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The New York Botanical Garden

New York, New York, United States

The New York Botanical Gardens

The New York Botanical Gardens are a fairly large garden complex located in The Bronx, NY. We hadn't been here before, so we didn't know quite what to expect. Overall, we were pretty pleased with the time we spent at the gardens. They are quite nice and well maintained gardens. They have a very large plant and flower collection, the most beautiful of which is probably the Rose Garden. The conservatory also houses a number of exotic plants and flowers. There is also a "home gardening" section with some nice displays of vegetables, and tips on how to grow them at home. The gardens also house some of the last uncut first-growth forest land in NYC.

Cost

The Rose Garden

There are two admission levels - a basic admission is $6 if you just want to walk around the park, and there is an "all access" admission ticket if you want to see the special exhibits that the park has to offer. The "full park access" ticket, which is $20 for adults, includes a narrated tour on the tram that goes around the park, and access to other exhibits like the Conservatory and the Rock Garden.

The gardens really aren't all that big, and the grounds are well maintained, so the tram isn't really necessary to get around. It's possible to walk from one end of the park to the other in about 20 minutes. The conservatory does have some neat plants, but it's hard to say whether it's worth the additional fee. The conservatory has some desert plants, some tropical rainforest plants, and then a "special exhibits" area that contains rotating exhibits. It was displaying Dutch Bulb flowers when we visited. The rock garden wasn't all that interesting - there were just more plants and some rocks.

The Cafe

Southwest Panini

After a full day of walking around, visitors are bound to get hungry or thirsty at some point. The Cafe is the only air conditioned building we discovered, which makes it a great place to recharge after a day in the sun. The washrooms here are also very nice.

The Cafe offers fruit, some hot pastas, sandwiches, ice cream, iced tea, iced coffee, and hot beverages. We had the daily special - a "Southwest Panini" (pictured here) - which was around $8. The food was decent but nothing worth going out of your way for.

Getting There

Inside the Conservatory

Probably the easiest way to get to the New York Botanical Garden is either to drive, or take Metro North from Grand Central. That's a bit more expensive, so we opted to take the subway.

By subway, take the 4, B, or D trains to Bedford Park. The D train is probably the fastest (since it is express in Manhattan from 59th to 125th street). When you arrive at Bedford Park, you can either walk along Bedford Park (200th street) down the hill, or take the Bx26 bus. We chose to walk down the hill (which took about 15 minutes) and then took the Bx26 bus back up the hill. The entire trip took about 50 minutes from midtown Manhattan.

Estimated Visiting Time

We spent about three hours at the New York Botanical Gardens, and saw everything that we wanted to see. It was a hot day, and we couldn't take any more time in the sun.