Winter at Wilber Lake Adventure

Sign for Wilber Lake (near Laurens, NY) a photo by JuneNY on Flickr.

Luckless and I set out this morning for some geocaching. We met up in Oneonta and found one that is hidden in the parking lot of a local store. Then, with Luckless at the wheel, we headed out to Wilber Lake.

Wilber Lake is so much more than a fishing access area. It is an old road that crosses over Wilber Lake. Cars have not used this road for years, but the road signs are still there. The old road makes a wonderful trail for hikers. It is a beautiful wooded area. So, its a bit like urban exploring when you walk down the road.

We parked at one end of the lake and quickly found a newly hidden geocache. I should say that Luckless found it, because I chickened out at the idea of climbing down the snowy hill. It was a large one, and we both signed the log and Luckless took a travel bug that wants to go to Washington state. From this vantage point, there is a beautiful view of Wilber Lake. This gnarled tree with many trunks can be seen at this lookout point.




After that we drove around and located the other entrance to Wilber Lake. We parked and went beyond the ROAD CLOSED BARRIER, and started walking. I told Luckless that last fall I saw a strange structure on the left hand side, and we watched for it. She spotted it, and we climbed over a ditch and up a bit to look at it. Unfortunately, it has deteriorated a lot with time and the weather. Here is a picture of what we saw today:

We decided to hide a small geocache near the mystery structure. We did that, and then continued walking the trail towards the lake. We quit when we came to a small creek or ditch that was a bit too wide to jump. We headed back into Oneonta.

We had lunch at the Corfu Diner. I tried the THAI special. Thai Chicken in garlic/black pepper sauce with rice and vegetables.
$7.75 included soup and a soft drink. It was very good. Luckless is not as adventurous with food as I am. She had a ham and cheese croissant with fries, it looked very tasty.

Luckless dropped me off and I headed home. At the intersection of Route 7 and Oneida Street, I noticed this ahead of me:

POSTSCRIPT: the new geocache was published within a few hours of submission. A couple of hours later several cachers got together and went out to find it in the dark. Their stories are a "comedy of errors" which can be read here: http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=aa6e6b58-eef2-4b99-9dcb-08b72501b18b