Before I came to Ithaca, NY, I never really questioned why waterfalls occur where they do. It’s a simple equation: Steep mountainsides + creeks = waterfalls.
I wouldn’t have called the Finger Lakes Region “mountainous,” though. Not compared to the Adirondacks or the Appalachians. “Rolling hills” is more like it. So where did all these gorges and waterfalls come from?
To find out, I walked through Taughannock Gorge – and back through time.
Expectations. We’ve talked before about the expectations I bring to each new area I visit. How I go to a new place with certain assumptions? Only to find the surroundings have something unexpected to say for themselves?
Last summer brought me to a new region that has been on my bucket list for a while: New York’s Finger Lakes. In lieu of the usual family gathering in Michigan, my cousin and her husband invited me to join their son and daughter-in-law and a close friend for a week at their home in Ithaca, New York. For them it would be a stay-cation; for us, a chance for new adventures in a year where a change of scenery was desperately needed.
The company of family and friends was incentive enough. To further entice me, Becky and Ron promised lots of outdoor activities. Hiking, swimming, kayaking, gorges, waterfalls…
Gorges? Waterfalls?
My friends and I came to the Catskill Mountains with preconceived beliefs, only to find our admittedly low expectations far exceeded by the beauty of the region.
Although the Catskill Mountains were the center of attention during our week-long vacation, they aren’t the only attraction in southeastern New York state. We’d visited the Hudson River Valley, but smaller ranges like the Taconics, the Shawangunks and the Helderbergs tempted with their own unique charms. Still, with our trip at its end, Robb, Don and I were out of time to explore any of the rugged places beyond the Catskills.
Or were we? Continue reading
The Summer Queen looked dubiously at the knights-apprentice kneeling before her. “You want to take them where?” she inquired of the wood elf beside them.
“To Dibble’s Quarry, Your Majesty.”
“You would take them to the Hall of the Mountain King? Why?”
“Because it’s time, Your Majesty. They have served you well, and deserve the chance to prove their mettle on this quest. Besides, I think they’d enjoy it.”
“ENJOY IT?!” the Queen convulsed in gales of laughter. “Oh, child, you do amuse me! Very well, for your pluck alone, I shall grant them this quest. Perhaps the Mountain King will find them amusing as well. Please bear my greetings to His Highness. But be sure you do not return without his token! Though I will be surprised if you succeed in this quest. It’s a rare visitor to his Hall that has the fortitude to win such a boon.”
“You… you don’t think the King will be there, surely?” the elf asked in a quavering voice.
“I know not. The Mountain King is no consort of mine, he does not answer to me. I bear no responsibility for what may come to pass should you find him at home.”
For the first time, the respectfully lowered eyes of one knight-apprentice looked up from the ground. “We are prepared, My Queen, and ready for all challenges. What could go wrong?”
As the travelers turned to leave, the Summer Queen wiped tears of mirth from her eyes. “What could go wrong, indeed!” Continue reading
Expectations are a funny thing. Go into an experience expecting great things, and you’re frequently disappointed. A location sure to yield amazing birds instead gives you Mallards at point-blank range, while the flock of Avocets feeds three football fields away. The stunning 360° views from the highest point east of the Mississippi are completely obscured by thick fog and driving rain.
On the other hand, it’s when you expect nothing that you are often pleasantly surprised. A fussy old mansion turns out to be surrounded by acres of stunning landscapes. The search for a humble lunch spot surprises with an amazing cavern hitherto unheard of.
When my friends and I left for a week in the Catskill Mountains of New York, we took with us our many expectations. Don thought “the Catskills would be touristy with lots of gift shops, restaurants and taverns.” I felt the same, expecting development, hotels and kitsch. Robb thought “the Catskills were going to be like the Adirondacks, very mountainous and ferny.” I, on the other hand, was sure the Catskills would seem like gentle hills, compared to the rugged heights of the Great Smokies and the Adirondacks.
Who was right, and who was wrong? Continue reading
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Reentry was a little bumpy. Our Harrier-class starship, still smoking, touched down with a series of thuds on what seemed from the stratosphere to be a landing pad. It wasn’t though. Some kind of exposed rock outcropping, blindingly white. Continue reading
Wherever my friends and I go, we try to get to the top of the highest mountain around. So on our Adirondack adventure, we were keen to get to the very top of the High Peaks. That would be Mt. Marcy, 5,344’ high. “How do we get there?” we wondered. Hike 7.4 miles through wilderness to the summit, then hike 7.4 miles back. Ok, maybe not.
Still, we were determined to get to the top of one of “The 46”, as the 46 High Peaks above 4,000’ are called. Folks who have successfully climbed all 46 are called “Adirondack 46ers.” We only had one day to get to the summit of a High Peak, and our experience on the relatively puny Pitchoff Mountain taught us not to take these mountains lightly. What to do?
Enter Whiteface Mountain, 4,867’ tall, the fifth highest in the state of New York. There’s a road that does 4,600’ of the work for you, with an elevator that takes tourists the rest of the way. How hard could it be?
If it’s Michigan, it must be Sleeping Bear Dunes.
Every summer that I visit Michigan, I try to spend a day in the sprawling Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.
Every summer I discover a new favorite place.
The Pierce Stocking Scenic Drive and Glen Haven.
The Port Oneida Rural Historic District and Platter River Point.
This year it was…
Wait. We have to get there first. In Sleeping Bear Dunes, the journey is the destination. Here are some scenes from the trail.
Glaciers played a large role in shaping the hills and lakes of the area, depositing deep layers of sand and debris. In this poor soil grows a dense forest of maple and birch. Scattered boulders known as “erratics” were carried here by glaciers from their origins far away.
Along the path I look at every fern. Finally, a wood fern I can identify. See the spores along the margins of the frond’s pinnules? It’s a Marginal Wood Fern!
Otter Creek.
My new friend is bright-eyed and curious.
Sunny opening in the woods along the shore of Otter Lake.
Otter Lake.
The best destinations offer journeys of their own. This path took me to my new favorite place in Sleeping Bear Dunes…
We came to the end of the road – and found a trail.
To the north of the Dolly Sods Wilderness Area in West Virginia lies Bear Rocks, a spectacular outcropping of white sandstone and quartz perched on the Allegheny Front. The rocks are surrounded by the 477-acre Bear Rocks Preserve, owned by the Nature Conservancy, which has been instrumental in preserving and protecting land in the Dolly Sods. After touring Dolly Sods by car, Robb, Don and I were eager to get out and explore on foot, stretch our legs a little.
A view of the Bear Rocks trail. No, that’s not a creek, it’s a trail. A very wet trail. After a lot of puddle-jumping, we turned back. The trail doesn’t go to Bear Rocks, which is what we were interested in. So we followed a cobweb of informal trails through the heath barrens to the ridge.
I’ve been using the word “heath” a lot. What is it?
“Heaths” are a family of acid-tolerant, low-growing plants. Huckleberry, blueberry, sheep and mountain laurel (left), rhododendron, tea berry, bear oak.
All of these plants are old friends of ours from the low-lying but acidic NJ Pine Barrens. Time and again, we find them in the higher elevations of the Appalachians.
Here they inhabit tundra-like meadows known locally as “huckleberry plains.”
Flagged red spruce trees on Bear Rocks.
The view east from the ridge. The Allegheny Front drops 2000’ here to the valley of the South Branch of the Potomac River. Rumor has it that on a clear day, a visitor can see seven mountain ridges, and on the clearest days, Hawksbill and Stony Man peaks in Shenandoah National Park. This wasn’t a clear day. I still can count four ridgelines.
Rocks, rhododendron and red spruce.
We had a lot of fun clambering all over Bear Rocks. Finding our way back through the heath to the main trail was a little challenging. We were glad the plants were so short that we could see right over them.
On the way back through Dolly Sods, we had time for one more stop, the interpretive Northland Loop Nature Trail. Lots of different ecosystems on one short trail.
Also a stern warning about unexploded ordnance. The Dolly Sods was a training area during World War II.
We managed to survive the walk with all limbs intact.
The trail started through a typical forest of red spruce and rhododendrons.
It was raining, still, which gave me some nice water droplets to play with.
Except for a few unidentified birds, this was the only wildlife we saw in Dolly Sods. No deer, no chipmunks, NO BEARS. Somehow that absence made this snail all the more welcome.
The highlight of the Northland Loop is Alder Run Bog, a large northern peat bog. Bogs are waterlogged ecosystems where the plants actually grow on the surface of the water. They are unusual at high altitudes, but not in Dolly Sods.
The margins of Alder Run Bog are populated by spruce trees, heaths, sedges and ferns. A boardwalk leads out into the bog, which is covered in sphagnum moss and…
Sundews! This is a much-loved carnivorous plant we see sometimes in the Pine Barrens. We were unprepared for the vastness of the sundew stands here in Alder Run Bog.
FUN FACT: No more than a couple of inches high, these tiny plants attract insects with a sweet secretion, than trap them with the sticky mucilage of their moveable tentacles. The prey dies of exhaustion or asphyxiation, whereupon the plant digests it. Charming, aren’t they?
Back through the forest, we came upon a river of rocks.
Among the rocks we found some white reindeer moss. Not a moss but a lichen, it’s common in the Pine Barrens, just like sphagnum moss and sundews. The similarities between the plant life of the Pinelands and that of high-altitude acidic Appalachian ecosystems continues to amaze us.
The road home. We had a wonderful day exploring Dolly Sods, despite the mist and rain. But our time in West Virginia was drawing to a close.
While doing some research for these posts, I have seen many images of Dolly Sods and Bear Rocks unlike any of mine. Photos of clear blue skies, mountain ranges rolling off into the distance, meadows abloom with flowers, heaths ablaze in autumnal reds and golds. Something to aspire to, I guess. Something for a return visit (or two!) to West Virginia. I could spend several days right here in Dolly Sods.
Maybe I’d even see a bear…
If it’s the Appalachians, it must be raining.
Like July Fourth last year, and the Appalachian Spring Expedition before it, Independence Day in the mountains of West Virginia was a wet one. The rain started at breakfast, and though light, continued for much of the day.
With precipitation in our future, the three of us had decided a day spent in and around our home base of Blackwater Falls State Park was in order. So we broke out our dancin’ shoes and Lindy hopped out to Lindy Point.
The short trail wound through woods dense with rhododendron. Sometimes there is beauty to be found in the rain.
The trail ended at a rocky outcropping, a once-proud craggy castle clinging to a precipice overlooking the Blackwater River Gorge. A two-tiered observation deck awaited us there. Mostly we ignored it in favor of ducking through curtains of greenery to stony alcoves open to the leaden sky. The rock formations and the view drew my complete attention…
When I wasn’t distracted by the rhododendron blooms.
A lone turret stood guard over the castle walls.
Made of sandstone and shale, like most of the rock in Blackwater Falls, the tower shows the effects of differential weathering.
Less resistant rock has eroded away, leaving the more resistant rock perched precariously in fantastical shapes.
Please pardon the raindrop blurs. It was raining faster than I could dry the lens.
Raindrops on rhodies… these are a few of my favorite things.
Don’t lean too far over the edge!
Don and Robb posed for the obligatory portrait on the observation deck. That didn’t satisfy the photographer. Too dull, too… common. Taskmistress that she is, she insisted that they walk around the railing and out onto the rocks, dance from side to side until they were placed just so, and then kneel before Her Majesty.
The Mage and his staff, and the Wise Fool, on the Castle Lindy parapet.
Luckily for her attendants, they did not displease Her Majesty. In her boundless generosity, she allowed them to return to the safety of the dance floor, er, observation deck.
The tomfoolery continued in the afternoon. Every day, we traveled from our cabin to the Lodge several times. Every time, we passed a certain sign. Every time, I cried out, “Look! There’s a petting zoo!”
This seemed as good a day as any to drop in on the furry residents of the zoo. Chickens, piglets, rabbits, a donkey, a goat and more were tucked into a cozy barn.
Robb and his new friend, Miss Moptop Alpaca. (cellphone image)
From farm to town, the whirlwind went on, to the little hamlets of Davis and Thomas. Davis offered a neat artisans’ shop full of local crafts.
Thomas had an opera house, antique shops, and the Purple Fiddle, a local watering hole renowned for its eclectic roster of musical performers. (cellphone image)
Thus another fine day in West Virginia drew to a close, with our merry band snug in our cabin while the rain beat a tattoo on the roof.
Others may have their parades, barbecues and fireworks on Independence Day. Not us. For my companions and I, a day of raindrops, moptops and the Lindy Hop was the perfect recipe for a West Virginia Fourth of July.
Sites Homestead, Seneca Rocks
The Wild Edge 