Watkins Glen

In the interest of regaining a sense of sanity and mental balance after finishing the Quals yesterday, I took half the day off today to get some fresh air and enjoy the beautiful spring weather we're getting here. A friend and I headed over to Watkins Glen, which is a quaint "village" at the south end of Seneca Lake, which (in turn) is another of the finger lakes that is about 50 miles long (about half an hour away from Ithaca). Apparently the counties in NY state are divided into townships which contain towns, villages (which still have a mayor), and hamlets (in order of decreasing size). Cute.

Anyhow, I got a good taste of some beautiful rolling countryside on the drive over there. This part of the finger lakes region is mostly a combination of wooded and open space, divided by wandering "cricks" and roads that meander a little. Nothing dramatic; just nice. There were several hamlets along the way, which tend to have an abundance of nice victorian houses.

So Watkins Glen is a village, but taking off from one side is Watkins Glen State Park, which incorporates another of the well-known gorges of the region. I'll let the pictures do the talking from here...

One of the higher waterfalls of this walk (left)

Typical gorge trail scenery (right)

More gorge bottom scenery.

Note the trail on the right-hand side of the gorge (right)

This is the view from the bridge that is barely visible in the first (upper left) image in this post. There are three level of trail visible! (left)

The trail winds under several waterfalls. Here is one of the most interesting ones, taken from the entrance to a short (man-made) cave that connects to the next level up of the gorge (right)