Celebrate Spring's colors at Lightscapes

Lightscapes is an annual event put on by Historic Hudson Valley at Van Cordlandt Manor in Croton-on-Hudson. It's the spring sister show to the Great Jack O’Lantern Blaze, and in some ways we enjoyed it even more.

Lightscapes focuses on recycling materials to create a fun art installations using light and color. From far away what looks like multi-color flowers turns out to be an assemblage of sliced plastic-gallon jugs on closer inspection.

This is a great show for people of all ages, and begins with a cascade of bubbles floating along two walls of flat colorful lights in different colors. Our 1.5 year old was so captivated she fought sleep in her stroller for the 45 minutes it took to go through the show, and when we went last year with a then 6-month old, she was also mesmerized by all the lights. The adults we were with also loved it, and the older kids we saw, all seemed to be having a blast.

It's a 30–60 minute stroll, depending on how fast you want to cruise. You’ll head down a meandering path where you'll see art illuminations on either side and even pass through a few fun tunnels.

As you walk through, you’ll see installations such as a sea of jellyfish-like creatures; giant turtles, crickets and geckos; a castle that appears to have been transported from the set of Super Mario Bros.; tons of light-up mushrooms, ladybugs, butterflies, ants, and flowers--in such volume that you don't know whether to look at each one individually or move back until you can take in the whole field. Mixed in with the scenes are educational signs with scientific facts about the materials used in the exhibits and nature facts about the plants and animals being portrayed.

It's a pleasant way to spend a warm, dry spring night. We got there right at 8:30pm, a bit before sunset and found that time to be perfect for travelling with young ones.  We had daylight for our drive up and parking at the exhibit, and we found the colors were just as bright at twilight as they were few minutes later when the sky got dark. Lightscapes was far less crowded than The Great Jack O’Lantern Blaze, and the spring air was much more pleasant to walk around in than a chilly October night. We were excited the event was empty enough to be able to use our stroller as the little one was too tired to tolerate being in the baby carrier. My recommendation is if you can comfortably wear your kid for up to an hour for the walk, go for it, otherwise a stroller is great if the event doesn’t seem overcrowded. The walking path is a bit uneven, so the larger the stroller wheels, the easier the time you’ll have navigating in the woods. We didn’t see any young kids walking; it seems to be too far for anyone who would fit in a stroller. There's a cute gift shop and snack bar at the entrance and exit but with porta-potties, only, it might be worth stopping off for a bathroom break and diaper change before you get to the site.

If you don’t mind your toddler being up a bit late one night, it’s a fun event for the whole family. Lightscapes closes on June 12, and is open rain or shine, so consult your calendar and weather map if you’d like tickets.