Hazards of travel, a hundred years on

If there's one thing my brief sojourn in Manhattan has taught me, it's that I could not have survived the journey my Lithuanian grandparents made to reach the city. The subway made me claustrophobic, the ferry to Ellis Island made me woozy, and the hot, crowded elevator down from the Empire State Building made me want to jump off the building--how could I have traveled across the ocean in steerage? 
 
But that's not all I've learned here. For instance, did you know that if you carry a harmonica in your pocket while going through security at the Empire State Building, the security guards will confiscate the dangerous instrument with no explanation? Also, the city from above looks like a giant Lego model, especially in the fog. And riding the subway regularly would have to improve core strength--but I won't be around long enough to test that theory because we leave early tomorrow to head for home.

I'm just glad I don't have to travel in steerage.

 

Reflecting on transience in NYC

As I stood near Alexander Hamilton's tomb yesterday, in the Trinity churchyard facing Wall Street, I thought of the spot in the musical Hamilton when Aaron Burr tells Hamilton, "You'll always be adored by the things you create," and I thought, well, maybe--always is a long time.

Trinity Episcopal Church in Manhattan is a good place to think about transience. Here's the grave of publisher William Bradford, appointed Royal Printer to the New York Colony in 1693, who founded New York's first newspaper but whose tombstone is covered with words now decayed into near illegibility. Other gravestones stand witness to the human desire to leave behind an enduring mark, but time and the elements erase the words until the stones stand silent.

These crumbling gravestones are surrounded by new attempts to leave a mark, construction cranes rising to the sky and new buildings cropping up to cover all trace of what preceded them. A few blocks away the Oculus looks like a child's toy about to take flight and somehow manages to be bigger on the inside than on the outside, while the 9/11 memorial presents viewers with a dark abyss evoking absence and inconsolable loss, but we spoke to parents of some 9/11 victims who shared their enduring hope and resilience. 

Around the 9/11 memorial plaza, glass buildings reflect each other in the early-morning sun, creating images that looked first solid and then fluid, like watercolors that could be wiped away with one sweep of an artist's hand. We will always keep creating things to mark our space and we will always be losing things we thought would last forever, but somewhere in that cycle of creation and destruction we manage to make a place for hope.

Oculus.

Freedom tower through the trees.

9/11 memorial

Reflections.

William Bradford's gravestone.

Old meets new.

Trinity churchyard.

Alex and Eliza.

 

Found my place

Because of COURSE we're staying at the Excelsior Hotel. Half a block from Central Park, where everything is blooming--and if I spend enough time oohing and aahing at the Shakespeare Garden, maybe I can persuade the English Department to cover the cost of my trip. Right? 

 

Pathfinding in the Adirondacks

An online review referred to the Pilot Knob Preserve trail as "suitable for kids," which is true provided that we're talking about mountain goat kids. Being neither mountain goats nor kids, we found the hike a little challenging. I blame the mud. 

It was a hike! The trail wound upward through wet woods, with spring rivulets frequently crossing the trail. Sometimes it was hard to separate the trail from the rivulet. Mud was thick, deep, and unavoidable, and rocks were sometimes slick. My husband was so good at finding the least muddy way through the mud that I kept wanting to call him Pathfinder even though he's not in a James Fenimore Cooper novel.

We made it to the top, where a gazebo provided lovely views of Lake George and the mountains in the distance, and then we proceeded further up and around the hill to a set of gorgeous waterfalls deep in the woods. We saw a few early spring ephemerals--Dutchmen's breeches, hepatica, stonecrop--but very few blossoms, but then right next to the waterfalls we saw a single red trillium blooming. 

We saw no one on the trail on the way up but then after the waterfall we kept encountering other hikers and their friendly dogs, one of which flushed a wild turkey out of hiding. And then we had to turn around and go back. Down the slopes, through the mud, around the switchbacks, to the parking lot, and back to civilization and sandwiches and warm, dry socks. No matter how lovely the hike, the best path to find is the one that heads home.

 

Pathfinding. Yes, that's the trail.

Lake George.

Interpretive signage was not helpful.

An attempt to overcome the mud.

That's the trail.

Hepatica

Solomon's Seal

That's the path.

Dutchmen's Breeches.

Fiddleheads.

Snow in the distance.

Weather or not, here we come!

No matter how much we plan and prepare before taking a vacation, we always neglect one important task. I'm not naming names, but whoever was supposed to be in charge of arranging the weather for this trip seems to have fallen down on the job. 

Since leaving home we've experienced one nice day in Ohio and another in New York; otherwise, we've had rain, clouds, wind, and more rain. Yesterday we soaked in all the sun we could find around Lake Otsego, spending the morning at the Fenimore Art Museum (where the Native American collection contains baskets so tiny I can't believe a human hand could have woven them) and the afternoon at Glimmerglass State Park (where the hiking trails were pretty muddy but a walk in the woods yielded sightings of many woodpeckers, skunk cabbages, and deer). Today, on the other hand, we drove through driving rain, viewed lovely Lake George through fog, and decided to spend the afternoon indoors where there's heat. 

This is not the first time the weather has thwarted vacation plans. Remember our honeymoon? We spent part of it at a beach where the temperature was near freezing, and then spent a few days at a ski area where there was no snow so we looked at the map for things to do that didn't require snow. Which is how we ended up touring the Johnstown Flood National Memorial. On our honeymoon. 

Now we have a full day and a half at Lake George and the forecast suggests that the rain might let up tomorrow afternoon. We've driven up to Ticonderoga and oohed and aahed over many gorgeous houses and majestic views, but if we don't get a break in the weather, we may break down and resort to visiting an outlet mall. For now, though, I'm just happy that I brought a good book to read.

Lake Otsego

Oldest covered bridge in America, built in 1825

We saw a doe and fawn amongst the skunk cabbages and a larger group of deer elsewhere in the woods.

I love the different bark colors; you don't see birch in my woods back home.

Skunk cabbages were everywhere.

The LaChute River in Ticonderoga. Water is high, thanks to spring thaw and rain.

The fact that the sign is necessary tells you something.

Lake George