Day Trip to Pomona Village and Perkins Memorial Drive

Last Updated on November 23, 2016 by Babita

Last Saturday we decided to head over to Pomona Village. One of my friend had mentioned to me about a Hindu temple nestled in the mountains of New York and I was curious to check it out.

A little background about Pomona Village

It is a village, which located in the towns of Ramapo and Haverstraw, New York. It was incorporated in February 3rd, 1967. Since the area had many apple orchards, it was named Pomona after the goddess of fruit trees, gardens and orchards.

Until my friend had informed me, I was not aware of this village. I am glad we decided to check it out. It was about and 1 1/2 hour drive north from our town. The drive itself was smooth and as we drew closer to the place we could see the mountains.

Once we reached Pomona Village, we visited the Sri Ranganatha temple. Like I mentioned before this temple is nestled in the mountains surrounded by greenery. It has the deity of Lord Vishnu in reclining position. I am not a very religious person, but I could not help but feel peaceful and calm within the temple interiors.  I have to say unlike other temples in the US, this one reminded me of our local temple back in India. After the prayers were done, we went down to the basement for the complimentary prasadam (food), which was generous and satisfying.

Photography is not allowed inside the temple, so my husband took a picture of us outside.

 

 

From there we headed over to Perkins Memorial Drive which is about 20 minutes away. It was a gorgeous day and we wanted to be outdoors. The temple website had mentioned this place as one of the nearby attractions to visit.

Perkins Memorial Drive at Bear Mountain State Park

It is a scenic road that takes you up to Bear Mountain State Park. Situated in there is the Perkins Memorial Tower. It is 1305 feet above the Hudson Valley with  a 360 degree panoramic view. During my research I found out that you can actually see four states including New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Connecticut. Far off you can even see the New York Skyline.

The Perkins Memorial Drive and Tower are generally open from April through late November, but it is dependent on weather.

I am so glad we visited it. The drive itself was not far from the temple and we could feel we were moving higher. As we drove higher, the scenery became more breathtaking. When we reached the Perkins Observatory Tower, we realized there were couple hundred visitors like us. Since it was not very crowded we were able to find parking easily.

 

 

The first thing we did was check out the tower. Inside the tower, there are no elevators. Everyone has to climb up the stairs. Each floor has windows where you can glance outside at the gorgeous view. After spending a couple of minutes in the tower, we climbed back down and walked outside. Couple of steps away from the tower and we had a view like this in front of us.

 

 

In the spot below (which was the most popular with all of the photographers), is the view of lower Hudson River. After clicking a lot of photographs we decided to explore the close by trails. We were not prepared for hiking, so we stayed close to the tower area and explored the small trails in the woods. TEE and ‘S’ had a great time climbing the rocks and were emboldened to stand over the edge to peer down.

 

 

We spent few hours walking around.  If it were up to me, I would never leave. But the girls were hungry and we decided to head home. While driving down we stopped at the side of the road and I took one last picture of the awesome view.

 

 

Although the view was great, I could not help but think that we should have gone there two weeks earlier. We would have been able to witness the Fall Foliage in all its glory. None the less we have decided to go there next year during Fall. In the meantime I am going to enjoy the memory of our most scenic trip.