For the night time part of the exhibit we chose a warmish evening. We got a pretty good parking spot in the main lot and were amazed at the many school buses full of people being brought in from the parking lot across Route 1. That parking actually wouldn't be too bad since the buses drop you right at the entrance.
Since we have memberships that allow us to get into Longwood Gardens any time, we chose to see the inside part of the Christmas exhibit right when they open at 10 AM. That worked perfectly since we got a close parking space.
We have subscribed to concerts by the Philly Orchestra on some Friday afternoons. We take a bus from Crosslands with other residents. This is the view from our seats.
They were mowing today and that seems to have scared the praying mantis' out of hiding. This one was on the walk toward the center and decided I was a safe haven. By the time it got up to my knee I decided I'd better shoo it away.
Last evening we heard the a cappella group VOCES8 which was outstanding. They sang a variety of pieces and all were good, but I especially enjoyed the classical works.
The chrysanthemum festival is going on in the conservatory so we took the opportunity to walk through most of that as well. We decided there is not enough lighting in the evening to really show off the flowers. Daylight is much better. But there were some neat ones.
We drove back home on Tuesday, October 3rd. The leaves were just passing their peak so it was a good time to leave. One of the reasons we came back so soon was to attend yesterday's Philadelphia Orchestra concert. It was marvelous. Daniil Trifonov played Gershwin's Piano Concerto and it was definitely the hit of the afternoon. There was also a piece"This Moment" by young composer Anna Clyne and William Grant Still's Symphony No 4. We went to the talk before the concert, given by assistant conductor Austin Chanu. The only issue with the afternoon was the bus ride. The bus going in was so uncomfortable on the bumpy road that I was concerned about my spine. Fortunately we had a different bus coming home and it was better. We saw friends there who did not take the bus. Instead, they take the train to Suburban station and walk the 0.6 mile to Kimmel Center, stopping along the way for lunch. That may be a better way to do it, especially since the train is free. But we are committed to the bus for this season.
Today we did our traditional paddle from Second Pond to Lake Flower. It was another beautiful day with barely any wind, and abundant sunshine. But something was not quite right. I realized I wasn't tempted to take any pictures. Then I noticed that while the fall colors close by were very pretty, they didn't show up at all on the hillsides which were shrouded in smoke. The Canadian wildfire smoke is upon us again. It didn't bother us, except perhaps a bit of burning of the eyes, but it sure spoiled the fall colors. So I took a picture at the end of the paddle while we were all eating our lunch at the picnic tables in the park.
W did a paddle with friends today from South Creek through Middle Saranac to Weller Pond. I was supposed to go but wasn't feeling good. But I wanted to keep a record of it, so here it is.
We did our traditional Rollins Pond loop today. The weather was perfect and the water so still.
At the northern end of Rollins we paddled along the shore by the culvert
then landed and climbed up to what will become the rail trail. The surface right now would be a challenge to bike.
Then we continued on our way through the narrow stream to Floodwood, which beavers had tried to block, through Floodwood, then down Fish Creek and through Square Pond. We landed at an empty campsite then W walked back to Rollins to get the car. We paddled about 7.5 miles. What a gorgeous day.
Today's paddle was supposed to be on the northern end of Upper Saranac Lake. But there recently was a toxic algal bloom there, and reports said that even though the algae had dispersed, the water could still be toxic. So we decided we had better find a different place to paddle. We didn't have much time to decide on a new destination, but in hindsight we should have taken more time than we did because the new destination we decided on, Long Pond, requires a 1/3 mile portage to get to the lake. I thought I could do it, even though I haven't been able to do much walking due to chronic Achilles tendonitis. The evening before the paddle I hurt my foot more and decided I couldn't do that walk. So W and the others went and had a good time.
We spent the weekend visiting with friends in Keene Valley who belong to the Ausable Club. We hiked to Rainbow Falls, though I didn't go the whole way since it was quite a rock scramble. But it was a neat place and W got a good photo of the falls.
We had a great paddle today. Some friends from our new neighborhood in PA were camping nearby so they joined us on a very nice paddle on Follensby Clear.
We put in at the upper parking lot. We decided to paddle a bit farther than our friends wanted to so after they took out we paddled down to investigate the beaver dams in Spider Creek. We went under the bridge and down the creek, where the beaver dams had been cleared,
then back up the creek and to our car. Our total paddle was 6.5 miles.
Several of us tried paddling on Round Lake today. Winds were forecast to be from the NNW at 8 mph so we knew they might be a problem. The orange line on this map shows what we ended up doing.
We put in at the arrowhead and paddled up the channel into Round Lake. It quickly became obvious that the winds were blowing at more than 8 mph and we assumed they would be worse as the day progressed. We hugged the southwestern shoreline to see if we could maybe get up the western shore where we would hopefully be shielded from the wind. But even the crossing seemed too dangerous. So we turned around and went under the bridge into Little Tupper. I thought that would be windy too, but I guess because the wind was from the north, we were shielded and it was a delightful paddle to the Little Tupper put in. We landed there and had lunch on a picnic table near the shore, then paddled back, hugging the shoreline though even then the winds were minimal. We paddled a total of 5.6 miles.
We were surprised at the bright red maples on the shoreline coming out of Round Lake. It seems early for leaves to be changing. We wondered if the trees were actually being stressed by the high water.
I had fun today walking around the property taking photos of mushrooms. It has been so wet there were plenty to be found.
A group of us paddled at Little Tupper today. It started out nice and calm.
We paddled across to the far shore from the put in but by the time we headed across to the other shore for lunch, it was pretty windy.
We stopped for lunch at one of the beaches, that was mostly under water.
Then we headed back along that shore and went up the creek that we had explored last year. We again went nearly a mile, and possibly could have gone farther but we were getting tired. By the time we got to the landing we had paddled about 8 miles.
The winds were forecast to be fairly high today, so we set off from Second Pond, through First Pond, then hugged the southern shore of the lake to get to Pope Bay, which we are pretty sure we never paddled before. We usually go zooming by on the way from South Creek. We stopped at campsite 52 for lunch and were lucky to find somewhere we could fairly easily get out of our boats. The water is still very high and it continues to rain. After lunch W was not feeling well so we headed back to the car, having paddled about five miles. The rest of the group had a good time exploring around some of the islands.
We had a nice group paddle today. Eight of us explored Deer River Flow, where we had not paddled since 2018. We put in off Cold Brook Road at the bottom of the map and paddled to the northwest end where the dam is.
We were very surprised to see the area to the right of the dam set up with nice picnic tables and chairs. The property is privately owned but paddlers are encouraged to use it. It also has a very nice privy, complete with little battery driven lights, toilet paper, hand sanitizer and a Vacant/Occupied sign you flip before you enter.
The view from that area down the flow was great.
After lunch we explored the arm up towards Route 14, to the upper right on the map, before returning to our starting point, for a total of about 7.5 miles.
The winds were forecast to be high today, but the group elected to try the paddle anyway. We put into Lake Placid right off Victor Herbert Road and headed clockwise around the lake. When we got to the passage through to the eastern section of the lake, the winds were extremely high and we quickly decided not to try to go that way. So we headed to the eastern shore and started back south. The winds there also picked up so it was a challenge getting back to the landing. The entire paddle was just 4 miles. Then the 7 of us went to Simply Gourmet for lunch and a nice long visit.
There has been a lot of rain which means some paddles have been rained out. Today was sunny, but we figured the nice weekend would bring everyone out, so we decided to just paddle on the flow. We went about 4 1/2 miles and saw three fisherman, two loons and three young otters.
We led an ADK paddle today on Forked Lake. Nine of us took off from the carry from Raquette Lake and headed west. The wind was stronger than forecast, but we were sheltered in that part of the lake. We paddled along the north shore and then up the Brandreth Lake Outlet. The water was high enough to allow us to get over two beaver dams so we got as far as the tree which blocks the stream. It would have taken a lot of effort to get all of us around it, so we elected to turn around. The two campsites on the north shore were occupied and those on the south shore were hard to get into due to high water, so we ended up lunching back at the dock where we started. The total paddling distance was about 5 1/4 miles.
I'm surprised to see how long it has been since I posted. We continue to be very busy. We stayed in PA through last Saturday, the 15th, because I had a family reunion in the area. And we had wanted to spend some more time in our new community before heading for the Adirondacks. So we drove up on the 17th and are so very happy to be here. We really don't like the summer heat and humidity in Pennsylvania. In addition to the chores required to get our place in the Adirondacks up and running, much of the time we have been here has been involved in the Stitchin' B's quilt show. We help take down the show tomorrow. We have a long paddle with our group scheduled for Thursday, so we figured we needed to try paddling on the Flow, to be sure we can still get in and out of our boats. It seems to get harder every year. I still love the view from the shore of our wonderful lake.
We are having trouble remembering that it is already July. So the pickerelweed is already blooming.
We went to the first of four preliminary tryouts of the international organ competition at Longwood Gardens today. What a treat. We will go to another tomorrow, and the final on Saturday. The organists and the judges are from all over the world. And of course at intermission one just has to walk over to the orchids and take photos.
