An ideal vacation or getaway for me and Eric involves hiking and camping along with a cool new town to explore -- especially if that town has breweries and a great beer scene. Of course, it's even better when we can do it with friends. We met up with Kate & Tom in Ithaca Saturday in time for lunch. We walked around the downtown area before settling on Hal's Deli to get a good meal in before heading to the trail.
We decided on the Interloken Trail, a north-south trail running in and out of the Finger Lakes National Forest and loaded up our backpacks for a night on the trail. We decided we wanted to end with a short spur trail called the Gorge Trail, so we dropped one car there, near the southern end of the trail, then shuttled back to the north end. By the time we got all geared up and got moving, it was going on 3:00.
The Interloken is a fairly flat, mostly easy trail. Sometimes (usually before I am on the trail with my bedroom and kitchen strapped to my back) I think we have to find the toughest (and thereby most rewarding) trail we can, but it was really nice to enjoy a nice leisurely pace here -- especially since we only see Kate & Tom a couple of times a year and had plenty of catching up to do. We were treated to toads and a black snake before we made it a quarter of a mile, hooray for wildlife!
The trail was mostly woodsy, with a few open, meadowy breaks as we crossed a couple of ridges. We enjoyed the scenery and the gorgeous day -- perfect blue skies, not too hot, no mosquitos -- perfect hiking conditions!
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| One of the flat, meadowy sections of the trail. |
Within three hours, we stumbled upon a clearing with a picnic table and a fire ring. We peeked a little farther behind some brush and saw a lovely pond and wondered if we were near the Blueberry Patch Campground. We felt like we hadn't hiked long at all, and it wasn't exactly back-country, but the sweet little campsite was too good to pass up, so we decided to claim it (no good picture--oops!).
We pitched our tents and walked through the brush to the pond, where we could see a few swimmers on the opposite bank -- and dozens of frogs sprang out from every step near the edge of the pond! It was a perfect spot to relax and enjoy nature.
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| How could we have passed this up? |
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| Blues so blue! Greens so green! |
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| Two happy hikers! |
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| The best vacation buddies ever. |
After unwinding on the bank of the pond for a while, the boys started a fire, we cracked our trail beers (pounders of Sierra Nevada Torpedo! perfect!), and we dined on some world class freeze-dried meals and waited for the stars to come out.
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| OH! And, there was an apple tree! Tom made himself a carmelized apple. Yum. |
We were treated to a perfectly clear night with lots of stars and the moon rising over the pond. It was the night after a full moon (a blue moon, actually!), so we had plenty of night light.
When we woke up, we enjoyed the morning sun over the pond and made coffee and oatmeal over the camping stoves before getting an early start on walking. We had not been anywhere near the Blueberry Patch Campground, which we ended up passing after a couple more miles. Again, the weather was flawless. The trail is really clearly marked and easy to follow and crosses over a couple of paved county roads as well as some service roads, so it was easy to keep track of where we were. We passed a couple of spur trails before getting to the Gorge Trail, which took us downhill quickly -- and back to the car before noon!
It worked out well that we ended up choosing such an easy trail and finished early, because there was plenty else to see in the area. We ended fairly close to Watkin's Glen and a private park called Eagle Cliff Falls, where Eric had identified a waterfall and swimming hole. We crammed (and I mean crammed -- four people, four stuffed packs, plus coolers and the rest of Eric's and my gear for the weekend) into the car and headed straight there for a swim to wash the trail off.
The waterfall was gorgeous and the water was frigid -- steals-your-breath away frigid. It was a perfect way to cap off a night on the trail!
From there, we were looking forward to exploring some Ithaca wineries, but decided it was time for some serious food, first. We found a delightful diamond-in-the-rough called Mr. Chicken in Watkins Glen, and we filled up on chicken, baked beans, and coleslaw. Refreshed and with full bellies, it was time to start drinking. We had passed a slew of wineries on a stretch along one of the lakes when we did the first car drop, so we headed back that way so we'd end up near the other car. We stopped first at Damiani Winery, which sits up on a hill to overlook the lake. We got to taste six wines ($3!) and they had some really tasty stuff (we bought a few bottles), and a sweet employee who told us about everything we were drinking. We also asked her if she would recommend a couple other wineries we should focus on in the limited amount of time we had, and she pointed us toward Shale Stone.
From there, we went right next door to the Finger Lakes Distillery, where we got even more delicious tastings of their vodkas, whiskeys and liquors -- and bought a couple of bottles of whiskey. Then it was on to Shale Stone Winery, which was much smaller than Damiani with a totally different vibe, but also had the gorgeous view of the lake. So much fun!
By the time we finished up there, it was near 5:00, when the wineries were all closing for the day (Sunday), so we headed to the other car, made a stop for groceries and beer, then headed to Robert Tremann State Park, where we had reservations for a campsite. The campsites there were kind of awful -- all out in an open field, instead of in little tree-covered alcoves like so many campsites I'm used to. But, not the end of the world, so we again got a fire going, played some frisbee, enjoyed some local beers, and made a fantastic campfire dinner: corn on the cob in the husks, veggie packets, hot dogs, and mac and cheese -- and of course marshmallows for dessert -- again, under a crystal clear sky full of stars.
The morning was a bit grey and dreary, but we had a pretty solid mission of visiting the swimming hole and waterfall complete with a diving board. This was an absolute blast. The water was freezing, but it was so beautiful and thrilling (can't be many places out there with a springboard next to a waterfall!) and we had an absolute blast.
After swimming, we wanted to have some lunch before hitting the road. Oh -- I have to interject here. I mentioned at the beginning of this post that we love checking out breweries and local beer on our vacations, so Ithaca Beer Co. was high on our to-do list. While gathering up addresses and hours for our various stops, I realized that the tasting room had shut down the week before our trip in preparation for Ithaca's move to a bigger and better brewpub. Yup -- closed for about a two-week window, and of course it was while we were there. Bummer! So, we decided to try the Scale House Brew Pub, instead. It was closed, despite the "Open!" sign in the doorway. Labor Day... d'oh! We had noticed a place called The Piggery on the drive, though, so we decided to go there, instead, and we were not disappointed by their delicious pulled pork sandwiches. Definitely make The Piggery part of your plan if you find yourself in Ithaca!
It was really a perfect Labor Day weekend and a great way to wrap up the summer. I was surprised to learn that Ithaca is only three hours from the area where Eric's parents live (not sure why I thought it was so much farther), and I can definitely see doing another weekend up there. And we're already talking about doing Acadia National Park with Kate & Tom next summer!
