I have to be in New Haven from the 15th through the 17th...

[zanana1]

Is there ANYTHING to do in New Haven? I've looked online and all I can find is hangouts for college kids. I was hoping for something just a little bit artsy or historical. For Christ's sake, it is New Haven! I would appreciate any info on this subject. Thanks in advance.

[catnhatnh]

1. Voila!

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attractions-g33851-Activities-New_Haven_Connecticut.html

And just for fun the worlds best pizza!

http://www.pepespizzeria.com/

[bigwillq]

7. Modern Apizza is better, imo

[whistler162]

2. You could bring one of these...

http://www.amazon.com/Greatest-Dot-Dot-Book-World/dp/0970043708

so you could connectdedots in conneticut

[Chan790]

3. Well, I usually just go home...I'm from halfway between New Haven and Hartford.

But yeah, New Haven's a college city. Lots of bars and clubs. Lots of cafes and small shops. Also, so this doesn't shock you...it's a filthy city, has been since the industrial revolution. Also, don't venture out of Downtown without a local...parts of the city are high-crime and it's not always easy to tell where is not a safe neighborhood. Hartford's the same way, some of the highest-crime neighborhoods look like suburbia.

Go to Pepe's or Modern and get a slice of what has been consistently judged as the best pizza in America. (A Traditional New Haven is white with clams, A Modern New Haven is cheese pizza on very-thin, very-chewy crust. At either place, go for opening (10am, I think...I haven't been home in a while) or expect to wait in line an hour or more.) Hit the museums associated with Yale. (There are a few but Peabody (Natural History) is the big one.) There's a lot of art galleries and historical sites, too many of the former to list most of which are bunched around the universities. (Sacred Heart and Yale)

There's a lot to do in New Haven, it's legitimately a major city. It just advertises itself poorly...that's to some extent intentional. We like not being a bigger city.

[grasswire]

17. maybe you can give me some advice....

....to pass on to elder cousins who are traveling to CT in September to see all the old family sights and the historical areas. This will be their first trip there. I've done Hartford and New Haven a dozen years ago, but wasn't worried about personal safety. I know that in Hartford they plan to hit the Mark Twain house and the Stowe house, and the Athenaeum. Not a problem in the daytime? And what area of New Haven should generally be avoided?

They'll also be staying in Greenport L.I. for a few nights, and want to take the RR into Manhattan for an afternoon. I assume that's not a problem.

They are pushing 80, but alert and energetic. They'll be flying into Springfield and renting a car.

BTW, I thought you were located in D.C.?

[Chan790]

19. I am in DC.

I grew up in the area around Bristol/New Britain, CT, moved to Hartford during HS (part of a Hartford white counterflight. Lots of nice bourgeois bohemian development while RE was cheap. Gentrification), went prep-school in the suburbs. College in DC then all over the eastern seaboard but mostly NYC as an adult. Currently in DC.

I'm more comfortable giving advice on Hartford, New Haven you'd be better off asking KamaAina as he's been there more recently and more-often than I and the unsafe areas I remember may not be the ones that exist now. As he said elsewhere in this thread, most everything one would want to see is in Downtown and within 3 blocks.

On Hartford:

The street layout and alternating one-way streets (Some main streets are one-way in downtown but which way alternates with time of day to ease traffic-flow.) are kind of a pain in the rear. Often if you're not leaving downtown, it makes more sense to park and walk or take the downtown circular shuttle. It used to be free, I think it still is. I'm not sure where your old family sites are so I did an overview of the city, if you PM me where in the city I can give you a more detail.

Wadsworth Athenaeum is right in downtown on Main Street near Bushnell Park, that's a safe part of the city pretty much 24/7; it's the city-center, there are always people around...it might get dicey past midnight but the entire city does. (The park closes at sunset. The carousel runs all summer and is kind of neat.) Park Av. is right near the Wadsworth, it's a vibrant Latino community with lots of shops and restaurants. Someplace the city has spent a lot of time and effort to make into a nice place. The Main St. end is safe but the other end is on Park Terrace in Frog Hollow which is still dangerous and run-down. I generally tell people park on the Main St. end because you couldn't walk to the bad part from there and the cool shops are on that end anyways. It's very much a pedestrian-zone. Pratt St. in downtown is closed to traffic and is where I typically hang out, basically a street bazaar with bars and cafes and restaurants right in downtown.

Stowe and Twain are in the West End, parts of it are medium-crime areas (mostly out by U of Hartford campus) but not really near there and from Downtown, you'd stay on major streets (Asylum St.) and there are plenty of signs. If they're out that way in the city, it probably makes sense to see Elizabeth Park too as the roses will be in-bloom (it's the largest rose garden in the US) and it's like 5 minutes from Twain House also on Asylum which is only about 10 minutes from downtown.

I avoid the North End, it's safer than it used to be but there's still nothing really there except Coltsville. Coltsville is kind of nice with its' museums and art galleries. You can park at the old Colt factory and everything is pretty much right there. Also some good West Indian takeout.

In the South End, stick to the main streets; most of it is safe but the area around the old Rice Heights projects and Prince Tech is not but looks really nice because it's new construction. (The state had this idea that if they tore down the projects and built really nice freestanding houses (on a rent-to-own basis) with yards and a park and playground as public-assistance housing that the neighborhood would improve...it was a good idea that didn't work.) Franklin Ave. Little Italy which used to be an area that attracted tourists and visitors basically no longer exists. The Italians moved out and the great cheap espresso-houses, bakeries and Italian restaurants closed.

Pretty much anyplace on LI is easy to take the train into NYC. The LIRR runs the length of the island and there isn't really anyplace more than 20 minutes from a stop. There's an LIRR terminal at Atlantic Ave. and Pacific Ave. in Brooklyn and another at I think Penn Station. (It might be Grand Central, I don't remember. They're only four blocks apart with a shuttle train.)

Springfield? I assume you mean Bradley International which is the airport for both Hartford and Springfield. It's in Windsor Locks CT about equidistant between the two cities. Both cities have their own airports as well but they only carry small regional flights.

[trof]

4. Yale has some great museums, open to the public:

http://www.yale.edu/museums/index.html
And do go to the coop for all things Yale.

[KamaAina]

10. The Co-op bit the dust a few years ago

forced out of the Yale-owned business strip on Broadway and replaced with a Yale-themed Barnes & Noble.

Good thing I didn't go for the lifetime membership!

[trof]

11. NO! Say it ain't so. The coop is ...GONE?

Dang.

Definitely the end of an era.
Double

[KamaAina]

13. They tried to make a go of it in a dying mall conveniently located just off campus

but the extra few blocks were apparently too far for the students to go and get their textbooks.

[bigwillq]

5. Come visit me!

I work in New Haven....live a few towns over.


If you're a meat eater, we can grab a burger at Louie's Lunch, home of the best burger on the face of the planet.

[KamaAina]

9. Noooooooooooo!

It's Louis' Lunch, dammit!

Happy eating!

[bigwillq]

12. I spelt it how I pronounce it!

[trof]

6. Unfortunately, you can't go to Mory's Temple Bar.

It's a private club.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mory%27s

I've been there.
My son-in-law is a Yalie.


The Whiffenpoof

To the tables down at Mory's
To the place where Louie dwells
To the dear old Temple bar we love so well
Sing the Whiffenpoofs assembled with their glasses raised on high
And the magic of their singing casts it's spell

Yes the magic of their singing of the songs we love so well
Shall I Wasting" and "Mavourneen" and the rest
We will serenade our Louie while life and voice shall last
Then we'll pass and be forgotten with the rest

We're poor little lambs who have lost our way
Baa baa baa
We're little black sheep who have gone astray
Baa baa baa

Gentleman songsters off on a spree
Doomed from here to eternity
Lord have mercy on such as we
Baa baa baa

[KamaAina]

8. Oh, you poor thing.

Yale Art Gallery, Museum of British Art (across the street) and Peabody Museum of Natural History. All free!

Grove Street Cemetery just behind Yale campus: quite historical.

That's just about the time of year when free concerts start on the Green, also home to the last continuous Occupation that I know of. There may also be concerts going on in Woolsey Hall.

Modern Apizza is the best and least crowded, but New Haven cuisine has, I am told, expanded beyond the round pie since my day: check the area around College and Chapel streets.

The whole city is quite compact and walkable: all this stuff except the Peabody is within about three blocks!

-KA
Y'85

edit: I forgot the theatre! That's where the phrase "bombed in New Haven" came from, y'know. Both the Yale Rep and Long Wharf Theater (rumored to be moving downtown) serve it up.

[grasswire]

14. Skull & Bones

It's a creepy building, on the Yale campus.

I think two days at Yale sounds very entertaining. I sure have enjoyed my visits there. I was researching writings of my Yalie ancestor that are held in the rare library holdings there. He was class of 1748.

[zanana1]

16. Class of 1748.

Now that's something worth going to New Haven for! I love things like that.

[grasswire]

18. yeah, pretty cool

This ancestor was a parson, and had delivered a hot-headed sermon to the Connecticut legislature -- that and some of his other writing is what I was researching at the Yale libraries.

He was the parson at the church in Stratford CT when news came of the British surrender at Yorktown. Church was in session, and someone slipped him the news. He said to the congregation: It's not appropriate to celebrate in God's house, but let us have a quiet Huzzah! So they all did the hip hip hooray in silence. I love that story.

[zanana1]

20. That's an incredible piece of American history. nt

[zanana1]

15. The last time I was in New Haven...

It was three years ago. I was staying at the New Haven hotel (directly across the street from the world-renowned Institute of Neurodegenerative Disorders. Catchy, huh? I'm a guinea pig in a research study there; two of my brothers have Parkinson's disease and science hasn't proven that it runs in families. So I'll take my shot of radiation and a CAT scan. Meanwhile, the hotel and all my meals are paid for (generously) so I can eat wherever I want. That was all I did the last time, because I couldn't find anything else to do.
Thanks so much for those of you who gave me some info besides where to engorge myself. When the driver picks me up for the trip down, I'll discuss it with him. Thanks all!