Specific attractions inside Westchester County are more than merely extraordinary settings, important heritage sites, or acclaimed cultural institutions. They’ll provide a special appeal which assists in defining Westchester. Here’s a collection of must-see locations certain to delight everyone who visits:
Go to the Caramoor Summer Music Festival
Have you been to one yet? If not, make this year the year you pack a picnic, get a blanket, then spread out on the Caramoor Center for Music & the Arts lawn to appreciate amazing music outdoors. The Caramoor summer festival is a real treat a gathering of some of the globe’s best jazz, classical, and popular musicians who make melodic, harmonious sounds inside a dazzling setting. It is as much about your experience as the music. Spend the day wandering through the gardens (ninety acres of woodlands, jewel-like formal gardens, and manicured grounds), stay for a night concert, and tour the Moorish manse. Once, Walter and Lucie Tower Rosen utilized it as their summer home and began the festival to entertain seasonal guests.
Caramoor Center for Music & the Arts, on 149 Girdle Ridge Road, Katonah
Website: caramoor.org, Phone: (914) 232-1252
Read the Short Story of Washington Irving
Legend of Sleepy Hollow is not merely any ghost story it’s Westchester County’s own ghost story, and all SUV-driving, card-carrying, 4-buck-latte-sipping resident ought to read it at least one time (viewing Johnny Depp in the 1999 film version does not count). In this story, set inside the sleepy little location of Sleepy Hollow (ne N. Tarrytown, until it decided to capitalize upon its literary heritage), W. Irving describes the encounters between Ichabod Crane and scary specter of the Headless Horseman. You’ll gain bonus credits for making a pilgrimage to this place to view Sleepy Hollow Cemetery (that have gravestones which date back to the 1600s), the Old Dutch Church, as well as the Pocantico River all discussed in the book alongside Sunnyside, Irving’s Tarrytown home. (For Your Information: He’s credited with coining the phrase the almighty dollar fitting for the county, no?)
Go to the Tarrytown Lighthouse
The poor little lighthouse. It doesn’t work anymore, because of the Tappan Zee Bridge, whose navigational lighting rendered the red lighthouse useless. However, with so few mementos of their early marine history, who cares if it is functioning or not? It is so cozy and cute and there are ecological exhibits inside which explain the importance of preserving the river and that’s enough. The best location to view it is from Kingsland Point Park inside Sleepy Hollow. Occasional visiting hours permit the general public to enter inside; otherwise, it’s open to group tours only by appointment (with a charge of $150 for the group of around 25 visitors).
Phone: (914) 366-5109
Kingsland Point Park, Sleepy Hollow
1883 Lighthouse at Sleepy Hollow
Go to “Hollywood on East Coast”
Tom Cruise inside Pelham? Yes. Michael Douglass? Sean Penn? Absolutely. Mamaroneck resident and Credit Rolling Stone movie critic Peter Travers, a Pelham Picture House movie advisory board member, with help, bring megawatt celebrities to the southern reaches of this county. This 1920s theater still is a work in progress; therefore, if you have not visited yet, arrive quickly so you can mention that you knew the place prior to it becoming referred to as Hollywood on East Coast.
Pelham Picture House
175 Wolfs Lane, Pelham
Phone: (914) 738-3161
Hear The Peak
As you are tooling up the Taconic, make sure you tune in to this countys world class rock station, The Peak 107.1FM. Listen within the morning for their famous 10 @ 10, DeeJay Rob Arrow’s selection of film clips, commercials, songs, and snippets from years past, or you can tune in Sunday and Wednesday evenings for Next, Chris Bros previewing of the Next Big Thing which stars cool new artists like Let’s Go Sailing, The National, Okkervil River, and Vampire Weekend. Because it is cool.
Go to Rockefeller Home
Even if your great-grandad did not start Standard Oil, you still can experience a taste of the A?ber good life by going to Kykuit, the family’s palatial, 6-story Beaux Arts mansion inside Pocantico Hills with breathtaking views of the Hudson. It is amazing outdoors and in; therefore, choose the 3-hour Grand Tour that will give you the best of the briefer tours plus entry into the 2nd floor. The terraced gardens (which include the Inner Garden that has its Roman Tea House, Morning Garden, as well as the incredible Brook Garden with its beautiful grotto and perennial borders) are graced with seventy fountains and ninety sculptures by Moore, Picasso, Calder, Noguchi, and much more. The home is packed with fine ceramics and antiques, which include (4) 7th Century pieces from the Tang Dynasty, as well as rare 7th Century sculpture referred to as Bodhisattva.
(914) 631-9491