We are blessed with not one but two Botanical Gardens - in the Bronx and Brooklyn. We call the New York Botanical Gardens the Bronx botanical gardens. It has many wonders including the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory which is based on all those famous Crystal Pavilions and was recently restored to its original 1902 splendor. You can take a walk along the Bronx River, cross a waterfall and view the only intact landscape where New York looks like before the Dutch landed. The Brooklyn Botanical Gardens is famed for its stand of Cherry Blossom trees and Japanese Gardens. Both are easy subway rides and a great escape from the summer heat of midtown.

Like the hotel rooftop gardens, restaurants offered outdoor areas to escape the city heat and to enjoy dining al fresco. Since most New Yorkers don't have back yards, eating outdoors is very special - a sort of urban picnic!. Sometimes the gardens are at the back of restaurants and may be tiny like the Riverdale Garden or large like the one at Barolo's in SoHo.  Sometimes there are on rooftops like Terrace in the Sky up by Columbia University or at Mitchell's Place atop Beekman Towers. And sometimes its a few tables placed on the sidewalk out front bringing a bit of Europe to the bustling streets of Manhattan.

Who remembers that Madison Square Garden once had a roof top garden?  It was there that Stanford White, the architect who designed it, was shot (as featured in the Broadway hit Ragtime). We have the Winter Garden Theatre which is home to Mamma Mia, and the Walter Kerr Theatre which is home to the hit musical Gray Gardens. It's the story of two very eccentric ladies who happen to be related to Jackie O. and based on the famous cult documentary movie starring Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter "Little Edie."  A sad story symbolized by the beautiful Hampton's mansion garden they lived in during the 1930 's and how it disintegrated to a junk heap in the 1970's.