Whether it’s foliage walks, pumpkin patches, or spooky maze and cemetery tours, Queens has got the nature enthusiasts covered for the fall season. Here are five fall-themed ideas for outdoor Queens adventures.
Queens County Farm Museum
Not only is the Queens County Farm Museum city’s largest tract of farmland, it also contains a 47-acre parcel that is the longest continuously farmed site in the state. The farm takes full advantage of its access to fields, orchards, farm vehicles and livestock to go all out during fall. From late September to the end of October, the museum will host a 3-acre corn maze, which will feature night hours on select dates. The farm will also host a pumpkin patch and harvest festival on the weekends in October.
Visit the farm’s calendar at www.queensfarm.org/events.html.
Catch the fall foliage in Alley Pond Park
The park’s mile-long Tulip Tree Trail presents a great opportunity to walk through a forest of deciduous foliage once the leaves turn. Numerous trails in the park also cross through a native hardwood oak-hickory forest.
The park also features the Parks Department’s first public high ropes adventure course. The Alley Pond Park Adventure Course offers a series of obstacles that challenge participants to work together in order to solve them. The programs are available on a first-come, first-served basis on Sundays at 9:30 a.m. and 1 p.m. through Oct. 27, weather permitting.
Queens Botanical Garden
The Queens Botanical Garden, which developed from a World’s Fair exhibit into a full-fledged urban oasis with year-round programming, offers a bounty of fall events. The garden will host a harvest festival on Oct. 13 with live music, inflatables, a petting zoo, face painting and craft and food vendors. It’s also bringing back its ever-popular Pumpkin Patch on Oct. 12 and 14, with activities including harvest-themed photo opportunities, pumpkin decorating, crafts and botanical demonstrations.
For the garden’s fall calendar, visit https://queensbotanical.org/calendar/2019-10/.
Queens International Night Market
The New York Hall of Science Flushing Meadows Corona Park will host the Queens International Night Market every Saturday from 5 p.m. to midnight until Oct. 26. The open-air night market features up to 100 vendors selling merchandise, art and food. The organizers also curate cultural performances, which are booked to celebrate the borough’s diversity.
For more information, visit queensnightmarket.com/.
For the morbidly inclined, visit the cemetery belt
What better season to visit some of the city’s most historic cemeteries, than the lead up to All Soul’s Eve? Queens’s cemetery belt is home over a dozen cemeteries, the oldest of which Calvary Cemetery, was founded in 1848.
Middle Village’s St. John Cemetery is the burial site for former mob boss John Gotti, New York Governor Mario Cuomo and Geraldine Ferraro, the first candidate to accept nomination for vice president from a major party. Glendale’s Machpelah Cemetery houses the grave site of Harry Houdini, the world famous magician, who survived through daring escapes and illusions only to die of appendicitis. Then, travel to the Flushing Cemetery, where lie jazz legends Louis Armstrong and John “Dizzy” Gillespie, whose plot is not marked.
