upstate New York

More Finger Lakes

~ MaryG ~ 10 Comments
Daily writing prompt
How do you feel about cold weather?
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I don’t like cold weather. I especially dislike snow. We have so many places in the Northeast that are spectacularly beautiful—in the summer. The Finger Lakes region (aka the Southern Tier) of upstate New York is one of them.

This area is a very long drive from Boston (about 6 hours), so I made this weekend’s graduation trip to Ithaca a “bucket list” sort of trip. I have enjoyed my many visits up here, but I doubt I’ll be back again.

In addition to the hot air ballooning, we visited the famous Corning Museum of Glass, which many people now know from Blown Away—the glassblowers competition series on Netflix.

Stunning glass sculpture at the Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, NY
Corning Museum of Glass

The city of Ithaca, NY is on Lake Cayuga and I’ve seen it many times. This trip, I wanted to see the next Finger Lake over—Lake Seneca. It is equally beautiful and has the cute town of Watkins Glen at the bottom.

The harbor area in Watkins Glen on Lake Seneca

Watkins Glen is also home to one of New York’s most beautiful state parks.

Watkins Glen State Park

There are many wineries in the area, but I had never been to a cidery, so we stopped at South Hill Cider after graduation for a glass of hard cider and a charcuterie board. Lovely spot and their dry, sparkling Baldwin cider was great. I bought a bottle to take home.

The view at South Hill Cider in Ithaca, NY

There’s an expression you may have heard—Ithaca is Gorges. Its deep gorges and their accompanying waterfalls are truly gorgeous, and there are dozens of them all over the region. I had seen the showstopper—Taughannock Falls—on a previous trip, but wanted to check out a couple of others before we left.

Buttermilk Falls State Park
Robert H. Treman State Park
Robert H. Treman State Park
Lucifer Falls at Robert H. Treman State Park

Related:

Summer is our glory in New England

Hot air balloon flight

~ MaryG ~ 18 Comments

Have you ever broken a bone?

I broke a toe once, really badly. I don’t even like to think about it. It hurt SO much. (I stubbed it on a futon leg while barefoot.) It was wildly out of alignment. My husband had to pop it back into place. OUCH! Doctors can’t really do anything about toes. They just taped it to the one next to it and I limped around until it healed.

Fortunately no bones were broken during our Friday night “bucket list” excursion in Ithaca. The take-off was much wilder than I thought it would be. I was holding on to the basket for dear life. But once we were floating, it was quite magical. I’ve been in a helicopter before, but this was different. It’s as close as you can imagine to being a bird. So very many shades of green. The bottom of the basket occasionally scraped on some tree tops. “No problem,” said our pilot Dar. “Basket cleaners,” he called them. And then handed us some leaves. 🍃

My husband and son got put to work on both takeoff and landing. I took pictures and videos.

Three people were already pre-loaded in the basket at this point. The rest of us scrambled in over the sides, once “Captain America” was upright.
Up we go, with Dar’s hand on the “flame throwers” (which were a bit loud, when in use)
We floated over some waterfalls in Ithaca’s Robert H. Treman State Park
The magic of floating in the air and Dar thanking his ground crew.
I really did not want to drop my phone, but eventually I relaxed enough to hand it to a fellow passenger from Pennsylvania. He took this nice pic.
Group selfie with Dar
Farms and fields and Lake Cayuga in the distance

I think we were all a bit nervous about the landing. Once he found a good spot, Dar had the heavier people, including my very strong husband, move to one side of the basket. We all crouched down with all body parts inside the basket. We dragged on the ground for a bit. My husband got out and helped hold us down, which he said was hard. (He got a rather large bruise as we attempted to “jump” the basket up and over a small ditch. Inside the basket, we actually jumped up and down.)

When instructed, I did not waste any time grabbing the bars and vaulting myself out of the basket in a move that my son described as “wildly athletic.”

My son was instructed to run out into the field and help the ground crew pull down Captain America.

The landing
My son and the ground crew pulling Captain America back to earth
Everyone helped put Captain America back in his bag.

We celebrated with a roadside champagne toast and then the ground crew drove us back to our car!

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Experiences over stuff