Le Refuge, a City Island B&B Where One Can Dream of Sea Monkeys
The best bed-and-breakfast, by far, on City Island is Le Refuge Inn. At the risk of sounding like a joke on Hee Haw, I must disclose that it is the only bed-and-breakfast on City Island, but that certainly does not take away from its loveliness. Owner Pierre St. Denis opened Le Refuge about eight years ago in a restored 19th-century sea captain's house that overlooks City Island's harbor. While I realize now that lots of folks go to City Island to hang out in Tito Puente's restaurant or eat at the Lobster Box, to me it was undiscovered territory. I was amazed that some place so close to Manhattan actually felt like a little New England town.
When I went there last summer, I decided to turn it into a full-fledged vacation, complete with picture postcards mailed to friends and family exotically postmarked "The Bronx," and the idea of staying in a charming French country inn just clinched it for me. How can you argue with a weekend getaway that you can get away to for just subway fare and a bus transfer? The current issue of New York magazine touts hype-free weekends on its cover, but they think they are going out on a limb to suggest the Jersey Shore or Fire Island instead of the Hamptons. I say you can't get much more hype-free than the Bronx.
Rooms at Le Refuge start at a modest $65 for a single. They also have doubles and two quite fancy suites. (They certainly look fancy on the promotional postcard.) They also offer fireside dining in the evening, for an extra fee. (You can be assured that Mr. Saint-Denis knows his French food, as he runs the popular Le Refuge restaurant in Manhattan.)
The prices for the rooms do include breakfast, which you can eat leisurely on Le Refuge's back deck. When we were there, someone was practicing his saxophone by the water's edge and it made a lovely accompaniment to our croissants. Afterward, we ambled over to the little whaling museum next door, where they have pictures of an actual whale named Physty. Other amusing pursuits could be a trip to the tiny branch of the New York Public Library or to the nearby bar/bait 'n' tackle shop, where the old salts start drinking around noon. (I believe they have a special on beer and blood worms during Happy Hour.) There is also a cute park on the main drag with an iron statue of a whale?good for photo opportunities.
Won't your friends be thrilled when you treat them to a slide show called "Our Recent Trip to City Island"? Who needs Block Island or Martha's Vineyard? We got your ocean right here.
Perfect First Pets
While we are on the subject of the sea and all its mysteries, allow me to indulge my preoccupation with Sea Monkeys. I am mystified that there has never been a Sea Monkeys movie: our precious, happy childhood memories have been stolen; why not start on the memories we have of being ripped off and deceived? Throw the X-ray Spex in there, too, and make the Sea Monkeys go down in the sewer to battle the baby alligators that got flushed down the toilet. Maybe the Nestle Quik bunny can join them as the wise, ancient sage.
(Before the two or three Howie Mandel fans in the Tri-State area write any irate letters: yes, I am aware of his work in the Amazing Live Sea Monkeys genre, but I am trying to forget it. Actually, there are many things I would like to forget about Howie Mandel, chief among them the way he wears his hat, sips his tea and does everything else. They can take that away from me. The Sea Monkeys, though, the Sea Monkeys are with me always. Even without their castle and their crowns and their flippers, they are still special to me.)
I think they make fabulous birthday gifts, because birthdays celebrate life, and what better way to exemplify the stupendous riddle of creation than with the creature that hatches from an "Instant Life Egg"? They come alive on the spot, and what's more, they come back from the dead.
A source no less august than Popular Mechanics calls Sea Monkeys the perfect first pet for kids because they just can't kill the damn things?something to do with a cyst they form around themselves; I didn't want to know the gory details. And where some people just saw a cyst with a hybrid oceanic bug inside, Harold von Braunhut saw his fortune swimming in a vat. He discovered??invented??this miracle product in the lab at the Transcience Corp. in 1957. Von Braunhut invented a lot of other schlocky comic book toys, including glow dust and those infamous X-ray Spex, so I would put the blame squarely on him for the End of the Innocence.
Transcience started marketing the Monkeys in earnest in 1960, and 40 years later they are still an international phenomenon. A few years back, they created quite a stir in Greece, where they are lyrically called Little Sea Souls, when the Greek trade commission didn't quite know how to classify them: toy or agricultural import.
Sea Monkeys remain halfway between cool science experiment and kitsch, so both young and old will delight in getting some. As currently distributed by ExploraToy, they come with all sorts of great accessories, like an Aqua Leash, a Space Shuttle Aquarium, a Magic Castle, a Ghostly Galleon and an Aquarium Watch. Just remember, if you buy the watch, when the sun is over the yardarm, at half past the big Sea Monkey, it's time to have a Brine Shrimp Cocktail.