Suspended

 
This post flips back to the weekend in New York because there are so many great things yet to share. I love how each of these pictures suspends the subject in its space.

First we have leaves floating below Salmon Creek Falls.



This little guy is just walking across the water. It's a water strider- the surface tension of the water is strong enough to support them.



Finally, these harebells were growing out of the rock face at Ithaca Falls.



Heading to bed early.

	See Trail Work Day
if you like this blog, click the +1   or

Kicking Back - Awesome Day!

 
Got to spend the day with Loretta, Paula and GayLynne. After a leisurely morning, we headed out for a couple hours of kayaking. Relaxed!



Loretta and Paula exhibit good form. We paddled downstream on the Pentwater River into Pentwater Lake and around to a landing near the house.





Back at the house, Loretta and I had to check out Paula's zipline, built for the grandkids. But that doesn't mean we can't enjoy it too!





Ending the day with pizza!

Of course, now I have to go to work very soon, but what an awesome day!

	See Trail Work Day
if you like this blog, click the +1   or

Fun with Friends

 
I know many of you don't know these people, but they are special to me, and I got to spend some time with all of them last weekend.

Marie and I spent Wednesday night with Janet, another friend from Girl Scout days.



Elaine went on the waterfall tour. We just had to be a little silly. It's required.



Then somehow the weekend was almost over and we'd hardly seen Irene and Lois. So we had lunch together and went on a short hike.



You may speculate all you wish about which specimens are "normal," but you probably shouldn't put money on the middle two. As they say, "normal" is a setting on the dryer.

if you like this blog, click the +1   or

Fast Waterfall Tour

 
I'll give you the blazing fast rest of our waterfall tour in New York, because there are other things I want to share as well, and the days continue here, adding new fun too.

I've shown you all of these falls before. They are all places very much a part of my geographic DNA, so I love seeing them in any phase of wetness. Here is Taughannock, the highest at 215 feet. It had very little water, but hey, I've seen it with none at all occasionally.



The upper falls on the same creek is interesting because we couldn't see it when I was a kid. The vantage point was an active rail line at that time. Actually, less water on this one means that you can see the shape of the rocks that make it a spiraled chute.



Buttermilk Falls couldn't even display the reason for it's name, it was so dry. Just one thin stream of water trickled down the face and continued in a twisted reflection in the pool. Compare this to a more normal flow at Buttermilk Falls in 2010



And by an odd fluke of weather, the watershed upstream from Ithaca Falls, east of Ithaca along Fall Creek, received rain the night before. That falls was near normal flow, and it was beautiful.



See other views of Taughannock Falls and Ithaca Falls.

You could visit these places every single day and see different things.

if you like this blog, click the +1   or

Salmon Creek Falls

 
The weekend was awesome! There's no way you are going to see all the pictures or even an orderly assortment of the ones I took. Here are some hit and miss. Loretta is visiting for a couple of weeks now, too, so there are current things I could be showing too.

The trail conference was near Cortland, NY. I didn't have time or power or wifi to blog while there. Anyway.

I did see a waterfall that I'd never seen before. There are SO many in the area, that's not a huge surprise. This is Salmon Creek Falls, on the east side of Cayuga Lake, and we rarely went over there when I was a kid.

The other thing is that they've had a very dry summer, so most of the falls had very little water. Of course, that means you can see the rocks! Here's the long view.



One truly odd thing about this falls is that the creek does several switchbacks and the falls faces away from Cayuga Lake. I realized it was headed the wrong way while we were taking pictures and had to look at a map to figure that out. Here's a closer view of some of the rock layers.



When there is more water in the creek the falls covers the whole expanse. Even so, it was interesting, and there was a nice little rainbow.



This is in the village of Ludlowville, New York. It was founded in 1791, and there was an inn, a grist mill and a tavern beside the falls.

	See
if you like this blog, click the +1   or