Your Guide to Family-Friendly Day Trips in New Jersey, New York…and Beyond
Have you ever pet a capybara? I’m guessing you have not. We hadn’t either, until we visited the Ghost Ranch Exotics and Funny Foot Farm outside of Tucson. You get to pet more than capybaras – you can pet warthogs, bulls, emus, porcupines and even hold baby goats. This Tucson exotic petting zoo is a lot of fun.
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Here’s something you don’t usually do on vacation in Phoenix – visit a worm farm in Arizona. But that’s what we did in December, and we loved it. These worms are grown for composting and fertilizer. The Arizona Worm Farm sells worms, castings and black soldier fly larvae direct-to-consumers (gardeners and farmers). This is a 10-acre urban farm (though the area itself does not feel urban).
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This not your typical Jersey Kids post, as absinthe is not a typical kids’ drink. To say the least. If you’re in New Orleans, visit the Museum of the American Cocktail, which is part of the Southern Food and Beverage Museum. The museum is kid-friendly – the cocktail part is too (if kids are interested in learning about alcohol – there are some fun glasses, including tiki glasses there).
A sizable portion of the cocktail area is devoted to absinthe, a liquor not so common in our lives today. But it was very popular in the 1800s – artists and writers especially loved it. Think: Vincent Van Gogh, Edgar Degas, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain, Walt Whitman and Edgar Allen Poe. There were coffee houses/cafes that specialized in the drink.
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We made our usual trek into NYC on Thanksgiving weekend to check out the 2024 NYC holiday windows. I have to say, other than Bergdorf Goodman, they were a disappointment. I’ll start with Bergdorf Goodman’s, and then share Macy’s and one from Bloomingdale’s. I’ll share at the bottom more about Sak’s Fifth Avenue’s windows.
AND, scroll down to see the Louis Vuitton scaffolding – which is UNREAL. A highlight of the day.
I’ve been to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty a handful of times since I’ve lived in New Jersey Each time I learn something new. But after taking the Ellis Island Hard Hat Tour with kids (have you even heard of it?) I now know even more. This is a great tour to take with kids – though the official age to go is 13+ (more on that later). You see a whole different side of Ellis Island – literally and figuratively.
I’d been wanting to check out the Robbinsville Mandir (technically the BAPS Swaminarayan Mandir) in Robbinsville, since it opened in 2023. It’s been a year now, and my in-laws were coming in town. A perfect time to visit. Though it turns out they had already been on a previous trip with another family member. Oops!
So this post will be less about the actual history and more about what you’ll see there. Note that on weekends, national holidays and Hindu festivals, you need a (free) reservation. They do check those before you enter the complex. Of course going to the Robbinsville temple with kids is easier on a weekend or holiday!
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A musical about the suffragist movement? (Don’t say suffragette). Sounds about as exciting as a musical about the history of Alexander Hamilton.
We know Hamilton is amazing. But so is Suffs. My husband is a history buff and even he learned new things about this time in history.
As New Jersey’s tallest lighthouse, the Absecon Lighthouse is 171 feet tall. It is also the nation’s third tallest. Go to Abesecon Lighthouse with kids!
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If you’ve been in the Atlantic City area, you probably have heard about or seen Lucy the Elephant. Touted as the top roadside attraction in America, Lucy has been around in various forms since 1881, in Margate – just south of Atlantic City.
If you haven’t heard of Mercer Labs, you’re not alone. Formally Mercer Labs Museum of Art and Technology opened in March, a collaboration between Israeli artist Roy Nachum and real estate developer Michael Cayre. The idea is to be a “place where the traditional hierarchies between art, architecture, design, technology and culture are dissolved,” the New York Times quoted from a news release (I couldn’t find the news release).
In the Limitless exhibit in this 36,000 square foot space, you’ll visit 15 rooms with multimedia and sensory experiences, climbing up and down stairs between the floors (of course there’s an elevator if needed). In the initial space, which was one of the least interesting, you’ll put on shoe covers and look at a digital moving object that looks like of like a space rock.
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