New York Feels A Long Way From Home

        Tonight is our third night in New York state, and when I look at the map it seems so far from home in California. It's rather daunting to think about how far away it is, and we still have further to go as our eastern destination is Acadia National Park in Maine. After our short hike at Cuyahoga Valley National Park in Ohio on Thursday August 20, we spent the night at a beautiful, very large KOA in Streetsboro, Ohio. There is pretty good consistency of quality amongst all the KOAs we've stayed in, but there is a great variety to their ambiance. The Streetsboro/Cleveland KOA had multiple fish ponds and a wide variety of camping and lodging choices. On Friday morning I walked around most of the perimeter and it was over a mile. There was one negative experience as a part of our stay though. The folks in the campsite next to us were having a good time around the campfire late into the night. Quiet hours were supposed to be 10:00 PM to 8:00 AM. As the group of six or eight people were getting louder and louder, Rob wondered at a few minutes before 10 if they would quiet down at 10. We stayed up later than usual because I was writing my blog, so we didn't mind too much when the noise continued past 10, and about 10:15 we heard one of the guys say goodnight, so we thought it would wind down, and it did get quieter for awhile so at 11:30 when Rob asked if I thought he should remind them of quiet hours I said I didn't think so because I thought they were quieting down. I think Rob finally went to sleep, but at 12:50 AM I couldn't take the loud talking anymore and I called out the window saying, "Excuse me, it is really late, almost 1 in the morning, and you are really loud and quiet time started at 10:00." I was surprised how apologetic their response was and the party broke up right away. I guess we should have reminded them of quiet hours earlier. This is the second time we've experienced rowdy neighbors in a KOA. We've never had a problem with that in a state or national forest campground. When we were at Wright's Lake the first part of July I asked the campground host if she ever had problems getting campers quiet. She said she never really had and that her technique to quiet folks was to put on her bathrobe and slippers and tell noisy campers that Mom wanted to get some sleep - she said that always worked. We need to remember that when we are campground hosts in the future.

A large fish pond at the Streetsboro/Cleveland KOA

    After a not so restful night on Friday morning we went back to Cuyahoga Valley National Park and a circular trail around The Ledges, dramatic eroded sandstone formations. In the afternoon we rode our bicycles on the Ohio and Erie Towpath Trail. In elementary school I learned about the Erie Canal system because of a song we learned. I thought it was pretty neat to ride my bike on one of the old towpaths and to see the remnants of the canal and locks. Though the whole time we were at Cuyahoga Valley National Park we could never escape the noise of freeway traffic, I totally appreciated this park and the natural and cultural history it preserves in the midst of an urban region.

Stone steps build by the CCC leading down to The Ledges

A view of the fascinating formations called The Ledges

        Our destination Friday night, August 21 was another Harvest Host location where we met wonderful hosts Tina and Larry who own Rainbow Farms in Madison, Ohio. I bought lots of fresh produce including delicious fresh sweet corn. Our campsite was in a beautiful setting in the back of the farm away from traffic and noisy campers. It was just a mile walk from the shore of Lake Erie. The next day after reaching New York we would see Lake Ontario, thus seeing all five of the Great Lakes. The parts we saw of all of them were beautiful.

Our "campsite" at Rainbow Farms

The sun about to set over Lake Erie

    Saturday norming, August 22 we left Rainbow Farms and headed east through Pennsylvania. We only took one brief rest stop in Pennsylvania before crossing into New York. We expect to spend a little more time in Pennsylvania as we begin the westward journey from Maine. Saturday we decided that since we'd be so close we should go see Niagara Falls and that's what we did. The falls were beautiful and impressive, but hard to get good pictures of. We saw first hand why everyone says you should see them from the Canadian side, but that isn't possible in the summer of 2020. Saturday night we were at another Harvest Host Farm with a Farm stand store to shop in and a quiet field to sleep in.

A picture of the beautiful Lake Erie

Part of the Canadian Rapids on the Niagara River

Horseshoe Falls

A faint rainbow at Bridal and American Falls

Partyka Farm, Kendall, New York

    Yesterday after leaving Partyka Farm we headed to Rochester, New York where we walked on the Turning Point Trail on the Genesee River. My niece Emily who is an alum of Rochester Institute of Technology suggested we might like this trail and we did. A unique feature of the trail is a 3,572 foot long bridge curving over the Genesee River Turning Basin. This basin is where coal barges used to be turned around. There was lots of wild life to see, including a raccoon swimming in the river.

A view of part of the unique bridge.

Can you find the raccoon in the picture? As we saw it from a distance we wondered what kind of mammal it was. It swam right under us on the bridge.

    Another Harvest Host guest we met at Partyka Farms told us about a winery they had stayed at as Harvest Host guests in the Finger Lakes Region of New York, so that is where we headed on Sunday after our walk at Turning Point Park. This was the first Harvest Host winery we have stayed at, partly because since we don't drink wine I feel a little guilty not buying anything in exchange for our stay. The property was beautifully situated above Seneca Lake near Watkins Glen, New York. They even had a disc golf course we were welcome to play for free, but we never managed to get the discs out to do it. We have certainly been pleased with our Harvest Host membership so far, staying interesting places, meeting wonderful hosts and other guests, and only once having a host say they were full for the night we asked to stay. Most times I have called the same day or only a day or two ahead and they have always had room for us, though most hosts only have room for 2 or 3 RVs. It has been wonderful to have Harvest Hosts to fall back on, especially in this year of closed and restricted campgrounds. Tonight we are at a KOA near Natural Bridge, New York before heading east through the Adirondack Mountains and into Vermont.

The eastern sky last night from Castel Grisch Winery.

Sunrise through the screened window this morning.

An old barn on my walk this morning at Castel Grisch

    You may be wondering besides pictures, what kind of souvenirs we are acquiring. Well, we really don't have much room to carry extra stuff, and after considerably downsizing before moving into LesThora we don't want more stuff. One day on a hike, I don't remember where now, I picked up a feather on the trail and thought about keeping it. I'm almost certain it was on Osprey feather, but I decided not to keep it. Since then I've seen other feathers and one monarch butterfly wing that I thought of gathering, but I left them for others to find.  One thing I have been collecting for many years is hat pins, but even they can get out of hand. My hiking hat has acquired so many pins that it is too heavy to wear very often, but I still like to buy pins when they are available in the parks. My solution is to just wear pins that represent the places we're going to on this journey on a newer hat. We've also bought a couple of jigsaw puzzles, but we're not buying much.

Some of the pins on the hat I bought when Erin, now 41, was in middle school. Can you see evidence of a missing pin? I didn't buy new pins at Lassen or Crater Lake, so I just borrowed them from the old hat to put on the one I'm wearing now.

Pins representing some of the places we've been since July 1, 2020

Here is Straus, the shy kitty who is hard to get a picture of. This is where he spends his time while we're driving. It is on top of the slide out that makes our dinning area bigger. Don't worry, we make sure we know where both cats are when and if we put the slide out.

Elsie, who really never minds posing for a picture.