Hyde Park, New York, is located about an hour and a half from New York City. and three hours from Philadelphia Train service is available on Amtrak and the Metro-North Railroad with stops in nearby Poughkeepsie. That is where our touring began.
We arrived at our hotel in the middle of a Sunday afternoon. Not knowing what to expect in Poughkeepsie, my wife grabbed a stack of brochures from the hotel's front desk. We studied them in our room and saw that there were at least two places in Poughkeepsie we should see, Vassar College and Locust Grove, the former home of Samuel F.B. Morse, the inventor of the telegraph and a well-known portrait and landscape painter of the Hudson River Valley School.
Locust Grove is located at 2683 South Road on Route 9 or the Albany-Post Road as it has been called for hundreds of years. It is a 40 room Italianate mansion which is available for guided tours only. Because the Morse family had sold it near the turn of the last century, most of the furniture and paintings in the house are from the subsequent owners, the Youngs. It is an interesting mix of Victorian and older antiques and paintings. The views from the estate's gardens are of the Hudson River Valley and are fantastic..
There is a small museum on the grounds which houses some of the artwork of Samuel Morse as well as some of his telegraphic inventions. It is well worth a visit. There is also a small gift shop. One of the staff members recommended we try the Shadows on the Hudson for dinner that night.
Just a few short blocks away, Shadows on the Hudson has magnificent views of the Hudson River Valley. The food matches the view. I had the Lobster bake and it was excellent, with a one and a quarter pound lobster, andoiuille sausage, redskin potatoes and corn on the cob. You felt like you were right on the beach. www.shdadowsonthehudson.com, 176 Rinaldi Blvd., Poughkeepsie, NY.
