Waterloo Part 4

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Being back in the area where we lived for so long was quite enjoyable. There are all the friends we still have in the area as well as all the great places we used to visit often. One such place is Sonnenberg Gardens. It’s hard to say how many times we have been here. Located just a few blocks from downtown Canandaigua, it was less than an hour drive from either of the two homes we used to live in. It was one of our “go to” places to take out of town visitors. The mansion and gardens sit on 50 acres. It started as a 300 acre estate that was the summer home of a wealthy New York City couple. The mansion itself was built in the mid to late 1880’s and was surrounded by numerous formal gardens. As the family died off, the whole property was sold to the state in the 1930’s and a large VA hospital was constructed on much of the farmland associated with the mansion. After years of neglect a citizen’s movement began in the late 1960’s to purchase, preserve and restore the property. In 2006, the state park system purchased the property and runs the facility although the majority of the work is done by a large volunteer community. We have lots of vague memories of this place although the most memorable one is the view of the Italian Garden from the second floor of the mansion.

Overlooking the Italian Garden at Sonnenberg

We head into Canandaigua mid morning to visit Sonnenberg. We know there is a lot to see here and the grounds are rather extensive so we figure we will need the better part of the day to try to see it all. Even though we have an annual NY state park pass, this doesn’t provide free or even reduced price entrance. As seniors (60+), we get in for $14 per person. We start our tour wandering around the conservatory and greenhouse complex. This is a massive structure taking up 13,000 square feet. While it doesn’t look to be in great condition, it still serves as a functioning greenhouse.

Greenhouse Entrance

Conservatory

There are many different areas within the greenhouse dedicated to specific plants or ecosystems. There were some pretty orchids in bloom and a lot of palms in the conservatory. One wing of the greenhouse is actually being used to get various grasses and other plants started that will be used in other state park properties around New York.

Orchid

Ferns Inside Conservatory

Starter Plants

Next we head over to the Japanese Garden. It seems like wherever we go, I enjoy this style of garden. I’m not sure if it is the interesting architecture of a tea house or the types of plants or the simple tranquility of the space. We found there was a group of a dozen artists setup around this part of the property painting various scenes. Not sure if it was a class or just a group of friends that decided to come here today. There were several turtles basking in the sun on some rocks in the duck weed covered pond.

Approaching Japanese Gardens

Turtles Sunbathing

Tea House

Coming around the grounds in this direction, our next stop is at the old pool house. It looks like this had been a very beautiful building and large pool. Alas, this is one area that is going to require a whole lot of money to restore.

Go for a Swim?

The Italian Garden and Rose Garden are right next to one another. The latter didn’t have much going on yet. From the small size of the bushes, it looks like this area was recently replanted and will need some time to fill in. There were several workers out in the Italian Garden and this one is in much nicer shape. Since it is the most prominent one seen from the mansion, it likely gets the most attention.

The Mansion Appears

Roar

Italian Garden

We were approaching the mansion from the wrong side so we needed to come around to the front in order to enter. This is a very large, Victorian-style building that has 40 rooms. Usually this type of historic building requires a guided tour with most of the rooms roped off but surprisingly there was just one volunteer here to answer questions as guests freely wandered around the main two floors of the building.

Entering Mansion

Fancy Fireplace

White Peacock?

Balcony Overlooks Great Room

We asked about the furnishings and were told that the majority of the original furniture had been sold off 90 years earlier, but the historic society that helps to maintain the building has done a great job of getting pieces that are in line with the timeframe and style of the original house.

Suit of Armor

Pool Room

Upstairs were several very well appointed bedrooms. Victorian style is not really our thing but it was still pretty and quite luxurious. The one bedroom has a balcony overlooking the Italian Garden and even has a glimpse of Canandaigua Lake in the distance.

Bedroom

Another View of Italian Garden

Wonderful Lamp Shade

By now we were getting hungry but we had brought along some PB&J sandwiches and we sat at a table on the big covered porch and soaked in the views. After lunch we headed to the other side of the mansion to even more gardens. It looks like the place could use a few more volunteers to help clean up some of the garden beds. There is a large white trellis that produced a neat shadow pattern in the afternoon sun.

Water Fountain

Roses

Trellis

There is a castle-like building dubbed the Peacock House since it used to be part of a large aviary complex. The Carriage House is also quite distinctive.

Peacock House

Tulip Poplar in Bloom

Carriage House

From here, we head into the Rock Garden. There are all sorts of pathways with varied terrain so some are low while one path creates a nice arched stone bridge. One structure in this garden has a graceful curved stone staircase with an amazing vine snaking up the side of the stairs to a large trellis over a patio above.

Arched Bridge Over Walkway

Spiral Staircase - Notice Large Vine

We were starting to get tired. We had already been here for 3 hours but we had pretty much seen all there was to see. We worked our way back around the South Lawn past a couple of ponds to get back to the greenhouse area. There is a visitor center and wine tasting area that we have stopped at decades ago, but we skip it this time and head home. This is quite a remarkable place that hopefully continues to get funds to maintain and restore the buildings and grounds.

A Glimpse of Mansion Through Trees

Unusual Flower

I have a group of friends from my work days at Eastman Kodak that used to religiously go for lunch on Fridays. The seven of us had a particular sports bar we go to and we were such regular customers that when our favorite waitress saw us walk in, she would get two pitchers of beer and have them and mugs at our table by the time we all sat down. Those were the good days! As Kodak went thru many downsizings, the group got smaller or only met for special occasions. It’s been over 10 years since I left Kodak but we would still try to get together twice a year for lunch. Once I moved out of the area, I was only able to join via FaceTime or a Zoom meeting and get together virtually. One other from the group has moved out of the area but still has family here so he makes it back from time to time. Since I’m here for the whole season, we agreed to get together for lunch the next time everyone was available. Our old bar has moved and changed names so it wasn’t exactly like old times and we actually had to order our drinks, but it was still wonderful to catch up with friends and hear how everyone is doing.

Besides the doctors visits we had started earlier in our stay, we had gotten a recommendation from a geocaching friend that lives in the area of our campground for a dentist. We had last had our teeth cleaned and checked 2 years ago when we were in the Asheville NC area and it was time to deal with this aspect of normal life as well. The first visit for each of us was okay, but there is going to be some additional work that we will need to take care of. We figure it makes more sense to do some preventative work now when we have the time and are in a populated area than to try to deal with an emergency when we are in the middle of nowhere and the best doctor we can find is a veterinarian!

We are fortunate enough to be staying near a 5 mile long trail that follows along the Seneca River. In fact it is just a few hundred feet away from our rig. Of course the actual trail is on the south side of the river while our campground is on the north side so it isn’t as convenient as one might think. We headed out one day to do a short walk along the trail to see what it is like. The eastern end of the trail starts at the lock for the river in Waterloo. The western end is at Seneca Lake State Park. We are slightly closer to the Waterloo end of the trail so we drive over to the trailhead parking lot and start off on the trail.

It doesn’t take us long to realize the Seneca Cayuga Canal Trail is a very nice one. It’s relatively flat and much of it is shaded. The trail is a fine cinder surface and in excellent shape. Plus it is fairly wide so there is room to pass by others. We decide this will be an excellent trail for our bicycles and decide to head back a few days later. We could easily drive the bikes to the Waterloo trailhead and simply bike from there.  It it turns out that the road the campground is on - Route 5&20 from Geneva to Waterloo - has a rather wide shoulder. So even though the road can be busy at times we feel we can safely ride the 2.2 miles from camp to the trailhead.

Since the start of the trail is right next to the lock, we stop to watch a boat that is passing thru. I always find locks fun to watch. This one isn’t as big as the Soo Locks up in Michigan but it is still impressive to watch. This lock (#4) has a lift of 14.5 feet. Given the dimensions of the lock, it takes about 1.6 million gallons of water to fill up or empty out of during one upstream or downstream operation of the lock.

Entrance to Lock #4 Heading Downstream

Over a Million Gallons of Water Coming Out

Boat Heading Downstream After Gates Open

We enjoy the ride on the trail and only saw a few other people out taking advantage of it that first day. There are mile marker posts every half mile. Our campground is just across from mile marker 1.5 but there are lots of trees and bushes between the trail and the river, so we aren’t able to actually see camp. It is a rather peaceful trail since we aren’t really close to any roads or homes. There may be some occasional noise from boats or people kayaking but it is rather minimal. There is one stretch of the trail that has both sides planted with all sorts of flowers and ornamental grasses as well as all sorts of small statues or ornaments. It isn’t clear who does this but it is obviously well taken care of.

Starting Along Seneca Cayuga Canal Trail

Well Maintained Section of Trail

At about the 4.5 mile point of the trail is an old railroad bridge that leads back over the river at roughly the same place that Route 96A intersects. It looks like the trail may have previously either ended at this busy road or followed along the road but now road access is blocked off and there is a boardwalk ramp that drops down and passes underneath 96A. Once on the other side, the trail goes up to a railroad crossing and then leads down into Seneca Lake State Park. The trail goes along the opposite side of boat docks and a boat ramp before coming out into the road of the state park. There is then a trail along the north shore of Seneca Lake that leads to the Finger Lakes Welcome Center in about another two miles. We end up deciding that even though it would be much shorter to follow along 5 & 20 to get back to camp, retracing our path along the trail will be more scenic and peaceful. In the upcoming months, this trail will become one that we ride quite regularly usually getting in between 13 and 18 round trip depending how far we follow the trail into Geneva before turning around.

View of Seneca River from Bridge

At Railroad Crossing into Seneca Lake SP

A Quiet Day at the Beach

Kendig Creek Flows Into River

The Fourth of July weekend was upon us so there wasn’t a lack of things to see and do in the surrounding towns. Seneca Falls was holding a festival that sounded interesting so we looked at the schedule of events and decided that the 42nd Infantry Division Band might be worth seeing. They were scheduled to play mid afternoon on Saturday so we planned to get there a little beforehand and spend a couple hours checking out the booths before the concert.

Seneca Falls is known as the Birthplace of Women’s Rights. There are actually several places to check out that are now part of the National Park System, but things are rather hectic in town with the festival crowd so we will be back on a less busy day to see these. It turns out there aren’t all that many vendors at this festival so it doesn’t take us too long to check them out. The most interesting part of the festival - at least to Chris - were the goats. There were a couple of large pens setup in a grassy section at one corner of the festival. One pen held a large camel while the other held over a dozen goats and an alpaca. There was a booth setup nearby that was selling packs of baby carrots and other treats for the animals. This seemed to be a very popular spot with the kids. It turns out these goats weren’t particularly fond of carrots but the camel enjoyed them.

Camel Hoping for Carrots

Alpaca and Goats

Colorful Goats

We still had some time to kill before the band was to play so we checked out a few more spots along the river in Seneca Falls. It is a pretty setting and there were several boats that were docked right next to the festivities. This town is purportedly the inspiration for Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” and the fictional town of Bedford Falls. One road and the bridge that crosses the river is dubbed “George Bailey Lane”. The town definitely plays up the connection to its advantage. There are lots of neat old buildings that are along the river. Many of them being old mills from back in the day.

It's A Wonderful Life Bridge

View from Bridge

Beautiful Old Mill

The band was to start in 30 minutes so we head back over to the concert area to stake out a spot. This is a rather large ensemble with close to three dozen members. There was a wide range of instruments and the members were all getting situated for a sound check. This was somewhat fascinating to watch. Most bands we would listen to are rather casually dressed and pretty informal. The members of this band were all in uniform with nicely polished shoes and quite formal. There seemed to be several band directors that were out in the audience as various bits of songs were performed in order to ensure proper sound levels. It was a rather formal and regimented band. I probably should have expected this but hadn’t even thought about it until we saw them in action. They had a wide range of songs from big band style to pop and rock hits. We were really looking forward to hearing them play.

Unfortunately Mother Nature had other plans. With 15 minutes before showtime, we saw the skies getting very dark to the west and even heard distant thunder. The band members were milling about and getting some last minute snacks from the nearby food truck. We were talking with one of them and he mentioned that if a thunderstorm were to come in, they would stop and unplug all their electronics. We checked our weather app and saw it was predicting the storm to hit our location at the exact time they were scheduled to play. A look at the live radar confirmed that this wasn’t going to be just a light, passing shower. Realizing we had a 5 minute walk back to the car, we decided that this part of our plan wasn’t meant to be and headed out. The storm was intense but we got back home safely.

Back in April, I had gotten a text from a friend and former coworker that lives in California. She wondered where we would in July. It turned out she was putting together plans for a road trip from Washington DC back to the LA area to move her daughter back for college. We told her our plans and it looked to be very close to her intended route. Over the next couple months, we formulated a plan to meet with her along the way. We suggested a few meeting locations and settled on Belhurst Castle in Geneva. Over the years in Western NY, we had driven by this place numerous times but never took the opportunity to see it up close. This was the perfect excuse to meet my friend and see the castle. Since it wasn’t a very long drive from camp, we just waited for a text to better coordinate our arrival to match hers.

We got there 10 minutes before she pulled in and walked around a bit to check things out. The castle was built in the late 1880’s and is rather stunning with an excellent view of Seneca Lake about 50 feet below the grounds. When Bev and her daughter arrived, we walked around the grounds on this beautiful afternoon.

Belhurst Castle

Lake View from Castle Grounds

Other Side of Belhurst Castle

We wanted to check out the inside of the castle but as we came in through one door, a guy greeted us and asked if we were guests of the hotel. The castle does have numerous rooms available for spending the night and a couple restaurants as well. We told him we just wanted to see in the main room of the castle. His comment was only paying guests are permitted but he would look the other way. Nice of him to let riff-raff like us in! We didn’t spend a lot of time wandering around since we felt a little like unwanted guests but it is a rather fancy place with lots of beautiful woodwork, a suit of armor and a big grandfather clock.

Fireplace Inside Castle

Large Grandfather Clock

We had less than an hour to catch up. We talked a lot about the old days at Kodak. Bev is retired now too but still keeps in touch with some of the same people we both know. It was great to see Bev again and finally meet her daughter that I had heard so much about over the years but they were on a mission to fit in as much as they could on their 3 week cross country road trip.

Selfie at Castle

Just down the road from Belhurst is Fox Run Winery. They have several wines we used to get regularly so we decide to head there one day for a wine tasting. It’s located in a big barn structure with a huge deck overlooking the lake. It was a rather hot day so we sat inside for our tasting. They offer tours of the vineyards but they were cancelled because of the excessive heat warnings. We enjoyed our tasting and picked up a bottle of one of our favorites to go.

Metal Artwork at Fox Run Winery

Tasting Building

The Saturday after the 4th was a geocaching event in Sodus right along Lake Ontario. We suspected there would be a few people we know as well as some new faces. Of course since we have been gone from the area for 7 years, we will likely be the new faces to many of the other attendees. We sat around and chatted for quite some time before we all disbanded. We had brought a picnic lunch so we sat and enjoyed the views and the cooler temperatures by the lake. We did a short walk past the beach and out onto the 1100 foot long pier to a lighthouse at the end that marks the entrance to Sodus Bay. We hadn’t made it to this section of Sodus back when we hiked nearby Chimney Bluffs State Park a few weeks ago but it was nice to get back for another look.

Looking Back Towards Sodus Bay from Pier

Beach at Sodus Point

Heading Out Pier

Sailboat Heads into Bay

We did a slight detour on the way back to camp in the town of Newark. There were several geocaches on the grounds of the old Newark State School. From the descriptions of the caches, the grounds here sounded to be rather unique. The facility sits on about 90 acres of land just to the southeast of town and consists of a several  dozen buildings. We start near the southern end of the complex next to a huge old brick building. This one was clearly one of the buildings that is no longer maintained or in use. As we wander around, there are lots of buildings that still are being used today as either educational facilities or healthcare.

Old Building at Newark State School

In Search of Feeble-Minded Women

It was kind of neat to walk around with the mix of open and boarded up buildings. Besides finding the geocaches hidden around the area, another goal was to see if we could find any remnants of signage from the past name this facility had. Back in 1885, it was known as the State Custodial Asylum for Feeble-Minded Women. Since it only had that name until 1919, it was highly unlikely we would spot any sign. Maybe that’s why Chris was willing to agree to pose beneath a sign if we could find it! There were also some caches in the nearby cemetery that was associated with the state school over the years. In all, it was a rather fascinating place to explore and image what it looked like 130 years ago.

A Building Still in Use

Our stay at Seneca River RV Park has been going okay. The sites and amenities aren’t the best but it is quiet. If the place was full, it might be less desirable given how close the adjacent spots are but of the 58 campsites, the largest number of rigs here in our 2 months so far is 12 or 13. There are just 4 of us here for the season. The others seem to come for a couple days or maybe a week before moving on. One weekend we had several rigs pull in and one even setup a tent. They were a younger crowd than we were accustomed to and they all seemed to have racing style bicycles. Turns out there was a triathlon in Geneva this weekend and these must have been out of town participants. We investigated what route was being used and decided to take our favorite canal trail into the state park to watch some of the race. We had missed the swimming and most of the bicycling stages but did get to see some of the runners as they made their way along the course next to the lake.

Turn-around Point of Running Section of Marathon