See The Most Underrated Resource In The Entire Hudson Valley

What makes a community? For many, great restaurants, cute shops, some local parks, and good schools are pretty top of the bill. But there's one hub that exists in a lot of communities that doesn't quite get the love it deserves.

What if I told you there was a magical place where you could practically relive your Blockbuster glory days browsing for movies? And at the very same place, you could find browse through spices you could borrow for a brand new recipe? And at that very same place, you could even borrow some hiking equipment to explore the peaks of the Hudson Valley.

Yes, such a place really does exist!

Have You Been to a Library Lately?

I recently needed to print something out. I haven't owned a printer since college because truthfully, most of the paperwork I've needed to do has been virtual in recent years.

In searching for a place to print, I realized the closest place with a printer was my public library. For $0.25 a page, I could print whatever I wanted! In fact, it was as easy as emailing the documents I needed over to the front desk. They printed the items for me and had them ready to go by the time I stepped inside.

While I was inside the library, my eyes immediately found the giant shelves full of DVDs. I thought to myself "wow, it's like Blockbuster except no rental fee!"

From there, I decided to browse my library's website to see what else was there and boy, is there a lot!

Things You Can Borrow From Hudson Valley Libraries

Public Libraries are much more than just a bunch of books to borrow these days (which, is pretty cool in itself to be fair). As media has evolved, so have public libraries. And the mid-Hudson region has quite a robust offering.

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Here are just a few of the random, useful, incredible items you can borrow from your mid-Hudson library:

• A Projector
• Board Games like The Game of Life, Settlers of Catan, Clue, Twister, Scrabble, and Apple to Apples
• Lawn Games like Ringtoss, Lawn Bowling
• A Bluetooth Speaker
• A Leafblower
• A Nintendo Switch Console and Controllers
• A Ouija Board
• American Girl Dolls
• Knitting Needles
• A Drum Kit
• Walkie Talkies
• An Amazon Fire Stick
• A Garden Hoe
• A 6-9 Person Camping Tent
• An Electric Piano

And that's just a sampling!

On top of renting items, you can even rent museum passes and park passes at many of the local libraries in the Hudson Valley. For example, at New Paltz's Elting Memorial Library, you can rent Mohonk passes, entrance into the Guggenheim Museum, the Bethel Woods Museum and more!

So, the next time you're looking for something fun to do or need a little help finding some tools for a project, don't rule out your local library. They have so much to offer!