If you read our last post, you know that we spent the two days prior to our Cooperstown trip checking out New York City as a family. The rest of our vacation was dedicated to Upstate New York, and in particular, getting my dad to the promised land.
We visited the Baseball Hall of Fame once as a family when I was little, but according to my mom, my brothers and I were so ill-behaved that we had to leave early, and my dad never got over it. This trip was to make amends for all of our childish nonsense, and JR and I could not have been more excited.
We met my family at a VRBO in Laurens, NY, about 30 minutes south of Cooperstown. This are is actually pretty well visited, as there are several baseball stadiums in the area that host little league tournaments. That said, being 30 minutes away from everything we wanted to do became a bit arduous by the end.
On our first night there, we ate with the family, the kids swam and we got settled in. The second, my family got up early and we headed up to Howe’s Caverns. This is a deep cave system at a pretty well developed site that offers multiple tours. We took the 1.5 hour tour, which involves about a mile of walking.
It also includes boating along an underground river, which was really fun and walking through an area that can best be described as an underground slot canyon that required a lot of turning sideways and tight squeezes. The whole experiences verges on being a bit kitschy, but it was a lot of fun, and I love a good cave.
We made our way back to the house and chilled out for the rest of the day. The kids swam, my dad grilled burgers, and we got to bed at a decent hour.
The next day was the big day, the Hall of Fame. We left the rental at 8 am and made it Cooperstown before the doors opened. Similar to many recently visited attractions, timed tickets were required, but we still had to wait in line to get in. This time, it was totally worth it.
It was recommended that we start on the second floor and watch a 17 minute video, which was definitely the right thing to do. This video, chronicling the history of the game and the importance of the Hall of Fame, is not only extraordinarily well done, but it had most of the adult men in the room (myself included) on the verge of tears. It perfectly set the stage for what we were about to see.
The second floor is dedicated to the history of the game, with great sections dedicated to classic teams like the Yankees and Cardinals, different eras of the game, including pre- and post-integration, and the new directions that the game is going. My son tried to read every word, but I finally got him to move along and join the rest of us on the first floor.
The first floor is where you find the actual plaques, and these are just splendid. Walking through the Hall, finding all of history’s greatest ball players, all of the Cardinals’ greatest athletes, was really special. I think my dad spent about three hours looking through this area, to the point that we had to force him to stop for lunch.
Lunch, in Cooperstown, can be a bit of a challenge; everyone is leaving the Hall at the exact same time. Some of us ate at the Doubleday Cafe, but the wait was too long, so my family and I went across the street to a deli/grocery called Danny’s Mainstream Market. The sandwiches were great, the people were nice and there was no wait.
Afterwards, JR, my dad, my youngest brother, Dan and I went back to Hall while everyone else headed back to the house. We spent the last two hours on the third floor, which is dedicated to some of the great stadiums in baseball history, as well as all the record holders, club members, etc.
JR and I could probably have spent a whole second day at the Hall of Fame, but I think everyone else was baseball’d out, and my dad was happy, so mission accomplished. We ordered pizza that night and got ready for the next day.
The next day, Eileen wanted to go strawberry picking, so we drove to a farm called Middlefield Orchard. At this time of year, all they had available were strawberries, but during different seasons, you can pick all sorts of fruits. The strawberries were really flavorful, and the people were super-nice. We drove into Cooperstown and grabbed lunch at a place called Mel’s, which was good but quite deliberate, and headed back to the house.
The kids got in the pool again, which was a lifesaver, and my brothers, the wives and I headed out to a brewery called Red Shed, which featured a fun, albeit not-too-challenging trivia. We came in second place out of 15, and I think we only missed four questions total. Like I said, it wasn’t the hardest trivia night I have been too, but it was a fun way to experience a local brewery.
The next morning, we rented two pontoon boats and cruised around Otsego Lake. There isn’t all that much to do or see on this lake, but it was fun to get out on the water, swim and let the kids drive the boat for a little bit. We had lunch that day at the Ommegang Brewery, which seemed a bit overwhelmed by all the customers, but was still pretty good. Of the two, I preferred the beer/experience at Red Shed, but that was not a unanimous verdict.
The next morning, my family got up early and set out to find a hike called the Natty Bumppo Cave Trail. This trail was evidently a favorite of James Fenimore Cooper, who wrote The Last of the Mohicans, whose main character goes by Natty Bumppo. To be honest, this trail was not the greatest. The access point is in the middle, so you have to decide which direction to go.
We went north, towards the cave, and this part of the trek was pretty cool. That said, it is not maintained and very poorly marked, and while I am sure we made it to the cave, I am not sure we saw it from the angle intended.
On the way back, we came across a trail that looked like it might connect to the south branch, so we took it, not knowing that it would disappear a few minutes in. We were using the All Trails app, so were never in danger of being lost, but we basically bushwhacked our way to the other end of the trail before making it back to the car. I am glad we attempted this trail, and it has the potential to be really cool, but because it is unmaintained, poorly marked and at times, quite steep, it was a very arduous morning.
We met my family for lunch that day at local place called Brook’s BBQ. To be honest, this was a bit disappointing. The food was fine, but when you get local barbecue, you are hoping to be blown away, and this was not that.
That afternoon, we all played mini-golf at a place called Barnyard Swing, which was a nice family activity to cap off the week. The following day, we dropped JR off in Williamstown, MA, to go on a trip with a group called Overland, and the rest of us headed back to New York to fly out of Laguardia.
If you are planning to visit Cooperstown, I could not more highly recommend it. That said, I would suggest staying as close as possible and perhaps not for a week. If I was doing this again, I would have stayed close to the Hall for two nights, then spent the rest of the time in the Finger Lakes or Catskills. There are a lot of great things to do in the area, but most of them are too far from where we stayed. Regardless, this was a great trip, and it is always great to spend a week with the extended family.