the East River.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Brooklyn, New York

Outsiders are constantly surprised to learn that there are many Brooklyns, from old and new immigrant neighborhoods to old- and new-money enclaves and sections that, more than almost anywhere else, reflect
what all New York looked like more than a century ago.

The latter is what you’ll find in and around Prospect Park, a grand 526-acre parkland laid out in 1866–68 by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, the landscaping geniuses behind Manhattan’s more famous Central Park (see p. 166). The pair considered Prospect Park their more successful New York creation. It’s easy to see why: To Olmsted, a park was a place where
a city’s citizens could feel immersed in tranquility, and that’s just what Prospect Park offers, even on busy weekend days when it becomes a giant playground. Pass through any of its entrances and the city outside drops away, hidden by trees. Inside are treasures: the Long Meadow, whose one-mile expanse is the longest in any urban park in the world; the Ravine, a steep gorge that contains Brooklyn’s only remaining stand of native forest; the 60-acre, stream-fed Prospect Lake; the Boathouse, a 1905 beaux arts structure that now houses an Audubon Nature Center and is surrounded by interpretive nature trails; and a classic 1912 carousel with wooden animals carved by Charles Carmel, one of the greatest carousel designers of the time. The highlights are balanced by thousands of grace notes designed to create the perfect urban escape: woodland springs and waterfalls, sandstone bridges and arches, music pavilions, playing fields, a children’s zoo, and even the Dog Beach, a corner of the small Upper Pool pond set aside for man’s best friend.

The park’s main entrance is the magnificent Grand Army Plaza at the park’s northwest corner. Its great memorial arch, crowned by bronze statues of a lady charioteer and two winged heralds, was erected in 1892 as a tribute to Union soldiers and sailors of the Civil War. Just east of the plaza, the grand 1897 beaux arts Brooklyn Museum is the borough’s premier art museum, with a collection that stretches from ancient Egyptian sculpture to contemporary art. Behind the museum, filling a 52-acre triangle that skirts the edge of Prospect Park, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden is perhaps the most popular garden in New York. Dating to 1910, it displays more than 10,000 plants from around the world, laid out in numerous specialty gardens including the Japanese Hill and Pond Garden, the English-style Shakespeare Garden, and the Cherry Esplanade, where in spring more than 220 Japanese cherry trees offer one of the finest spots outside Japan for seeing cherry blossoms.

During your visit, be sure to set aside some time to walk the residential streets on the western slope of Prospect Park. Known as Park Slope, it’s one of the best-preserved 19th-century residential neighborhoods in all New York, full of the three- and four-story brownstone row houses that remain the archetypal, idealized New York home today. For an entirely different Brooklyn experience, head north a mile from Grand Army Plaza along commercial Flatbush Avenue to Junior’s Restaurant, known since 1950 as the home of the world’s best cheesecake. Wash it down with an egg cream, a classic Brooklyn blend of milk, chocolate syrup, and seltzer that’s increasingly difficult to find (and, weirdly enough, contains neither egg nor cream).

P
ROSPECT
P
ARK:
Tel 718-965-8951;
www.prospectpark.org
.
B
ROOKLYN
M
USEUM:
Tel 718-638-5000;
www.brooklynmuseum.org
.
B
ROOKLYN
B
OTANIC
G
ARDEN:
1000 Washington Ave. Tel 718-623-7200;
www.bbg.org
.
When:
closed Mon–Tues.
J
UNIOR’S:
Tel 718-852-5257;
www.juniorscheesecake.com
.
Cost:
cheesecake $5.50 per slice.
B
EST TIME
: late Apr for the Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s 2-day Cherry Blossom Festival.

A Lavish Paean to Local Food and Good Eating

Pocantico Hills, New York

Blue Hill at Stone Barns is more than just a hot restaurant destination for foodies and luminaries like President Bill and Senator Hillary Clinton (they have a home in nearby Chappauqua). It’s the most talked-about
part of a $30 million experiment called the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture, a sustainable farm aimed at educating the unknowing about locally raised food. It is financed by David Rockefeller, grandson of the oil magnate, and led by chef Dan Barber, who made his name in New York City with the original Blue Hill, his Greenwich Village restaurant dedicated to local farmers.

Fashioned out of unusually elegant Norman-style stone barns built in the 1930s as the Rockefeller family’s private farm, the center is an 80-acre organic farm and educational facility designed as a fitting memorial to Rockefeller’s wife, Peggy, a founder of the American Farmland Trust. Guests can stroll about, past flocks of chickens and turkeys, penned Berkshire pigs, gardens of heirloom tomatoes, and a vast state-of-the-art greenhouse.

The undeniable highlight of a visit here is mealtime at Blue Hill. Decorated in earth tones, the restaurant is a converted dairy barn whose high, vaulted ceiling is crisscrossed by steel beams. The chefs are hands-on at the farm, and intimately so—getting out in the fields picking, weeding, even composting. As a result, the restaurant is not just lip service to seasonality, but a deep expression of the farm and integrity in food. When tomatoes are in season, you can sample an entire spectrum of them—marinated, as tartare, as confit, even as sorbet. Blue Hill celebrates the quality of the ingredients and doesn’t dare mask them with fancy sauces or spices—it’s all about the sheer intensity of flavor.

The Stone Barns Center is far more than just an eating experience. Shop the farmer’s market, attend a workshop, take a tour, and then pick up a warm sandwich made from Hudson Valley cheeses and fresh sausages at the casual Blue Hill Café. The experience is designed to make you think more deeply about what you eat and where it comes from, an idea that might seem too highbrow if it wasn’t so intensely pleasurable.

W
HERE
: 30 miles north of Manhattan; 630 Bedford Road. Tel 914-366-6200;
www.stonebarnscenter.org
.
When:
closed Mon–Tues.
B
LUE
H
ILL AT
S
TONE
B
ARNS:
Tel 914-366-9600;
www.bluehillstonebarns.com
.
Cost:
$65 for 3-course dinner.
B
EST TIMES
: June–Oct for weather; mid-Oct for Harvest Fest.