A Hudson River Road Trip

This was our fourth fall river road trip in the last several years.  We have done the upper Mississippi, the lower Mississipi and the Ohio River.  This year it was the Hudson River road trip with the bonus of being able to visit family and friends along the way.

We left Tuesday around 11:30 am.  Our first stop was Olana, the elaborate Moorish house that Frederic Church built in the mid-1800s.  After a bad experience years ago, we don't do house tours but we were eager to see the view of the Hudson River from the grounds of the estate.   And it was magnificent.

From there we headed north to Troy, home of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute where we checked into a Courtyard by Marriott with an upgraded riverfront room.  The real purpose of our visit was to have dinner with our grandson James.  We found his off campus house easily and headed to Dinosaur BBQ where we could have patio dining on the river.   We enjoyed southern ribs and pulled pork meals complete with corn bread and sweet potato casserole and for two of us, great beer.   James' college experience is very strange thanks to Covid.  Most of his classes are online even though he is near campus.  He does go into RPI a few times each week. 

Covid also affects hotel stays.  There was no place to get a breakfast in the hotel so we walked to a nearby Starbucks.   As it turned out, it was a difficult uphill walk crossing very busy streets sometimes without signals.   We ordered at the Starbucks but we were not allowed to eat inside.  We brought our coffees and sweets outside and I immediately got stung by a bee.   I sat down on the curb and a kind young man came up to check on me.  He went inside and got me a plastic glove full of ice.  We found a nearby bench across the mall area and I recovered enough to walk downhill back to the hotel.   

Trinity Episcopal Church

Our plan was to meet Dan in Rensselaerville and hike at the Huyck Preserve there.  We got there early and walked through the charming old village.  But our hike was aborted due to rain so instead we drove to Dan and Alex's home on Engel Road near Potter Hollow where we enjoyed Alex's pear cake and the view from their porch.   

It was really peak leaf peeping time in the Catskills with the hills a panorama of color.   We left Engel Road shortly before three and drove to the Hampton Inn off I87 in New Paltz.  Our plan was to eat in the garden patio at Garvan's, an old Dutch farmhouse but the weather was so windy and cold that we asked if they could place us inside.  Fortunately they had room even with the need for social distancing.  We had a lovely leisurely meal with Dan and Alex. 

Engel Road

We left New Paltz around 9:30 this morning and drove to Dobb's Ferry where Sue VanEngen was visiting her son Stefan and his family.   We hadn't seen Sue for a year since we moved so it was a treat to visit and to see Stefan's lovely neighborhood of historic houses.   Sharon, Stefan's wife, had purchased a spread from a nearby deli for lunch which we ate in the backyard.

We were home before 3 pm feeling that we had seen beautiful scenery and had more sociability than we usually have in this time of social distancing.  

Jim had a three month follow up doctor's visit and blood test just before we left on Tuesday.  The results were supposed to be in yesterday but when we got home he had a frustrating experience of trying to access his portal to get results.  And when he finally got the password and access code all working, the results were not in.  So we will have to wait a bit more for what we hope will be low numbers again after his spring radiation treatments.  I have been very anxious about these results but it was good to be distracted for a few days and not think as much about doctors' appointments and lab tests.  

There is so much more we could see and do in the Hudson River Valley area but we hope to have other opportunities to travel that way again especially if Dan and Alex make that their home instead of returning to New York City.