New Discoveries In the Neighborhood

In keeping with my theme of late, walking and biking, here are a couple new discoveries in West Ghent.

Last month we attended the musical Nine To Five at the Little Theatre of Norfolk. We had a great time with lots of laughs! Boy, did it bring back memories of the '80's.

This little gem is right here in our West Ghent neighborhood! It is about a four block walk from our house. And that is exactly what we did on a balmy September night. Amazing!

 

I've written about the great restaurants, many of which are nearby. We have now experienced 34 of the 53 restaurants currently on the list. Yum! A local favorite and one of ours, as well, is at this intersection - Redgate Avenue & Orapax Street. It is the Orapax Inn and it is two and a half blocks from our front door!

 

But there are other important businesses that share this corner. There is The New Leaf florist and ...

 



The Muse Writer's Center. This place is fantastic! There are workshops available for all things writing related: poetry, fiction, journaling, blogging, comedy ... you name it! So I am enrolled in a workshop that meets once a week called Personal Narratives An Introduction to Memoir. I am hoping to gain some writing skills to put toward writing all my family history stories and all my own stories.

Having lost both my parents I realize that my memories could be gone one day if I don't write them down. Some are important, some not-so-much but I still want to share them with my children and their (future) children.

I am so lucky. My classmates drive here from all over the area. I can attend the smorgasbord of workshops and I can walk to this great neighborhood place. Love it!

The West Side = The Wet Side

After living in our new neighborhood for four months I have so many questions. Among the questions, where's the water? I know that we are near the water, namely the Elizabeth River, but you can't see the water from the residential part of West Ghent. So, naturally, I'm curious.

Since we are not boat people (Go Army, Beat Navy!) we took to the water via Norfolk's harbor tour on the American Rover.



I have often felt disappointed that Norfolk doesn't have a beautiful, touristy coastline but after touring the harbor I have a new appreciation of Norfolk's working coastline. As someone said recently, it has a unique beauty. Everywhere you look, other than the Waterside area in downtown, there are ship yards, ship repairs, shipping containers, docks, naval vessels, work boats, naval facilities ...

 







At the southern tip of West Ghent and just west of the Midtown Tunnel is an industrial area. Located in this area and a short walk from our house are a couple of our favorite restaurants, Tortilla West and Orapax.

 

In addition there is the Smartmouth Brewing Company one of two Norfolk breweries and The Birch Bar, rated one of the world's top 50 beer bars (according to ratebeer.com). Yes, I said WORLD.

 

 

But back to the water ...

 

 

We can walk past the Orapax Inn and past Tortilla West and at the southern end of Orapax Avenue (the northern end of Orapax Ave. ends at the intersection with our street) is a ship repair facility and there are two ships under repair right now (above).

 

Moving northwest along the coastline is a landmark you see when headed north across the Midtown Tunnel - cranes at the Lambert's Point Docks. The Lambert's Point Docks property encompasses 117 acres and is a part of the Norfolk Southern Corporation. Ships bring cargo here especially lumber and rubber.

 

 

Continuing northwest is a huge area where the rail yard for the Norfolk and Southern Railroad lies. This is the headquarters, right here in our neighborhood, of this mammoth company. NS operates over 20,000 miles of rail in 22 US States and in Canada. Their most commonly transported product is coal.

 

 

In the photo above see the two black structures? Those are the culmination of the rail lines where the cars filled with coal reach the ships that deliver the coal, to wherever. That is a ship (blue and red) behind the structure on the right.

 

 

The railroad tracks that enter this ginormous rail yard create the northern border of our neighborhood. You can see them on the map at the top, just above Blue Bird Park (really Jeff Robertson Park). And here, in this photo from the park, you can see the train cars in the background.

 

 



Love that caution sign.

 

 

So, that completes our tour. Our very abbreviated and highly summarized tour.

 

But, I still have questions. The most pressing is what did this area look like in say, 1910? Before the houses and apartments were built? I know that this was once a rural area with a farm, Cromwell Farm. But, how did it become a neighborhood? And why?

 

And I know that the US Navy didn't have a foothold here until 1917 right after we entered WWI. So, without the Navy how was the harbor different? Hmmmm. Hopefully, I will get some of those answers.

 

Stay tuned ...





Favorites of a West Ghent Newbie

Part of this new adventure - smaller house, more pedestrian lifestyle, urban neighborhood - is trying lots and lots of restaurants that we have never been to before. Some of them we can walk to!

I've made a list (it keeps growing) of restaurants in Ghent and some in downtown Norfolk. From our house we can drive a couple minutes to the western termination of The Tide at the Fort Norfolk station, park and then we can scoot downtown in a flash without the hassle of parking. Nice!

Back to the list ... it contains 52 restaurants and so far, we've been to 20 of them. Honestly, I hope the list keeps growing and we never get to the end. I love it! We have lived in our new/old West Ghent home for about 2 months and here are my five faves, so far,  in no particular order:

Y Not Pizza. Oh my gosh! Y Not is a place you can go everyday! Great pizza, Italian dishes and salads and more. Our favorites are the create your own salad and pasta. Their meat sauce is like really good homemade sauce. Soooo yummy! And, BONUS, they deliver! Y Not has a few locations in the area.

No Frill Bar and Grill. No Frill is across the street from Y Not and we will be able to walk to both of them when my knee is back to 100%. No Frill has a very large and innovative menu and every single meal sounds delicious. One of the specialties is the Funky Chicken and you can get it as a salad or a sandwich. Oh! And they have a Sunday brunch.

Press 626 Café and Wine Bar. Love this place! It is in an old house and it has a couple tables on the front porch. If you like wine you should try Press 626. They have all kinds of specials depending on the day of the week. The day we went there was a list of 8 or 10 wines for $15 for the bottle. The fare is light with several sandwiches hence the name of the restaurant "press" as in Panini press. Oh! They have ladies' night on Mondays and I hear you need reservations it's so popular.

Luna Maya. Luna Maya serves South American dishes that are crazy good but, I also love the atmosphere. It reminds me of restaurants that I've been to in San Francisco - it has tall industrial ceilings and it is noisy and bustling. Everybody seems to be having fun in Luna Maya! Their tamales are great, not your typical, they taste more like barbecue on corn bread, yum! And, anything with the cilantro lime chicken is delicious. They have happy hour Tuesday through Thursday when you can get discounted food entrees in addition to discounted drinks from 4:30 to 6:30.

Pasha Mezze. They describe their food as Mediterranean and Anatolian, I'd go with Turkish with lots of organic, vegetarian and vegan options. It's really delicious and it is very nice inside and there is a pretty patio for outdoor dining. I got the Turkish sampler platter but they have tons of things I would like to try like the kebabs and the Anatolian plate with quinoa cake and grilled eggplant steak. There is also a Pasha coffee house next door and when we went there was a sign posted saying they serve breakfast!

I'll have to do a similar post in about two more months and see if my favorites have changed????

Welcome to our neighborhood, West Ghent

After almost two weeks in our new/old house, here are some impressions I have of the neighborhood.

We live in an urban neighborhood in Norfolk, Virginia called West Ghent. As you might imagine there is also a Ghent neighborhood or "Ghent proper." There is also an East Ghent and a Ghent Square - don't want to leave anyone out! The original Ghent neighborhood began being developed in about 1890 for Norfolk's upper class.  Many business owners, heads of industry, veterans of the Civil War, lawyers, doctors, ministers, folks like that built the homes there. It is a beautiful neighborhood and still has mostly original homes that were built between 1890 and about 1910.  When we were looking at homes to buy many that we looked at were built in 1908 - that must have been a boom year for building in Ghent!

 

West Ghent, as you might have surmised, is to the west of Ghent proper and it was built a little later. I'm guessing between 1910 and about 1940 with the occasional newer house thrown in.  Both neighborhoods have homes next to apartments next to old apartments that have been turned into condos.  In some cases huge old houses have been turned into condos.  But what is also great is that it has streets that are primarily commercial areas. 

 



The north-south artery that divides West Ghent from Ghent is Colley Avenue.  Colley Avenue has multiple restaurants, bars, coffee shops, a running store, a bike store, an antique shop, a pottery making studio and an historic theatre, etc, etc.  All of that is a 14 minute walk from our front door.  And, to say that Colley Avenue has energy is probably its most accurate description.

 



                               

Another north-south artery, one that runs through West Ghent is Hampton Boulevard.  Hampton Boulevard gets all the traffic (not a great thing) - I don't think trucks are permitted to drive on some of the other main roads.  But also Hampton Boulevard runs north through the Old Dominion University campus and on to the Norfolk Naval Air Station.  Old Dominion has been around since 1930.  My Dad attended ODU for a time in the late 50's when it was still an extension campus of the College of William and Mary. ODU has grown like crazy in the last 10 years.  They used to have a top women's basketball team and they're still very good. They have added football team in recent years that seems to get better and better each year and they have a huge conference center that draws all kinds a great concerts. ODU is a 5 minute drive!

Alex Palmer's Natural History Notes and Thoughts
 



Also there is this cool walking and biking trail (one of the Rails to Trails Conservancy projects), the Elizabeth River Trail that runs along the perimeter of our neighborhood (maybe a block from our house) all the way to ODU and beyond. If you go the other direction on the Elizabeth River Trail you go through downtown Norfolk along the river and on to Harbor Park where the Norfolk Tides baseball team plays.

How could you possibly NOT love living here!

For more information about Ghent, West Ghent & Norfolk you might enjoy some of these:
Ghent Business Association
West Ghent Civic League
Ghent Neighborhood League
altdaily.com
City of Norfolk
Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce - Norfolk
Insider's Passport Norfolk Blog