Summer Visit to New York

First Stop, New York City

Hot Town, Summer in the City With the pandemic seeming to be subsiding (ha!), we headed east to visit Dave and Stephanie and NYC and Catskill NY. It's summer and unlike Seattle, it gets warm in the Hudson Valley as a rule. One evening, after noodles and rice and everything nice in Chinatown, we returned to our hotel bar for drinks and games on the sidewalk. A few kibitzers stopped by, but none was very helpful.

Playing games on the sidewalk in the West Seventies

Art for Art's Sake We looked at a lot of art on this visit. As we'd hoped. Our first stop was the upgraded Museum of Modern Art. It's always a fave and we approve of the revisions: many classics and much diversity. After most of the day cruising the collection, we dashed through the raindrops and down the mews to an oyster bar for a careful review of the art we'd seen. Followed by more oysters and more review.

MoMA's Still Showing Rothko's No. 5/No. 22

The Art of Plants Dave and Stephanie took us to the New York Botanical Garden. It's huge. It exhibits an extensive variety of fascinating plants. One new species we learned about is called the Japanese Wingnut (Pterocarya rhoifolia). We wondered what the common name for Pterocarya americana might be. As if the botany wasn't spectacular enough, the garden was enhanced with a special exhibit of works by Yayoi Kusama including this Yellow Octopus Thing. Not clear it helped the garden, but it was interesting.

Brave Stephanie and Dave Risk Being Eaten

... more Kusama She put a mirrored building in the garden so visitors could clown around, being photographed between a single Agave americana plant.

Two Agaves Are the Same as One

... more Kusama Floating hundreds of mirrored spheres in a pond seems silly, but Kusama knew better. They're really cool because they move around with the wind 'clonking' into each other, getting stranded in the grass and reflecting one another. They're better than frogs.

Chrome Bubbles

... more NYBG Some Rockefeller donated a spectacular rose garden with more than 500 varieties. They're a delight at a distance or up close.

Plants competing on beauty, fragrance and thorniness

In addition to MoMA, we toured the Whitney Museum of Art, which is always enjoyable. Photographs by Dawoud Bey were unquestionably this visit's highlight. His choice of subjects - high schoolers, street people, immigrants and minorities - together with his ability to reveal their soul is mind-boggling. Sadly personal photography was prohibited.

In between the art, there was the eating and nowhere in America is better than NYC for that.

Next Stop, Catskill NY

Left Bank Ciders It's fun to be in New York City and it's fun to leave it, which is weird. But we were happy to leave for the two hour drive north to Catskill. On our last visit in 2019, we saw the future home of Left Bank Ciders, a hard cider company founded by Dave and his partners Tim and Anna. At that point it was three rooms in serious need of repair and updating. Since then they created the business, opened in the midst of the pandemic, and established their tap room as a trendy stop for locals and tourists alike. We were eager to see what the team had created.

Left Bank Ciders' Tap Room Bar

... more Left Bank Left Bank makes a wide variety of hard, dry ciders and meads. They differ depending on apple variety and / or other fruit with which the cider is fermented. Generally, eight flavors are on tap at any one time; we were eager to try a flight.

As Delicious as they are Beautiful!

... more Left Bank Most fascinating was Dave's backroom tour. Cider begins with picking apples, crushing them and pressing, of course. From then on it's chemistry, fermentation in large stainless steel tanks, temperature control, blending, aging and waiting for all of the magic to happen.

Keeping Tabs on One Tree's Juice

Wild Trees Left Bank uses some commercial apples, but some of their most interesting ciders come from 'wild apples' they gather around New York State. Cider was widely popular before Prohibition, but afterwards didn't return to its former glory. Accordingly, many of NY's apple trees fell into neglect. (NY is #2 US apple producer.) The Left Bank team likes these old varieties for the spectrum of flavors, tartness and acidity they exhibit. Dave and Stephanie took us to Byron's, one of their favorite historic orchards.

Sun Beams Down on Busy Apple Producers

Around Catskill Our putting around Catskill took us down to the shores of the Hudson River. Astonishingly, the river is still tidal here 125 miles up river from Manhattan. At one point the sun came out to highlight Frederick Church's home, Olana, perched above the river, once the epicenter of the Hudson River School of Art.

Hudson River and Frederick Church's Home

... Around Catskill The fun excursions included picking up bratwursts at the Applestone Meat Co., a vending machine meat market. Based on a series of refrigerated cases containing the usual selections from a meat counter, this (apparently) one-of-a-kind business seems to be on to something. No need to take a number!

Customer with her Brats

... Around Catskill Dave and Stephanie love to hike in the Catskill Mountains. We joined them on a couple of their favorite trails. Despite the huge metropolitan centers nearby, it is simple to find a hike with no crowds and little company.

Taking a Short Break

Dia Beacon Between Catskill and Manhattan is Beacon NY, home to the famous museum, Dia Beacon. The Dia museums specialize in large-to-ginormous size sculpture. Dia: Beacon is perhaps most famous for its Richard Sera sculptures: huge steel forms, many of which visitors can walk into. A couple even wind like a chambered nautilus.

Richard Sera Sculptures

... More Dia We spent a substantial part of the day experiencing the work of all of the Dia's artists, wandering quietly, looking closely. And for one brief moment the work caused our hearts to race. Walking along the left side of this Sera induced the feeling that the steel structure was tipping over on us. It's an adrenaline rush. Art is supposed to affect the viewer, and this work unquestionably does.

To Raise the Heart Rate, Size Matters

ART OMI For some reason New York State attracts large scale sculpture exhibits. One afternoon we toured ART OMI, a rural acreage with large art pieces scattered throughout the fields and forests. A favorite work was Obolin 2020 by Steven Holl, a large laminated wooden box that viewers can enter. It is a 21st Century take on Stonehenge. From inside the viewer can look out the three holes (ceiling hole not visible) to see the perfect alignment of the Sun on each Solstice and on the Equinox.

Holl's Advantage over Stonehenge: GPS and Calculus

Storm King Perhaps the coolest countryside art exhibit between Catskill and Manhattan is Storm King Art Center. Interesting to us was a sculpture by Roy Lichtenstein, who is much more famous for his comic book inspired paintings using Ben Day dots. Though his canoe seems to have run aground, at least it captured the mermaid.

On Reflection, Did It Capture Her?

... More Storm King Unquestionably the most impressive art at Storm King is Maya Lin's earthwork Wave Field. More than 11 acres in size, Lin contoured the ground to represent the tide coming in on successive waves. The 'land side' of her surf exhibits different structure than the 'sea side', reflecting their different roles. Curators have left the grass at the wave tops longer and rougher suggesting the white froth on the crests

Maya LIn's Wave Field