Breitbeck Park In Oswego

I love Oswego. I went to college there, and I’m always heading up there for calzones from Pizza Villa, or a drive around the lakefront, or going up later in the afternoon every once in a while just to catch a sunset.

What I never knew about before, which is strange because it turns out I’ve been there often, is Breitbeck Park. I know you’re asking how I could not know about a place I’ve been. Because in the 90’s I used to go up to Oswego every summer for what’s called Harborfest, which is pretty much an all weekend party and sales fest throughout the city on both sides of Bridge Street, but mainly on the west side of the city.

At night they have concerts, and on Saturday night they have a major fireworks display. Every year I’d go see the fireworks display to this one place where I could sit with friends on kind of a hill that led down to the docks where all the boats sat. I always knew where to go after the first couple of visits but I never knew it was called Brietbeck Park, and the one time I went during the day I was more interested in seeing KC & the Sunshine Band than in knowing where I was; that’s called focus!

Anyway, it’s a beautiful park at the end of north 5th and 6th Streets, small and intimate but spacious enough most of the time for people to come eat, walk their dogs, have a little picnic, walk around to look at the boats or the lake and pretty much just chill and watch one of the beautiful sunsets. Saturday I went up with my friend Scott and his wife because he had to pay off our Super Bowl bet, which was a calzone from… well, I mentioned them already. 🙂

On this night we ate those calzones in a tiny pavilion that has plastic picnic benches, and then walked around taking in the few natural sites and some of the monuments. One that threw me off was a tribute to a former theater teacher and director who I knew because one of my friends was her favorite actor in the area, and I thought that was a very nice tribute. I also finally noticed the Kingsford Bell and Tower; how the heck had I missed this before?

It was also the first time I really paid attention to where the nuclear plant and the industrial plants were. I always knew about both of them, but rarely paid much attention; that happens when you’re in college, as I know many people who went to college in Oswego yet never made it to the east side.

The sunset was interesting in that it was a cloudy evening, so we didn’t get to see the sun fully falling into Lake Ontario. But as it got a little later in the evening the full sun finally came out of the clouds and we got a good 10 minutes of it in all its red glory before it finally sank into the drink. We also got to see a lot of boats coming in; I guess they didn’t want to be out in the water in the dark.

It was a great time, peaceful, and I know I’ll be heading back up another time. It’s a different view of things than where I normally go, which is the Loop where the fish and ice cream places are, close to the university. The things I keep learning about Oswego; yeah!