Van Cortlandt Park
1,100 acres at the top of the Bronx with the oldest surviving house in the borough, a former rail bed turned flat woodland trail, and the country's most historic cross-country course.
- What it costs
- Free. The house museum charges a small admission; the golf course charges separately.
- Best in
- Spring, Fall, Summer
- Where
- Broadway & West 246th Street, Bronx, NY 10471
- Official site
- nycgovparks.org
The Putnam Trail
The old New York and Putnam Railroad bed, abandoned in the 1950s, now runs north through the park as a flat, straight, shaded trail alongside Van Cortlandt Lake. It continues over the county line as the South County Trailway if you want to keep going.
Because it's a rail bed there are no hills at all, which makes it the easiest serious walk or ride in the borough. Two miles inside the park, and you can turn round whenever you like.
Van Cortlandt House Museum
A 1748 Georgian fieldstone house — the oldest building still standing in the Bronx. Washington used it during the Revolution; so did the British.
Inside is a period-furnished house museum with a small admission and limited opening days, so check before you build a trip round it. From outside it's free and still worth the five minutes.
The trails and the cross-country course
The John Kieran Nature Trail loops the lake and the freshwater marsh — good birding, easy going. The Cass Gallagher Nature Trail in the northwest is hillier, wooded and quiet.
The park's cross-country course is the oldest and most storied in the United States; if you turn up on an autumn Saturday you'll find several thousand high-school and college runners and a genuinely great atmosphere.
The flat bit at the front
The Parade Ground is one of the largest flat open spaces in the city — cricket, soccer, baseball and rugby all running at once on a summer weekend, mostly leagues from the borough's Caribbean and South Asian communities.
It's free, it's public, and standing at the edge of it watching a cricket match in the Bronx tells you more about New York than most paid attractions.
Getting there
The 1 to its last stop, Van Cortlandt Park–242nd Street, drops you at the southwest corner by the parade ground. About 45 minutes from Times Square, and the ride itself is elevated and worth the window seat.
The 4 to Woodlawn serves the eastern side.
The Bx9 and Bx16 buses run along the park's edges if you want to start somewhere other than a corner.
Getting around once you're there
The **Putnam Trail is flat, wide and largely surfaced** — it is the most accessible woodland trail in the Bronx and works for wheelchairs and strollers. The parade ground and the paths around the house are level. The John Kieran and Cass Gallagher trails are unpaved and hilly. 242nd Street station has stairs only.