Ringing Rocks County Park
We are drawn to this park on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware by tales of a strange field of rocks that ring loudly when struck. “Bring a hammer!” the marketing people advise. The field of rocks is visually arresting, but our hammer produces a dull sound much like hammers do when hitting rocks. Apparently the children roaming the middle of the boulder field are having better luck, or so we’re told. But our mature ankles aren’t going to complete that trip in one piece, so we head elsewhere for natural entertainment.
Fortunately, there’s also a nice loop trail that leads down to a ravine and back again. No false advertising here. We were warned that the ravine’s waterfall would be dry this time of year, and it is, though the ravine itself floods our eyes with autumn color.
ArtYard
Next we drive a short distance to Frenchtown, NJ, and park just off Bridge Street. A stroll along the Delaware, beautiful as always, brings us to an exhibit space called ArtYard. We remember ArtYard when it was little more than an unfinished building with a few sculptures in it. Still free to enter, it now occupies a grand structure, at least by Frenchtown standards, with two floors of galleries and a small auditorium for lectures and concerts. We enjoy, among other things, Unfinished Verses, a set of rectangular boxes hanging from the ceiling with peep holes for viewing pages from sketchbooks. The idea, according to the artist, is for the viewer to seek out the artwork rather than passively view it on a wall.
Shopping
We return to Bridge Street, bustling with small shops, including Gemstone Gallery, seller of every type of gemstone imaginable, a specialty gift shop called Modern Love, and the Frenchtown Bookshop (always a good sign when a town supports an independent bookstore). Our ambition is to limit ourselves to window shopping, but of course we end up buying something from every charming store we enter.
FiNNBAR
We end our day at FiNNBAR, also on Bridge Street. This fine restaurant is run by chef and co-owner Cal Peternell, previously of famed Chez Panisse in Berkeley, where local sourcing was practically invented in America. The farm-to-table menu at FiNNBAR changes daily. Our pasta in a delectable pumpkin sauce does the trick, and we leave Frenchtown with satisfied appetites, several gifts, and a hammer.
FiNNBAR exterior
FiNNBAR interior dining area. The restaurant’s profits benefit Studio Route 29, which aims to strengthen the art community at large by extending resources and access to those historically dispossessed of them.