Shaker settlement and downtown Albany

Just outside of Albany is America's first Shaker Settlement.  They left Manchester, England in 1774 and arrived in New York fleeing religious persecution.  Led by an illiterate textile worker named Ann Lee, they leased a parcel of land near Albany and established a communal religious society that was to become well entrenched in America.  The Shakers were Christians who believed that the Christ Spirit could dwell within anyone who led a pure life, consisting of confession of sins, celibacy, communal ownership of property,  racial and sexual equality, honesty, devotion to industry and perfection, pacifism and the avoidance of worldly influence. 
  They were a celibate group so obviously they eventually died out, although a few still survive in the state of Maine, but their legacy still remains.  Who hasn't heard of Shaker style furniture but it was their commitment to perfection in all their endeavours that endears them.  Their faith was in their efforts.

I enjoyed strolling around the herb garden.  The Shakers that lived here sold farm goods, canned vegetables, and herbs and medicinal products produced from the knowledge of plants.

Just to show you how laid-back this place is--tucked on the shelf in the gift shop among some stuffed animals is a real life cat sunning himself in the rays!!  I didn't even notice until he stretched.  He was pretty comfy.

Drove into Albany to check out the state capitol.  This is "the Egg," a performing arts center on a downtown plaza.

Impressive State Capitol building

Lots of lovely old architecture.  Albany was settled by the Dutch when it was called Fort Orange, but soon the English took over.  Still lots of Dutch history around.

Birthday and attempted bike ride

I had a very nice Birthday! Thanks, dear friends and family for the wonderful e-cards, emails, greetings, phone calls and messages, and texts! Those are treasured birthday gifts! Will got up and drove to Dunkin Donuts to bring me a birthday breakfast and a cappuccino. That was pretty swell too! We’re going to try a local favorite Italian restaurant tonight and celebrate some more.


The plan for today and the reason we decided to stay where we are is the Mohawk-Hudson Bike Trail. This is a 35 mile segment of the partly rail-to-trails bicycle path that runs from here to Albany along the Mohawk River that looked really fun. Its part of a 300 mile bike trail that runs from Lake Ontario to Albany along the old Erie Canal route. Started out a great day for a bike ride, and the trail proved to be lovely. . .until my bicycle began to malfunction. We got almost 14 miles out and the gears were slipping and wouldn’t catch so that my peddling wasn’t making the bike go anywhere. Will tried to do a trail fix for me but it was non-repairable.

Will was about to bike back to the car and leave me to wait for him to come back for me when a kindly gentlemen offered his help. Tossed my bike in the back of his pickup and drove us back to the trailhead. Nice guy that just wanted to help—and it was so appreciated. Hope we have the opportunity to pay it forward sometime. Googled a bike shop that happened to be a couple of miles away and immediately took my bike to be repaired. So. . .I guess I got a new back bicycle wheel for my birthday! We’ll pick up the repaired bike tomorrow afternoon. So end of my bicycling adventure for now.

Schenectady

We moved again to Schenectady.  I can't spell this town's name without looking every time--let alone pronounce it.  We came to do some serious bicycling but we won't think about that until tomorrow.  On the way we stopped at Saratoga Springs for a couple of hours to walk around the historic spa and the saunter into the lobby of the posh Gideon Putnam Hotel.  There was a classic Cadillac car show going on in the parking lot.  How fitting.

Schenectady's Stockade is a 300 year old Dutch villiage and now historic district.  We walked and drove the streets looking at all the old architechture.  Most every house had at least a date plaque on it and some told an abreviated history of the house. 

This is First Reformed Church, established in 1680.  Don't know how old the present structure is but it is very beautiful.  Wish we had arrived earlier as I would have loved to attend services here.

The DeBoer's, Doug, Lia and Tammy

Lilliana

Time out for some Lilliana pictures!!  These are some of her one year pictures.  Only a few days before we get our hands on her. 

A little Korean princess!!

Side stories

Out birding early in the morning in the campground.  Walked off the path into the woods toward a rock wall with a boulder fall in front of it.  Quietly minding my own business, looking up when I heard a raspy bark/growl that I had never heard before.  It was loud and menacing--couldn't imagine what it was.  Could it be a crow's nest up ahead?  So I walked toward it.  Suddenly I was face to face with a red fox!  The warning calls were obviously directed at me--she saw me long before I saw her.  No doubt I was too close to her den and her kits in the rock jumble.  I backed off in record time.

There is a monument dedicated to Samual Champlain on a remote point of the lake near Crown Point commemorating the discovery of his namesake in 1609.  It originally was a lighthouse that became obsolete.  In 1903, in the 300 year celebration of that defining event they rededicated and updated the lighthouse into a historical marker with bronze statues and etchings.  On the side of the stone monument is a little square bronze relief--maybe 2ft square--by August Rodin that was given for the occasion by France.  What an unlikely place for a artistic treasure.

We drove into the village of Lake George today.  It was Saturday so very busy, lots of summer holiday family vacationers enjoying the shops, water parks, beaches, restaurants.  Fun to see but we both decided we liked the quiet of the northern part of Lake George with all the stately homes along the shore and the quaint little towns nestled into the woods.  We moved the RV to Lake Luzerne to a full service campground close to the Hudson River.  I was surprised to find the Hudson up here--it has its beginning in the Adirondacks but is already good sized here.  Popular place for river float trips.

Two days worth. . .

Yesterday was moving day. Also a rainy day. Broke camp in the morning in the rain and set up again in the rain.

We’re at Roger’s Rock State Park now on the northwest shore of Lake George. It’s a lovely campground but like all New York State parks, there are no electrical or water hookups. Also no cell phone coverage here which is a bit of a surprise since we're close to Lake George and a big resort area.

The rain lasted all day and really broke loose for a gully-washer in the evening. Felt sorry for all the tenters in the park. In between rain showers we visited Crown Point and toured the excavated remains of an old French military fort built in 1731 and the still intact wall and remains of an English fort that was built on the same location in 1759 after the French were forced to give up this strategic location. Now we are learning about the French and Indian war—another layer of history that adds to my confusion. I think I need to dig up a copy of Cooper’s, Last of the Mohicans.

Next morning was still pretty soggy. To lift our spirits we made a big breakfast of fresh blueberry pancakes, bacon and broke open the real maple syrup. In spite of the forecast the clouds did clear up and by midmorning we were good to go again.

Spent the entire day at Fort Ticonderoga. It’s a fully restored fort on the confluence of Lake Champlain and Lake George. Period dressed interpreters tell the story of life at the fort throughout its history as a French installation, then English and finally American military fort into the Revolutionary War. Actually, it went back and forth a couple of times as the tide of war ebbed and flowed. We watched fife and drummers, a black powder rifle demonstration, read all we could absorb in the museum and then toured the “King’s Garden.”

Year’s after the fort fell into ruin, a luxury resort hotel was built on the lake shore on the property. That ultimately became a private home and lived in by generations of the Pell family. Sarah Pell commissioned a formal English garden behind the grand house in the 1920’s. the house is boarded up now, awaiting money for renovation but the gardens are open and lovingly tended. It just happens to also be where the old fort’s vegetable garden and orchard’s were located—that’s where the name King’s Garden comes from.

Second quiet night with no cell phone or internet or TV. We’re listening to the whippoorwills and watching fire fly’s instead.

Another day on Lake Champlain

Will went for a long bike ride this morning and I went back to the marsh to see if I could find some more birds.  One side of the road is wetland and the other side is marsh that creeps out into Lake Champlain.  The early morning light on the big lake was worth getting up for.

This guy was still cruising the skies looking for some fresh fish for breakfast.  Mrs Osprey and chick waiting at the nest for him to bring something yummy back.

We've been told by locals that this is THE place in Plattsburg.  Oldest fast food establishment in town and still the most popular. The building looks like the back end is sinking into the ground and from the inside it looks pretty shaky too!  We ate inside but they do have car hops--see the tray hanging on the white car's window.  They are famous for their "Michigan."  We have seen these on menu's all over the Adirondacks and finally figured out that they are simply a hot dog smothered with chili meat sauce.  Don't ask me why it is called a Michigan--or what this establishment has to do with Texas!  Well, it was good but we're not sure we'd order another one--wasn't that good.  The ambiance was the most fun.

Pick Your Own Blueberries

Just up the road is a farm market and orchard.  The blueberries are ripe now and they have Pick-Your-Own fields.  We do like blueberries!!!  We ate our fill in the fields and then brought some home and I baked a blueberry cobbler.

Hot out of the oven (microwave) with icecream for desert.  Mmmmmm.

Plattsburgh, New York

It rained overnight a slow lovely rain that the region badly needed.  Like so much of the country, it has been a dry summer here.  The drippy morning made for a slow leisurely start for our day.  As the day began to clear off and sun peaked out we went over to a Wildlife Management area close to our campground to see what birds we could scare up.  We walked out onto a boardwalk to scan the marsh and enjoyed quite a bit of avian activity.  We were there for several minutes when a raucous made us look up and realized we were directly under a osprey nest.  Think this was a first year bird as she did not seem at all startled.  She was looking at us as much as we were looking at her!!

Blue Heron in the marsh

Stone Ledge Sculpture Garden is a curiosity along the highway that goes into the town of Plattsburg.  Most of the items were metal sculptures and a few made of pottery or stone but have no idea if it is one person's work or several.  Couldn't find any information about it.

This "Last Supper" was very intriguing.  Table is wood and stone but the figures are welded iron.

A famous battle of the War of 1812 was fought near Plattsburgh.  Apparently some American troops were garrisoned here.  Money to support the war effort was hard to come by and the owner of this house, being a merchant supplied those soldiers with what they needed on credit to sustain their efforts.  Without that support, those soldiers might have disappeared and the course of that war might have been very different--so the story goes.  We enjoyed a tour of the Kent-Delord House Museum that has an amazing amount of items that are original to the house from early 1800's.  By the way, the American government never paid their debt to this man and he was never able to regain his wealth.

Hearts of Delight Farm near Chazy, NY is the legacy of a man named William Miner.  He made his fortune in the Railroad industry and then came back here and resettled his grandparents homestead and built it up into a model farm in early 1900's.  He had electricity on his farm before the governor's mansion in Albany.  It is now a research and demonstration farm for dairy and to a lesser extent to equine research (horses.)

The farm boy surfaced and Will had to watch the milking.  All the milk they produce now goes to a cheese factory somewhere in the Adirondacks.  Exhibit showed what the grounds use to look like when William Miner and Hearts of Delight were in thier hayday right after the turn of the century.  Interesting agricultural history. 

 Lots of apple orchards, wineries, corn fields, dairies--diverse agricultural area

A day in Vermont

We took a ferry across Lake Champlain this morning to spend the day in Burlington, Vermont.  Pleasant 20 minute float over.  There are several choices of ferries so we picked one that was north of Burlington so we could drive through the country a bit also.  Also, this was the closest one to a Costco and we have been hoping we'd run onto a Costco.  That says something when Costco is the highlight of your day. . .

No, the ferry ride was a highlight.  And Church Street in downtown Burlington.  Its a pedestrian only shopping street with lots of restaurants and trendy shops near the waterfront which is also a nice, touristy area to stroll and enjoy the sights.

We took a different ferry back that brought us into the old town of Essex, NY.  Lots of buildings on the National Register, even a quaint looking town from the water.

It was another one of those hot, sticky days--perfect day for Vermont's favorite icecream, Ben and Jerry's!  And the only flavor to have is, of course, Cherry Garcia. Stopped at a farm market on the way home and bought some fresh sweet corn for dinner.  That's about as "summer" as it gets!