Land o' Lakes

I've already mentioned how many lakes dot the Adirondacks, and there are lots of neat little towns, too. Saranac Lake, where we spent a few days, deserves a special shout-out.

This is a look at part of the town from [near] the top of Mt. Baker. The lovely long lake with the homes alongside it isn't named Saranac, though. It's Lake Flower, which gave its name to our nice little motel. The larger lake in the distance is one of the Saranacs, probably Lower. If you look at a map of the area around the town, though, it is simply lousy with lakes. A wide-angle view would be a textbook example of glaciated terrain.

I've already extolled the Adirondack scenery, though, and I want to show you more of the town this time. 

First, here are a couple of closer looks at Lake Flower and some of the fabulous vacation homes that line it:

the lake view from our motel's dock

a lone fisherman

Everywhere we went in the area we saw lots of great flowers and other landscaping. These are a couple of the best collections of blooms, decorating a porch near our motel.

Another yard decoration that seemed puzzlingly common was very large chairs. Here's an example, out in front of the Saranac Lake visitors' center, with accompanying tourist for scale:

not even an Adirondack chair...

In addition to its naturally beautiful setting and quirky ambiance, SL has a really exquisite old downtown. 

That clock tower is especially handsome and I couldn't help but take several shots of it.

I'm not sure you couldn't find a better base of operations for seeing the Adirondacks than Saranac Lake!

Adirondack history: part 2

In addition to the scenery and the everyday history showcased in the Adirondack Museum, the region has seen a lot of really important history-book history, and scientific history, as well. We were able to sample bits of both during our brief visit.

First up, on our way back to Albany, we wandered around Last of the Mohicans territory a bit and toured the ruins at Crown Point on Lake Champlain. The forts whose remains are found on this strategic knob of land have very interesting stories and were occupied by both French and British forces during what we call the French and Indian War.

You can see the British flag above their section of the historic site in the photo above. These ruins look more like a real fort than the French ones, and are even undergoing some refurbishment works (see the photo on the right).

remains of "His Majesty's Fort of Crown Point"

tourists at Crown Point

earthworks at Fort Crown Point

close-up of Crown Point stonework; they had plenty of stone at hand to work with!

There's a reason the French fort is just piles of rubble: they blew it up when they retreated, to deprive their enemies of a structure at this important point on the Lake.

ruins of the French Fort St. Fredric

The handsome bridge in the background of this and some of my other photos leads out of New York to Vermont, across Lake Champlain at almost its narrowest point (it's probably a little narrower further south at the more famous Ft. Ticonderoga).

We also took a few minutes to visit and climb the handsome lighthouse (still in New York) just across an inlet from the forts. The views are great from up there, and the narrowness of the lake shows why a light was necessary. Long-time readers might remember that we are quite fans of lighthouses, so this structure, the only one we saw on our trip, was a must-stop.

from the viewing platform almost at the top

Crown Point lighthouse

We saw some scientific history, too. Lovely Saranac Lake (which I'll show you more of next time) used to be quite famous as a place whose pure air and restful ambiance was inspiration for research into a cure for tuberculosis and other lung ailments. The museum where we learned about this is the Saranac Laboratory Museum, right in the middle of downtown.

A lot of famous, and not so famous, people came there for relief from the TB-encouraging environments of the cities. Including one of my favorite historical baseball players, Christy Mathewson, to keep up the baseball-related reason for our visit here. His lungs were damaged by mustard gas when he was serving in World War I.

In addition to the actual laboratory where a great deal of TB research was done in the early 20th century (see the picture above), the museum has information, letters, and moving reproduced recordings that tell the often very sad stories of the patients who came to Saranac Lake. On a lighter note, but still quite interesting, there's a room with exhibits of all kinds of medical curiosities, including this mysterious device..."What is it?"

My final historical note is also from Saranac Lake. When we took our surprisingly strenuous hike, the trail led us right by this lovely cemetery:

And cemeteries, especially in long-settled parts of the country, always offer a fascinating historical perspective. We were particularly puzzled by a little cluster of what looked like Norwegian flags in a section of the cemetery. Reading the memorial that they surrounded solved some of the puzzle, but still left me wondering. As many World War II memorials as I have seen, this one is still unique.

Someone in Saranac Lake is perhaps related to some of these seamen? Whatever the impetus, it is a lovely memorial. And notice the pebbles on top of the headstone; I learned about this custom in the final moving scene of Schindler's List, but I doubt there are many Jewish Norwegian seamen. But the presence of the pebbles makes this memorial extra special.

Adirondack Museum bonus: boats, boats, and more boats!

As we drove around the Adirondacks earlier this month, I probably saw more cars with boats of various kinds atop them than I'd ever seen anywhere. Even around here, where we have lots of nice rivers. Up there, though, they have rivers and lakes and ponds, lots of them. To refresh your memory...

...these statistics refer to the Adirondack Park that is pretty much contiguous with the whole mountain range. 

So boating of many kinds has always been a major activity in this area. To celebrate this great tradition, the Adirondack Museum had a whole building devoted to boats and boating, and it was the highlight of our visit there for me.

From this lovely sailboat that's suspended in the Museum's entrance building...

...to an impressive array of guideboats that are the signature craft of the area. We learned a lot about these interesting vessels, even getting to watch a boat builder working on a new one:

The craftsmanship in all of the boats on display was exquisite. Here's a closeup of a guideboat interior...doesn't this wood look luscious?!

Here are a couple more examples of guideboats:

a splendid wooden guideboat

a more primitive example (note the photo on the wall in the background)

As ubiquitous as these boats must be in Adirondack boating history, at least one of the quotes on display in the exhibit might be considered fighting words to our paddling friends:

(I highlighted another interesting set of quotes in this Wordless Wednesday post a few weeks back.)

Other types of watercraft were also on display, even some that were motorized:

Other boat-related artifacts were om the exhibit, too, like this handsome "cruising" trophy. I loved the little silver canoe that apparently came with it:

But my favorite item wasn't even in the boat exhibit building but in with the sleds and carriages. It's a "boat carrying wagon," typical of "about 1890," according to the museum information. The wagon frame is original but the boat rack was "carefully reproduced."

I think we should invest in one of these to carry our boats to the river in style!

Adirondack history: part 1

Upstate New York isn't just rich in scenery. Lots of important history happened up here, too. And besides, just ordinary life in the area has been pretty interesting through the years as well.

One of the best places to learn about this everyday life history is the Adirondack Museum, near Blue Mountain Lake.

I showed you this museum's scenic setting in my last post, so now it's time to explore some of its history exhibits.

The place is set up in a series of buildings, similar, but not nearly as large, as the wonderful Shelburne Museum just outside of Burlington, VT. Some of the structures are original cabins and other buildings from the area, and some are more recent exhibit spaces. 

Here's the interior of a rather luxurious cabin. Note the wooden designs in the furniture, simultaneously elaborate and simple. 

A similar style of decoration fully adorns the outside of this building, which was being worked on:

Logging has always been an important industry in the area, and there was a whole building devoted to interesting exhibits about this often dangerous activity. Here's a large photo of some guys working to break up a log jam from the "Jam Boat." I can't help remembering this wrenching scene from Sometimes a Great Notion whenever I see logs in the water. 

The wetlands up here are used for recreation, too, of course. Here's a reconstructed "Fish Camp," cozy and very well-appointed...perhaps "glamping" isn't such a new idea?

The museum's exhibits were heavily weighted toward transportation, and I'm saving one particular mode of transport for a whole other post. But for now, some selected Adirondack ways of getting from point A to point B:

funerals still have to happen, even when roads are frozen...

out and about in style

My favorite transportation exhibit was a wonderful Gilded Age train car.  I so wish it was still possible to travel like this!

looking down the corridor

such elegant accommodations!

attention to every Victorian detail

Next up, I'll show you some more expert craftsmanship...making ways to get around works of art.

Adirondack scenery

In my last post, where I described the highlight and main impetus for our trip east, I said that Cooperstown, New York, is in the middle of nowhere. Which is sort of true, in terms of urban areas.

But there's plenty of neat stuff nearby: scenery, history, and charming small towns. So I'll tell you about the brief glimpses we had of these various attractions now and in upcoming posts.

The Adirondacks are very different kinds of mountains than the Rockies, with which we are much more familiar. But they are scenic in their own way, with the added advantage of not being so danged high, making hiking around on them a lot easier for flatlanders.

The photo above was taken at a scenic pull-out somewhere between Speculator (who came up with

that name for a really nice little town?!) and Saranac Lake. I think the high points on the horizon are Bullhead and Puffer Mountains.

The road we took from the Albany area to Saranac Lake, which was to be our Adirondack base of operations for 3 days, followed the Sacandaga River for a while. We stopped at a picnic pullout along the road and I took the picture on the right. It shows the river through some of the dense forest that is a defining attribute of this area.

We took time during our drive to spend a very pleasant few hours at the Adirondack Museum. I'll tell you lots more about its fascinating exhibits when I get to my history blog posts, but its scenic setting was a standout, too. It's near Blue Mountain Lake, and you get good views of this photogenic and typically island-studded lake from the Museum's cafe, where we had a nice lunch:

The next day, fortified by a hearty and delicious dinner at Nonna Fina's in Saranac Lake the night before, we tackled our first real hike. Touted in the guidebooks and by the cheerful staff at the visitor center as a "family-friendly" trail, we struck out to climb Mt. Baker. It's right in town, the roundtrip isn't even 2 miles and the elevation at the top isn't even 2500 feet. How hard could it be?

Well, our final assessment was that Adirondack families must be pretty tough! Not only was it very rocky (see the photo at the left), which wasn't too much of a concern, except when the rocks were slippery when covered by wet leaves. But it was really, really steep!

Joan remarked that in Colorado they would have made the trail with a lot more switchbacks. Apparently, though, switchbacks are a new-fangled western invention.

However, the view from the top (or almost the top; except for Joan, who of course was 'way ahead of Steve and myself, we decided to blow off the final yardage) was pretty nice and going down wasn't quite as scary as I'd thought it would be.

A local we met at our stopping and lunching spot said she thought we were looking at Lower Saranac Lake, which is the closest one to town. That's it in the distance in the photo below. The mid-range lake is Lake Flower, which was right at the doorstep of our old-school motel. The bit of water that's closest is the "pond" at the foot of the climb. I knew that rivers were lots bigger in the east than in our neck of the woods, but apparently lakes are, too. This "pond" would be a good-sized lake in south Texas.

Badly in need of more sustenance after this short but strenuous outing, we found it at the Blue Moon Cafe in downtown Saranac Lake (more about this charming little town in a future post). Fortunately I was now able to continue on to another excursion. 

A bit northwest of Saranac Lake is the Paul Smith College Visitor Interpretive Center (the VIC, to those in the know) and it sounded intriguing. As it turned out, we were fortunate that some sort of special program was in progress, since that meant the nature center was open later than usual and it was getting on toward dusk. 

So we had time for a brief but fulfilling walk on a couple of their nature trails. Here are some scenic shots:

reflections in a pond along the Barnum Brook trail

Heron Marsh and Adirondacks in the distance

perhaps Barnum Brook

Fortunately, we were at a high enough latitude that we got back in time for sunset on the lawn of our motel back in Saranac Lake, even after taking a wrong turn on state highway 30 and getting a little closer to Canada than we intended. We even had time for some yummy treats from Mountain Mist Custard that were almost at the level of Classics Custard in Roswell, NM (worth going out of your way for!)

We weren't through with Adirondack scenery, though. The next day we took a different route back to Albany, bypassing Lake Placid (advised because a large Iron Man competition was going on that day) but still catching some of the area's fine scenery.

We let some cyclists out for their pre-race warmups pass us and stopped at a scenic pulloff to enjoy the reflections of hillside and cliffs in this mirror-like water....just another pond/lake in the Adirondacks.

To show you how little of this vast, beautiful area we were able to see, here are some stats on the Adirondacks from the eponymous museum:

yes, that's 2,759 lakes and ponds!

Next up: see more from this great museum and learn why this part of the world is a true historical treasure-house!