I Found Ruins of a REAL Shadow House (Northgate, Cold Spring, NY)
Hey guys!
So, The Gathering: Shadow House Book 1 has been out for a week today! I hope you've all been able to find a copy to read and share and review it somewhere online. Help me get the word out about this series! I'm so excited that people are actually reading it already! Let me know what you think!
I signed lots of copies at Barnes & Noble in Newburgh and Poughkeepsie in New York State . . . Go see if you can find one!
To mark the one week birthday of Shadow House, I thought I'd share some pictures from a hike I took yesterday. I was in a town called Cold Spring, NY, which may or may not have been the inspiration for the town of Greencliffe in the new series... (There's a train station right by the Hudson River, and you can totally walk up the hills into the woods nearby. Sound familiar?) I'd read about the ruins of an old mansion on a nearby hill, so I NEEDED to go see it. And when I found the place, I couldn't believe how much it reminded me of Larkspur House, the evil estate where The Gathering takes place.
The mansion in Cold Spring is called Northgate (or the Stern/ Cornish Estate). You can learn more about its doomed history here.
I climbed a very steep path called Brook Trail for about 15 minutes before I started seeing foundations of some of the outer buildings.
The metal window frames were still intact. Some walls were covered with graffiti.
The buildings seemed to be cut in half. The roof had collapsed.
Creepy tunnel passages filled with spiderwebs lead nowhere.
I tried to stay on the paths, but there was so much to see, so I crawled up a very steep hill to see what was at the top.
This hill was so steep, I almost tumbled backwards!
And when I got there, my jaw dropped . . . There were so many buildings - so many stone structures - left to rot in the middle of these woods!
This wall lined the edge of a winding driveway.
The first big building I came to was this greenhouse...
I imagined a roof made of glass, letting in light for gardens that once grew here.
Inside the greenhouse, I caught a glimpse of something bone-chilling . . . A stairwell leading into pitch darkness. As I descended, I finally understood what the characters in The Gathering must have felt when they explored Larkspur.
Uh, yeah . . . Would YOU have climbed down those stairs?
I did! And I found that someone had written HOUSE OF THE RISING SUN in red paint on the far wall . . .
The room stank. It was filled with mud and debris. I didn't stay long before I panicked and then ran back outside!
Farther down the path, after catching my breath, I discovered what was left of the main building.
My first view of the mansion . . .
Most of the stone walls still stood along with several chimneys and MANY fireplaces. I wandered throughout the paths, passing through doorways, marveling at how beautiful the mansion was, even after its collapse. I kept thinking about what must have happened for such a grand building to fall into disrepair.
Who'd lived here? Why did they leave? Could they have ever imagined what it would come to look like?
I was impressed with the green tile that still clung to the wall over the bottom fireplace. So beautiful and intricate.
Me - very sweaty - standing in the house's main entry.
Use your imagination to fill in the gaps. Could you draw Northgate's floor plan?
Can't you see the terror hiding behind my smile? Hahaha . . . (There were other people there, sitting in the window behind me. Apparently, I was't the only one who'd gone searching for the ruins that afternoon . . .)
I had to catch my train home so eventually it was time to go. As I walked back down the slope, I hoped that Northgate would allow me to leave.
I managed to avoid the pitfall traps that it had set for me . . .
Imagine a skeletal hand reaching out of the dead leaves to grab at my leg! Yikes!
Bye-bye, Northgate! Till next time . . .
Finally, the Hudson River. Storm King Mountain stares out at the ruins from just across the waters.
I count myself lucky! Would you ever explore a place like Northgate?