Sunday, October 24, 2010

The Coolest Small Town In America

Owego, NY was voted "The coolest small town in America" in 2009. This was where we would hold our autumn rally for Northeast Coaches for Christ. Never having been to the Finger Lakes region of NY, Lenny and I decided to go up there early and check things out. It's not that far from us, but we still decided to leave Wednesday afternoon. Lenny's sister lives right off of I-81, so we stopped there for a great dinner. Thanks Lisa for the invitation and great food. We drove a little further and spent the night at a Flying J rest stop. One of the "perks" of travelling in our home on wheels is we can stop anywhere and still have all the comforts of home. We've stayed at truck stops before, but this night we would not get any sleep. They were fixing the parking lot and decided they needed to rip up the macadam right by our coach. The next morning we continued on our way, stopping at the NY Welcome Center. What a view. It was spectacular, to see the fog dividing the top of the mountains from the base. Looking out we could see the Susquehanna River. The fall colors were not as vibrant as we would have liked, but still it was as if we were standing on top of the world. We wanted to beat the rain, so we continued on to the campground. Hickories Park Campground is a city run campground in Owego, NY. It is a beautiful park and at $21 per night for water and electric hook-ups, we will definitely return there.

Thursday was a dreary rainy day and Friday wasn't looking much better, but we decided to do a little sightseeing anyway. Our first stop was Evergreen Cemetery. I had done a little research before our trip and discovered some interesting facts about this place. Established inn 1851, it was placed on a hill overlooking the town of Owego and the Susquehanna River Valley. At the top of the hill, an Indian maiden Sa-sa-na Loft is buried. You can read more about her here. There is also a section dedicated to 80 men who fought in the Civil War, as well as politicians from the area who are buried here.

With the rally not beginning until Friday evening, we decided to drive north to Ithaca, NY to view some of the waterfalls of the area as well as Cayuga Lake, the longest of the Finger Lakes. As we drove north we noticed some eclectic art work in a yard. I just had to take a few pictures. We followed the GPS directions to Robert H. Treman State Park. There are a number of waterfalls in the park and while we saw three of them, we did not hike two miles to view Lucifer Falls because of the weather. OK, we're a bit out of shape as well, but the weather was the main reason. We continued our drive around Ithaca and went to the Allan H. Treman State Marine Park. At this point in the day, the weather was really bad and the rain was pouring down, so I could not get as many pictures as I would have liked. Still, it was a nice drive with beautiful scenery.


 




Friday afternoon we headed back to the campground to find that the wind had been brutal and our awning had a three inch tear at one end, so up the awning went. We live and learn. Next on our agenda would be the rally...but more on that in my next post.

Thanks for travelling along with us on The Thomas' Trails...till next time.

No comments:

Post a Comment