Taughannock Falls in December

Christmas Day skiing? Made it to the ski slope but did not go; first - did not have the "discount" first-timer coupon so would need to pay a higher price and second - people in the parking lot said the conditions were very icy. Decided it would not be the best condition to ski (or snowboard as I had been told it was not as demanding on quad muscles - Thanks J) for the first time of the year. Now that the weather will get in the low 50's/high 40's this weekend, the next ski opportunity may be in 2009.

So off to photo the waterfalls that I had missed on Sunday. Hiking at
Buttermilk Falls was possible - advise using the ski poles to avoid falling on the way down! The photos at Taughannock Falls were much better though! The trails on the north and south rim had been closed but you could hike the "river" path. Bad news was that the park facilities were closed and being Christmas not many other places open either. (Luckily one of the Chinese restaurants was having a Celebration Day! Xie xie ni!!)

Sorry Y.F. and T.N. - Have not made it South during December so no new photos or travel stories of driving adventures! Tentatively planning camping in NY mountains soon so maybe photos from there.

Second Official Day of Winter 2008

Last year in early December, I was seeing the Fall foliage in Japan. Now the second official day of winter 2008, I took photos of frozen waterfalls. With the windchill, I was advised that it would be much colder outside than I had thought. (Thanks J - I stayed quite warm!) So rather than driving to the Ithaca area, I went to waterfalls near Watkins Glen. Three locations were photoed and each was beautiful. Found out that there is zero tolerance from police for stepping over gates/fences to hike --- hundreds of dollars in fines. So hiking to get closer or different angles of the falls was not something that I tried.

After being an amateur photographer and test driving my car on the "seasonal road" along the East side of the lake, we went to the Watkins Glen Pier restaurant, sorry did not catch the actual name. Burger was good, but not as good as the bleu-cheese burger at the Wildflower; however, the view of the blue sky and blue water was nice.

Can also say that my car handled great on the seasonal and unploughed mountain/lake road. Learned how to use the auto-manual drive as we climbed the mountain road over ice and to not to go off the road into the marsh and creek! Thanks Pam for the advice as I drove the one lane seasonal road. We stayed out of the lake!

Comedy Club #2

The second in the series was another wonderful night. Again, three of us went out. The Chinese place near the Clemens Center remained the "food of choice". The comedy was improved over the first night; two of the three were good and one was very good. (Note that the one I would say was "very good" was not the headliner!) The next Club #3 is set for early/mid January. Can only hope it they continue to either stay the same or improve!