I grew up living less than 30 minutes away from NYC, a city that people travel from all world to see, and I had never been to Central Park. Wow, I took my location for granted. Well, I made an effort to change that recently, and spent a good amount of time wandering around like I should have been for years. The park is 2.5 mile long and 5 mile wide with so much to see. Frederick Law Olmsted was the park architect of the day and created a variety of amazing green spaces from places close to home like Albany’s Washington Park and Saratoga Springs Congress Park, and others I have had the pleasure of visiting such as Manor Park in Larchmont and Mount Royal in Montreal. The man knows how to design a park suited for leisure, and Central Park may be the most famous of them all. We started our journey at the north end of the park in Harlem, where we were greeted by a pond surrounded by families, couples, joggers, and all sorts of people getting into the greenery. We took the high road into the woods called the Ravine. Here we saw a beautiful man made waterfall.
We heard birds chirping and saw chipmunks racing, for a moment you could completely forget you were in the middle of NYC. Then of course a group of people would come and disturb that tranquility and bounce you back into reality, but for that moment you were one with nature. We continued on and soon came out of the woods discovering that real and serious roads run through the park. You are meant to take bridges over to get to the next section, which we kind of botched, and had to scurry on a skinny sidewalk narrowly avoiding getting nailed by trucks – but certainly getting beeped at. Whoops, a mistake I wouldn’t make again! Back into the safety of the park we arrived at the reservoir, a beautiful body of water whose outline is an amazing cityscape.
After viewing and walking along the reservoir we made our way down to a bridge and crossed over to the next section of the park correctly this time.
It was a romantic looking bridge, which led us to some emerging spring flowers
And eventually reveals Belvedere Castle, standing out of time and originally built with no purpose, except to be beautiful.
What a life. Cross the road and enter the Ramble a fantastically designed maze of woodland paths, we followed the cascading water to get a view of the lake.
When I visited spring was just showing its first friendly rays of warmth, and there were so many turtles basking on a rock in the distance. It was such a welcoming sight. Walk the length across the park to see Alice, a statue completely covered in kids!
Join them! I got up close and personal with Alice,
The White Rabbit,
And Cheshire Cat.
Watch the miniature boats racing in the nearby conservatory pond,
And keep your eyes peeled for a peregrine falcon I spotted atop a building on the street over here. You can head back through the center of the park to beautiful Bethesada Terrace where weddings were occurring, and walk through a gorgeous row of trees.
My last moments of soaking in the park were from Sheep Meadow, what a grand view.
The park is almost too big to see every nook and cranny in a day! I didn’t get a chance to visit Strawberry Fields or the Zoo, so I am excited for my next visit.