New York Traveler.net

New York City Car Service

Doing a little traveling to or through the Big Apple? Don’t take your car! It is murderous, trying to navigate the narrow and congested Manhattan streets (not to mention horridly expensive due to high gasoline prices). Here’s a tip: use a car service. There are various car services available, but only a few have been around for over three decades. And few have such a memorable telephone number as 212-777-7777! It’s Dial 7 New York Car & Limousine Service, and they specialize in LaGuardia airport car service. They also serve the tri-state area plus Pennsylvania to and from JFK Airport and Newark Airport, too. Dial 7 currently has over four hundred new Cadillac Luxury Sedans, Mercedes Benz and Lincoln Town Cars, plus stretch limousines and SUVs. They’ve also got minivans and larger vans for shuttle service. Prices are very reasonable! New York Magazine called them “the best ride in town”! You can make online reservations; check out their website for more details here.

Wordless Wednesday: Whoa Woes

Hmmm. I think I can say I speak for multitudes or people right now about this. Isn’t is a sad state of affairs. We are stuck right now because gasoline is just too durn expensive.

Be Bewildered No More

My kids are tremendous Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett fans. They even have the “gear”: coonskin caps, Kentucky rifles (toy, but they look real), and various Indian paraphernalia. They are also in the process of collecting each and every one of the old television series from the 50s and 60s. Funny! They love Boone and Crockett because they were such rugged frontiersmen. You know– all that exploration in the frontier wilderness, eating squirrels, quoting the Bible, and defending the Constitution!

We were joking recently about something Daniel Boone once said. He was an old man, sitting for a portrait for which posterity to remember him. The artist painting the portrait, a young man named Chester Harding, chatted on and off with the aged legend of old. (Harding’s painting is the only live portrait of Boone, by the way!) The young man asked, “Tell me, Mr. Boone, have you ever been lost?” Mr. Boone reportedly scratched his head and answered with his customary drawl, “Well, no, I can’t say I was ever lost, but I was bewildered once for three days.”

For some strange and utterly uncalled for reason, every time the children and I go out for a drive in the Adirondacks, they bring that little story up. I wonder why! Ha! Maybe it is because I get lost sometimes? I’m always checking out the weekly specials at Buy.com, and came across this gorgeous little gadget.

It’s a Garmin StreetPilot GPS Navigation System! Isn’t it the cutest little thing! Buy.com always has such great deals– this is a whopping 64% off right now. Mother’s Day is right around the corner. Maybe I should drop some hints. Well, the kids read my blog, so WINK WINK, KIDS! Shipping is freeeeee!

Just think– if I get this, I’ll never have to hear how Daniel Boone was “bewildered” for three days, again and again! Although, it’s become a family running gag now. Maybe I could name my new little GPS System “Dan’l Boone,” in honor of the old guy.

The Cannonball Run!

Growing up in a house with four brothers, I am very familiar with football, boxing, Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, and the Cannonball Run. We always had dreams of being able to travel the country by car (just a little bitty bit slooower than the people in the race, however). Someday I expect we shall.

I just found out that the Cannonball Run is not called the Cannonball Run anymore! It’s now called the One Lap of America! I rather liked the Cannonball Run name, but I guess in this day and age of highway speeding and etc, they had to change the name. “Cannonball” didn’t quite support the concept of safety driving, did it?

For all you traveling and race fans, there are some really cool things going on this year for the 2008 One Lap of America. A “smart” car! The kids and I flipped when we saw it! Isn’t it adorable?! we want one, we want one! I’m a sucker for those kinds of cars. I’d get one if all six of us could squeeze into it…

Here’s the scoop about this gorgeous car and the race:

The Tire Rack 2008, One Lap of America (formerly named Cannonball Run), will celebrate its 25th anniversary race around the United States and Stephen Noton along with his 451 smart fortwo will be apart of this historic race.

The smart has only been on sale for a couple months in the USA and Canada but it has already sparked some amazing interest from all types of car enthusiasts. While most people see the smart as an economical form of transportation Stephen Noton is showing that a smart can also be a very cool and fun car to drive.

Stephen Noton says “The smart is like a Ferrari, it is a 2 seater, rear wheel drive, rear mounted engine European exotic and it even beats the Ferrari in one performance metric, MPG”. That is very true and with some vehicles in the One Lap of America averaging less then 10mpg the smart at 41mpg might even have an advantage during the 4,000 mile event.

Here’s the map. The route looks so good.

The car is nicknamed “forfiveone” and already has a following at it’s website. The car has been modified with “racing springs, wider tires and some nice interior enhancements.” I would love to watch this car in action, live. But I’ll have to settle for broadcasting. If you want to go see the race, entrance to most of the tracks is free! Go here for more details.

A Trip To Cooperstown, NY

This post is about a recent visit we took to Cooperstown, NY. It was years ago (well, more like decades ago!) I used to visit the town frequently with my husband, when we lived in the area as newlyweds. Some of the children had never been here, so I wanted to take them to see quintessential small-town America.

We considered going to the Farmer’s Museum to see the Cardiff Giant, and I wanted to go to the Fenimore Art Museum, but we didn’t. The kids weren’t really up to interacting with crowds, and my youngest rolled his eyes when I suggested going to another museum. However, the Farmer’s Museum is open April 1st with reduced rates, so here’s hoping we go then.

Cooperstown was packed. We drove up and down the streets looking for a place to park. we finally found an empty spot in the marina’s parking lot. We walked to the Lakefront Park and got a look at Otsego Lake.

>>> Read more of ‘A Trip To Cooperstown, NY’

A Pal in the Car

It was bound to happen! Someone invented a new gadget for travelers- car travelers. Since I travel only via car (well, I have a minivan), I think this is a cool invention. It’s called the GPS Pal.

It’s a cup-mount holder for your little GPS gadget. It looks very cute! It’s helpful, because now the GPS is stationed in the cup-holder area of the vehicle– not on the sun-scorched dashboard where thieves can easily spot it. And in the cup-holder, the GPS is still readable (versus, having the GPS on the floor where it does you no good). The cords and wires of the GPS device can be neatly tucked away within the GPS Pal. (Also doubles as a drink holder for drivers who tend to take curves a little too fast, whose names shall not be mentioned).

My “co-pilot” (my eldest daughter who sits in the passenger seat during our travels) always appreciates a good gadget holder. This is because she as been my traditional gadget holder during our travels, and I think she’d like to retire from that tedious job! I still have to get a gadget to hold my cell phone, my wallet, and my maps. I guess I could always order two GPS Pals, and dump all that stuff in the extra one…

The Fish Hatchery in Van Hornesville, NY

The beginning of spring in Upstate New York is a beautiful thing. Spring is coming! Last March about this time, we decided to break out of our winter hibernation hole and go for a drive in the country. My youngest son wanted to go fishing that day (he is a fishing maniac– he even reads fishing magazines), but no one else did. So we did the next best thing, for a fish freak: we visited a fish hatchery.

Our choices were whittled down to the hatchery in Rome or in Van Hornesville. We opted for Van Hornesville; perhaps some other day we’ll see what Rome is like. If you are a fish freak, you can find out more about New York State hatcheries here.

Van Hornesville stocks only Rainbow Trout, a beautiful fish. And yummy. The action starts here, in the Nursery:

The tanks were swarming with billions of teeny-tiny fish. The place reeked something fierce, too. Outside, various muddy paths led to large tanks with medium-sized trout.

There are a total of 12 pools, most of them are filled with the medium-sized fish. Click the photo for a larger one from Flickr.com.

The fish were irresistible. Some of the kids tried to grab one. Rrrrright! These buggers were slippery. The water was very cold. My son said some of the fish tried to nibble his hand with their beak-like snouts.

The fish were a great, big squirming mass of brown fish. When I tapped the pool’s concrete wall with my boot, the entire mass moved in unison away from the wall. The fish were amazingly active. Hundreds of them flagellated just below the surface of the water. Some leaped from the water, showing off their pink flanks and brown freckles.

Wandering further, we came to an employee of the hatchery (there are three who work here). It looked like he was making a big pot of soup.

He was actually cleaning the pool of bacterial debris, which had accumulated in the water pipes. The water was a brown swirling mass of gooey debris. Ugh. The employee, Mr. D, said there were fish in there. We waited for the water to clear, and then we saw them. BIG MONSTER fish!

I tried to take a picture of the one who kept coming close to the surface. The photo is not so hot, but maybe you can see the fish better if you enlarge the photo.

Their mouths were large white traps, snapping open and closed as they swam. As they swam, they reminded me of the movements a shark makes as it swims in the deep. Some were allowing the swirling current to drag them backwards. Others were quite aggressive, bonking the slower fish out of the way. I’d say the fish were a good ten to twelve pounds, and maybe a yard long. Some had very bright pink sides. You could see the beautiful color even through the murky water. They looked delicious.

We talked with Mr. D who was more than happy to tell us everything we wanted to know about the fish.

The Van Hornesville hatchery raise these trout to distribute them into lakes and streams, local and even as far away as Long Island. The employees do become familiar the fish they have raised, sometimes becoming attached to them and giving them names. They also take delight in surprising unsuspecting local fisherman by dumping these monster trout into local ponds. A fisherman might just be out fishing for sunfish or perch, and snag a whopper trout instead! He told us that he once caught one of these Rainbows when fishing in Canadarago Lake and was shocked to measure it at 44 inches.

Mr. D told us one story about encountering a fisherman who had just pulled an enormous trout from a local pond. The fisherman lifted the great fish from his bucket to show him the prize. Mr. D promptly recognized this fish that he’d cared for since a fry. Mr. D yelled, “That’s ole Leatherback!” taking the fisherman completely aback. In the local diner that night, the fish find was the talk of the town.

It was a nice visit, even for a fish hatchery! Certainly this was no fanciful outing, but it was so good to be outside again and to drive on clear roads with the sun shining! From the hatchery, we ventured on to a few other places. But these narratives will have to wait, because I am going to get to bed in a timely fashion tonight! More to come.

Hamilton College Library

We took a jaunt to Hamilton College in Clinton, NY, recently. My daughter, a budding American historian, discovered that Oneida County residents can obtain a library card from the Burke Library at the campus. Hoh boy, was she eager to go after she found that out! The Burke Library is a beautiful library, chock full of the dusty tomes that make an historian’s skin tingle. The kids and I perused the library’s numerous sitting areas while we waited for Miss Historian to find her tomes.

We liked this one best:

We waited and waited. The Historian was no where to be found. So we wandered around a little. I took snapshots, just for kicks.

Finally, she arrived, lugging the three biggest books I’ve ever seen (besides Strong’s Concordance)– stuff on Alexander Hamilton.

We meandered the campus a little. Rain looked imminent, so I didn’t get as many photos of the buildings as I’d wanted. The architecture of the buildings are jaw-dropping. Here are just a sample of the beautiful edifices to be found.

We love Hamilton College because we love Samuel Kirkland and Alexander Hamilton. But I’d never send my kids there. It’s too fringe-kooky and too expensive (45K a year).