what about the plastic animals?

Walkway Over the Hudson

I finally got a chance to go up to the Walkway Over the Hudson in Poughkeepsie.  When it opened in 1888 the Great Poughkeepsie Railroad Bridge was one of the longest bridges in the world and the first bridge crossing the Hudson south of Albany.  The bridge was closed in 1974.  In 1998, after nearly a quarter century of sordid dealings, the bridge was deeded to Walkway Over the Hudson a non-profit that has spent the last ten years raising money and renovating the bridge.  Last month the pedestrian bridge was finally opened to the public.

It was cool yesterday, 212 feet above the Hudson.  Despite the chill the pedestrian bridge had plenty of pedestrians.  The bridge is still a work in progress.  Eventually it will connect to trails on either side of the river.  For now all you can do is walk, or ride if you have a penny-farthing, back and forth.  It's worth it.  Look at those views!

Speaking of walking, the Times has a great narrated slide show of a woman who walks up to 90 miles a week around the city.

Hudson Highlands

West Point

Bull Hill and Breakneck Ridge across the river

I went up to the Beacon-Newburgh area yesterday.  On the way back I stopped on Storm King Mountain and the neighboring Crow's Nest to have a look around.

Today was too humid to do much of anything outdoors.  At least that's my excuse for laying on the couch and reading the paper.

Random:  Too funny.

Lookout

Looking south from the State Line Lookout on a hot and hazy day a few weeks ago.

Saturday Sunset

A couple of shots of Saturday's pretty sunset along the Hudson.  Not the most colorful but I like the dramatic, yet not very threatening, cumulus clouds.

Three Boats at Sunset

Reading the paper and people watching in Riverside Park was a good way to end the holiday weekend.

Sunset Over Hoboken

Ack!  I don't have any Thanksgiving themed photos.  The sunset over Hoboken as seen through a chain link fence will have to do. 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  I'll be in upstate New York, eating turkey and staying away from the internet for a few days.

A Trip to Fort Lee

Palisades from the George Washington Bridge.  The park on the water is where the carnival scene in the movie Big takes place.

George Washington Bridge from Fort Lee Historical Park

Tasty cheese fries and chili dog at Hiram's.  The dog is deep fried in the north Jersey fashion.

Hideous McMansion under construction in Fort Lee.

Another Sunday, another 20 mile bike ride.  This time it was an indirect ride to Fort Lee, New Jersey.  Indirect because it went up around the northern tip of Manhattan before heading across the George Washington Bridge into suburbia. 

Cycling across the bridge is fun.  Taking photos while on the bridge is not recommended.  What you don't notice while riding is that the bridge bounces, a lot, as trucks drive across it.

Back to Ohio:  12 second video of a cow at Young's Jersey Dairy.

Visiting the Science Barge

The Science Barge

Zak, Sustainable Systems Director, builder of the solar panels, and excellent tour guide.

Little plants germinating in "rock wool" i.e. basaltic rock spun into fibers.

Cucumbers are ready for picking

Greenhouse cooling system - when the greenhouse gets too hot the cardboard is moistened and air is blown through to cool the house by evaporation.

In writing yesterday's post I lost my train of thought and forgot the punchline.  Before eating the gelato and searching for ice cream recipe books I had lunch at the Shake Shack, where I enjoyed the a tasty, thick vanilla shake.  It was a true dairy overload day!  Okay, now on to today's wit and wisdom...

Thanks to a story on Gothamist I visited the Science Barge on Saturday.  The Science Barge is a demonstration project of New York Sun Works, a non-profit that promotes "sustainability by building and testing ecologically responsible systems for the production of energy, clean water, and food, and by scientifically observing and measuring human impacts on the local environment." 

The barge itself is a sustainable urban farm that is touring the city's waterfront parks over the next couple of years.  Power for the barge comes from solar panels, wind turbines and biodiesel and waste vegetable oil.  Water comes from captured rain and purified river water.  They are hydroponically growing cucumbers (that looked great), tomatoes, peppers, lettuce and basil.  A recent addition is a school of tilapia.  All that is done with no waste water and no net carbon dioxide emissions.

New York City's population is expected to grow by a million people over the next twenty-five years.  All those extra people gotta eat.  NY Sun Works, has estimated that the rooftop space in the city is sufficient to grow enough vegetables to meet the city's needs.  Whether that is practical is another matter, the point is with a little creativity and ingenuity a lot more food could be sustainably grown within the city.

The Science Barge is docked at Pier 84 (at 44th Street) through June.  In July the barge moves to Riverside Park (at 72nd) and then onto Stuyvesant Cove Park (23rd St) in September.  Tours are free.

Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge

More from the Saturday walk.

At 3500 feet the main span of the George Washington Bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the world when completed in 1931.  That record lasted six years.  The Golden Gate Bridge, at 4200 feet long, surpassed the GWB in 1937.  Weather permitting, I'm flying to San Francisco tomorrow.  I don't know if I'll get to see the Golden Gate Bridge.  The longest suspension bridge in the world is the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in Japan with a span of 6529 feet.

Ice on the Hudson

This winter has been mild.  It's only been in the last couple of weeks that the temperature has stayed below freezing long enough for ice to start building on the Hudson.  On Friday afternoon a thin layer of ice covered much of the river.  The winds and tides wiped most of that ice away by the time I took my walk on Saturday.  By then the ice was restricted to more sheltered locations near shore.  The posts in the river in the second photograph are there to break up the ice before it crashes into the North River Wastewater Treatment Plant, aka the sewage plant on top of which Riverbank State Park was built.