Central Park in Winter

Entire books have been written about Central Park, easily New York City's most famous green space. Countless movies have essential Central Park scenes—Love Story, Enchanted, Hair, The Out of Towners, you-name-it by Woody Allen. Entire websites and blogs are devoted to this one park, so since we have 1,300 parks to visit, there's no need to dwell here on this vast and varied green that everyone already knows about—and if they don't, they have plenty of dedicated sources for finding out just about anything they could ever want to know about Olmstead and Vaux's rectangular tapestry in green, grey and blue.

So: big park, small blog entry. It's only fair, I say. Instead of a bunch of writing, here are some of my favorite images of Central Park as seen through my own humble camera during the season parks tend to be least visited: the winter.

First, a clear day.


Bundled up


Harlem Meer in the northeastern corner of the park


Your correspondent at the Blockhouse


Archway


Too cold to sit

And now, one of those snowy days we don't seem to be seeing too many of in recent years.


The sun peers out from behind a bare tree


Alexander von Humboldt, the German naturalist and explorer, keeps watch over the park near the Museum of Natural History


Humans huddle in a gazebo under an icy blue sky


Snow drapes this outcropping of Manhattan Schist


Birds take off…


…but this one posed gracefully first.