Roosevelt Island: A Simple, Amazing Excursion for Families

A few weeks ago, my son, daughter, and I joined up with a few other NYC Dads Group members and went to the Roosevelt Island excursion sponsored by Urban Sitter.  We had a wonderful time!

The tram ride, one of those amazing New York City experiences I’ve always wanted to do, was fun and easy enough, even with a double stroller!  The ride is smooth, takes about seven minutes, includes jaw-dropping views, and is just the cost of a subway ride (or swipe of your MetroCard).  After the brief ride, it was a moderate walk to the playground area, which was pretty NYC standard, but with lots of room to run around.  One side of the playground had a tot-lot geared towards the cruisers & new walkers, separated by basketball courts, with a larger sized playscape for the older kids on the other end.  All with prime water views of the river!

As usual, it was the company that made the event:  Nice dads with kids of various ages, talking together, eating and sharing snacks, and watching the grey skies for any rain (safe!), and getting a little “time off” thanks to three very friendly UrbanSitter staff. UrbanSitter (sponsored this meetup event) recently launched in New York City and is such a simple and unique concept, it’s no surprise, that so many parents are utilizing their resource in cities across the country.  Think of the UrbanSitter concept like using Open Table for a dinner reservation.   Basically, you logon, decide which day/time you would like to hire a sitter, review several sitters (by price, experience, reviews, which ones accept credit cards, etc.) in your neighborhood, and easily book them online.  It made for a nice morning to be able to have conversations with several of the dads while our children were being carefully tended to by UrbanSitter.

When I asked UrbanSitter about their services I was impressed by their versatility:  Initially, I suggested that I probably wouldn’t use their services much since I live on Staten Island, and they said that they have connections in any location so it was not a problem.  Additionally, I go to the occasional commercial audition, and asked if I could arrange short-term care in random locations (i.e., for an hour-long meeting at Broadway and Houston) and they assured me they could.  Pretty cool!

Roosevelt Island is a bit of a hike for us (we live in Staten Island), but if you’ve never done it or live closer to the Tram at 59th Street and 2nd Avenue, it’s a fun experience to do as a family.  Some of the other dads said that they take the Tram more often to Roosevelt Island – “a small and quiet local oasis outside of Manhattan.”  Now that I have more of a handle on how to manage two small children, and now that the weather is more pleasant, I plan to be out and about more frequently in the city.  See you around!