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Governor's Island
Aug. 17th, 2019 07:46 pmChuckro's at a con this weekend. (I'm not going because we're leaving ARR to go to Asia next week, and I didn't want him to be away from home/missing us for that long a span. He and I had an opportunity to go visit my brother this weekend instead, and he was sufficiently worried about being homesick that we skipped that as well.) So ARR and I are on our own. And because I have a limited (existing, just not unlimited) patience for Minecraft Legos, we're adventuring.
We decided to hit Governor's Island today, which I've never been to. (Pro-tip: the first couple of ferries in the morning are free.) We did a whole bunch of cool stuff, and skipped even more stuff.
- They have a fantastic adventure playground called The Yard. It's...basically a junkyard. Parents aren't allowed in. (You can see most of it through the fence, and there are adult facilitators in there with suggestions and keeping it from getting too Lord of the Flies.) There's a whole bunch of nailed together structures mostly built by the kids themselves. There's a giant mudpuddle people were busy excavating and building bridges across. Forts and hideaways. Random hubcaps and costumes and semi-broken musical instruments. ARR found two headless golf clubs he was delighted with. Things to climb and hang off of and hide in and nail to other things. We'll be back.
- There are hammocks, lots of them. But they're hidden in a forest of reeds and wildflowers taller than me, so you can find a little nook with only a couple hammocks and chill out. We read books for awhile.
- Lots of food trucks.
- Disappointing water feature - from the looks of things, I think there were supposed to be more fountains but most of them were broken. This was unfortunate.
- ARR "played" his first game of mini golf. (We didn't keep score. I figured we'd work up to that.) It's an extremely small and underwhelming course which makes it perfect for learning.
- AMAZING lookout point, with a rock scramble (or a more leisurely path we ignored) up to it. You can see the Statue of Liberty, all of Jersey City, lower Manhattan, the Brooklyn waterfront, and all the way down to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
- Cool slide hill, although we were wearing down at that point.
But then we were hot and tired and it was a long walk back to food and Mommy foolishly brought insufficient snacks, and we ruined some nice group of friends' attempt to play a board game by melting down and stealing their Adirondack chairs.
So we got a hot dog and went back to the ferry.
Things we didn't do:
- Whole bunch of climate change related activities
- Billion Oyster Project
- Castle Williams tour
- Renting bikes
- Zip line
- Overpriced maze thing
- Very cool climbing structure
- Children's Museum of the Arts outpost
And a ton of more adult-oriented activities.
We'll have to go back.
Then we got home and had to make and fly paper airplanes, and decided we needed to make banana bread, and I made him take a bath that was really, really necessary. Because my god the mud. Also, the way his feet smell now makes me fear for the teenage years.
And now I am really tired.
We decided to hit Governor's Island today, which I've never been to. (Pro-tip: the first couple of ferries in the morning are free.) We did a whole bunch of cool stuff, and skipped even more stuff.
- They have a fantastic adventure playground called The Yard. It's...basically a junkyard. Parents aren't allowed in. (You can see most of it through the fence, and there are adult facilitators in there with suggestions and keeping it from getting too Lord of the Flies.) There's a whole bunch of nailed together structures mostly built by the kids themselves. There's a giant mudpuddle people were busy excavating and building bridges across. Forts and hideaways. Random hubcaps and costumes and semi-broken musical instruments. ARR found two headless golf clubs he was delighted with. Things to climb and hang off of and hide in and nail to other things. We'll be back.
- There are hammocks, lots of them. But they're hidden in a forest of reeds and wildflowers taller than me, so you can find a little nook with only a couple hammocks and chill out. We read books for awhile.
- Lots of food trucks.
- Disappointing water feature - from the looks of things, I think there were supposed to be more fountains but most of them were broken. This was unfortunate.
- ARR "played" his first game of mini golf. (We didn't keep score. I figured we'd work up to that.) It's an extremely small and underwhelming course which makes it perfect for learning.
- AMAZING lookout point, with a rock scramble (or a more leisurely path we ignored) up to it. You can see the Statue of Liberty, all of Jersey City, lower Manhattan, the Brooklyn waterfront, and all the way down to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.
- Cool slide hill, although we were wearing down at that point.
But then we were hot and tired and it was a long walk back to food and Mommy foolishly brought insufficient snacks, and we ruined some nice group of friends' attempt to play a board game by melting down and stealing their Adirondack chairs.
So we got a hot dog and went back to the ferry.
Things we didn't do:
- Whole bunch of climate change related activities
- Billion Oyster Project
- Castle Williams tour
- Renting bikes
- Zip line
- Overpriced maze thing
- Very cool climbing structure
- Children's Museum of the Arts outpost
And a ton of more adult-oriented activities.
We'll have to go back.
Then we got home and had to make and fly paper airplanes, and decided we needed to make banana bread, and I made him take a bath that was really, really necessary. Because my god the mud. Also, the way his feet smell now makes me fear for the teenage years.
And now I am really tired.
