Fall colors are elusive and seeing them in full array takes good timing. Our first fall trip was back to Kebler Pass. We probably were one week too early for the best display but were rewarded with the sighting of a bull moose near the top of the pass & a brown bear cub scurrying across the road near Paonia reservoir. A week later we took a one-day trip to Bailey & over back Guanella Pass. The aspen there were beautiful. It was a great day for a walk as well.
Our next trip was to fulfill a desire I have had for years to see the fall colors back East. We started in Newark, New Jerseyand drove up the Hudson. It was my first time driving in the big city. We took the back streets and only had to turn around once! We even ended up on a road that was a route for one of the Revolutionary War retreats. I truly enjoyed connecting history lessons from school with the actual places. We stopped at West Point & took a tour of the academy. I didn't realize how strategic a position it was for the Colonial Army in the Revolutionary War. Before we left Aurora a fellow retired teacher, Bob Hine, told me how his family had forged part of the chain that was strung across the Hudson to keep the British ships from advancing.
While touring West Point we came across a display of thirteen links of the actual chain & description of how they used it. I love it when history has a personal touch. The one disappointment of this part of the trip was that the leaves were only just starting to turn, but the weather was great for walks on Bear Mountain & Storm King Mountain.
The next part of our trip took us to the Adirondacks along Lake George with a stop at Fort Ticonderoga. The presentation at the fort helped me to get a better feel for the hardships that were faced by early settlers & soldiers in colonial times.
Next we headed across Lake Champlain into Vermont. At first I thought we were not going to have any better luck seeing color until we headed up Stowe Mountain. There the leaves were all in full color but didn't show as brilliant as I had imagined due to a cloudy day. We soothed our disappointment with a stop at Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory. Of course we had to sample the wares. Our next stop was Middlebury for some shopping at a soap factory while we tried to wait out a rainstorm. But it lasted all the way back to our hotel in Plattsburgh, New York. I ended the day by watching the Rockies beat the Phillies.
Sunday found us visiting a small Salvation Army Corps in Plattsburgh and then driving back to Middlebury.
Saturday we had passed by some of the area devoted to Robert Frost & wanted to return Sunday. We walked the Robert Frost Nature Trail that used his poetry at various spots along the trail, the most famous being "The Road not Taken." We also found some of Vermont's covered bridges. We then had supper on the way back at a very popular local restaurant called "The Bridge" because it was close to one of the bridges over Lake Champlain which led back to New York. New York was our base because accommodations were less expensive than in Vermont.
We left Plattsburgh the next morning & headed to Watertown via Lake Placid.
It was again a very cloudy rainy day. The fall colors were great but the weather was a little too wet to truly enjoy the views. Inspite of the weather, Bob did get an awesome picture at Lake Saranac. Near Watertown we took a boat ride from Alexander Bay around the Thousand Islands, seeing the millionaires' homes on the St. Lawrence River, our boundary with Canada. We also stopped at the Boldt Castle built on one of the islands. It had never been finished because of the untimely death of the owner's wife. It suffered a lot of vandalism through the years but is now being restored & reminded me of the castles in Germany.
The next day found us on a drive through the Finger Lakes area to Elmira. Along the way we found a great waterfall & walking trail in Taughannock State Park on Cayuga Lake. In Elmira we were able to connect up with my former student, Monique Lewis who moved to this area to work for a newspaper in Binghamton. Since it was rainy again, we went to the glass museum in Corning. It amazes me how people first learned how to make glass & what they can create with it.
We had a lot of fun in the Innovations part of the museum playing with all of the inventions that use glass. The late evening was spent watching the Rockies beat the Diamondbacks. It was a bit hard to stay up to watch a game that started at 10p.m. in the EST.
The last part of our visit found us in Pennsylvania visiting Bob's college roommate & family.
They treated us to walks in the woods, along the Delawareand an interesting trip through the Crayolaand Canal museum in Allentown. Both attractions were housed in the same building & geared mainly to children, but the adults had a lot of fun too. In the evening we enjoyed a spaghetti dinnerand silent auction fund raiser for their synagogue. The entertainment included Jewish dancing. Sunday, we attended St. Andrews Lutheran Church. Where in place of a sermon, we enjoyed a dramatic presentation based on the story of the 10 lepers who were healed by Jesus. It was related from the point of view of one of the nine who did not come back to thank Jesus for healing. After lunch in Bethlehem, we headed back to our starting point in New Jersey for our flight home.
The trip was not exactly what I was hoping for as far as fall colors.
But it was still interestingand fun seeing more of our great country & seeing where important events in our early history actually took place.