Greg Clarke with his son, Ian, and his daughter, Molly. (
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Last summer, Jeffrey Millenbach, a New York City police officer, was holed up in his Hell’s Kitchen apartment with a knee injury. His sick policy, he says, required him to remain in residence while he healed, which he did until returning to work in September. His greatest disappointment? Not being able to escape to a rental house in Saugerties, NY, that he considers his second home.
This summer will be different. Millenbach and his fiancée, Kristin Auble, have already booked their getaway. They plan to rent that Saugerties house, a two-bedroom Contemporary in the woods, for a long weekend after marrying in late June.
“Going upstate takes me back to my rural childhood in East Tennessee,” says Millenbach, who found his upstate rental house on WoodstockEscape.com. “I go there to recharge my battery, to connect with nature, to listen to the quiet.”
Millenbach is among the league of urban sojourners who head about 2½ hours north on the New York State Thruway to revel in the mountain air, cool streams and understated lifestyle of Catskills mountain towns like Woodstock, Stone Ridge, Saugerties and Hunter. They rent houses — ranging from Hamptons-worthy Contemporaries with pools to rustic little cottages — for an antidote to city life.
Some renters are converts who got tired of battling traffic on the Long Island Expressway or the Garden State Parkway to get to the shore. Others have always preferred the hills.
And while there are good restaurants, galleries, music and culture in the better-known towns and villages, it’s not a scene.
“In Woodstock, I don’t feel like I have to dress up,” says Mishele Wells, who owns an NYC marketing/p.r. company and rents an upstate house for the summer. “There’s a lot less social pressure, less distraction. When I’m in the Hamptons, I don’t feel like I’ve left the city. When I’m upstate, I do.”
Realtors and renters say this summer season has gotten off to a slow start, and plenty of properties still have availability. Upstate, people tend to rent for a week at a time or a month, rather than the typical Memorial Day to Labor Day period in the Hamptons. Four-bedroom houses with gourmet kitchens and swimming pools on private roads in the Woodstock area fetch $3,500 per week and $15,000 a month.
Renting for an entire season in the area costs about $35,000 — a bargain compared to upscale beach communities. Fan out into western Ulster County, west toward Ellenville or further upstate toward Hunter, and weekly rentals drop to $900 to $1,500 a week. Listings can be found on HomeAway.com, VacationRentals.com and VRBO.com.
Greg Clarke and his wife Tina Chan Clarke of Staten Island rent a four-bedroom house with an in-ground pool, sauna, Jacuzzi and game room in Hunter for $1,500 per week. Clarke, a painting contractor, says his ultimate idea of a vacation is Maine’s Arcadia National Park, but it’s too far to drive with two small children. The Catskills are a treasure much easier to reach from the city.
“Up here, I unwind, read, kick back and breathe in fresh air,” he says. “We feel far away from the city, even though we’re not.”