Bear Mountain Trailside Museums: rescued animals (bears, coyotes, eagles) along a paved Appalachian Trail stretch past four stone museums from 1927.
Trailside Museums and Zoo is a uniquely American institution, founded in 1927 with funding from the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Foundation and built as a partnership between the Palisades Interstate Park Commission and the American Museum of Natural History. It was the nation's first self-guided nature trail.
The trail follows a paved stretch of the Appalachian Trail past four small stone museums. The oldest, now the Reptile and Amphibian Museum, is the original 1927 building; the History, Geology, and Nature Study museums came a few years later, built by WPA crews during the Depression to match its stone style.
Keep reading Bear Mountain State Park & Trailside Museums and Zoo The rest of the write-up, our tier and the caveat — $16 for all 460 places.
Our take is in the guide
We went to Bear Mountain State Park & Trailside Museums and Zoo. Here's where it lands.
Everything above is free and stays free. The guide adds the part that took the driving: the tier we gave Bear Mountain State Park & Trailside Museums and Zoo, whether we'd go back, and the caveat we'd tell a friend — plus the same for 459 other places across the Hudson Valley, NY.
One-time purchase. Permanent access and every future revision included.