Friday, January 22, 2010

Cooperstown, New York Ruins
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

Luckless and I met up at ten thirty a.m. at her house and we headed to Portlandville. There is a geocache hidden at a boating access area on Goodyear Lake there. We found that one without any trouble. Then we went to find another one, I think it was at a fishing access area. Luckless pretty much told me how to get there. That involved quite a trek in the woods with some bushwhacking. After that we drove to Cooperstown to try to find a geocache hidden near one of the museums. We were not successful in finding that one, but we did find these ruins which are of a private bridge over Glimmerglen Stream. The bridge was part of the

Glimmerglen Estate which was torn down in the sixties.

Down by the lake edge there were two interesting looking buildings. They were built by the New York State Historical Association and are examples of cabins belonging to early trappers or native indians.

We talked a bit about going into the New York Historical Association which seemed to be the only building in the whole museum complex that was open. I was starting to fade a bit, so I suggested going out for lunch.

The place we chose for lunch turned out to have a very interesting history. Originally, it was a meat storage building, where people rented freezer space to keep their meat in. That was before most people had their own freezers at home. The long narrow one story building in the picture is

Jackie's Restaurant in Milford. The menu says its where the locals hang out, and I think thats true.

We headed back to Oneonta and I dropped Luckless off. I decided to stop on River Street and take a couple pictures of a vacant mom and pop type store. I was in it a few times before it closed down. I am not sure how many years it has been closed, but I am guessing maybe eight.

It was a good day, but somewhat tiring. I laid down about three thirty and slept for a couple of hours.

January 21, 2010 Adventure

Some people might find this too boring to be called an adventure.

My friend Connie and I met up in Oneonta to take a walk since it was such a gorgeous winter day, no snow and the sun was shining and the sky was a gorgeous blue. We walked around Wilber Park for about a half an hour. Then we decided to check out the ARTS COUNCIL, a gallery that is in the old Wilber Mansion. The art displayed today did not appeal a lot to either one of us, but I decided to take some pictures of the architecture, which is very interesting because it is very beautiful. The staircase is especially beautiful. There is also a mural on an outbuilding behind the mansion.

After that we decided to to to the Lettis Auction House. This was my second visit. I put in a prebid on a cobalt blue glass boot, it stands about three inches high and would be a nice addition to my collection. I was allowed to take pictures of the facade of the inside of the old post office. I am not sure where it was before it was in this building. I emailed the owner of the auction house and asked if he has any history or facts about it. The reddish brown building is the auction house. The other building is the Wilber Mansion.

Connie suggested we go to a salvage company that she has been to. She wanted to look at old sinks, since she wants to purchase one. The walkway to the building that has the sinks was a sheet of ice, so we decided to try again in the spring.

All in all it was a great day. I was really glad that I had supper in the crockpot so that I did not have to cook tonight.

Brookfield, New York Adventure: November 2, 2009

On November 2, 2009, my friend Carol wanted to go to a tack shop in Brookfield . I had never been to that area so it was a perfect chance for me to take my camera along and get some pictures of someplace new and different. When I checked geocaching.com I found that there were geocaches hidden in that area, so I printed out the information.

We left mid morning and headed towards Brookfield. Carol had been there before, but she forgot the exact directions. Lndmarks along the way helped a great deal. We stopped at what appeared to be a highway department garage to make sure we were on the right track. While Carol went in to ask, I turned my GPS on and found out that we were within a couple hundred feet of one of the caches: BROOKFIELD STEEL ANGEL. We decided not to look for it just yet, since we would be coming back that same way.

We headed on to the Tack Shop, but found it closed when we arrived. I turned my GPS on again and we headed towards the cache. We found ourselves driving around in the Beaver Creek State Forest. Some of the roads were rather questionable (narrow, winding, lots of potholes, etc) so we went slowly. We found the Quaker Hill Cemetery and were successful in locating the cache hidden there.

Then we headed towards the Little Cross Cemetery to find the one hidden there. Again we were on questionable dirt roads heading out into what my Australian friend would refer to as "the bush". This cemetery was not visible from the road, but we parked in a spot that seemed to be close to the coordinates. A walk through the woods and across a neat bridge took us to the cemetery and we found the geocache.

While we were exploring the Little Cross Cemetery I asked Carol if she tells her grown sons about the places she goes, and she said "no, they would think I am nuts".

By this time, it was well after noon and we were getting hungry, so we headed back to the town of Brookfield. We were happy to see a sign pointing to a DINER, but when we got there, we found that it was closed on Mondays. We decided to head back towards New Berlin where there would be a choice of eating places. But first, we had to stop and look for the Steel Angel. Apparently, its hidden in or on a huge old plow that is standing outside of the highway department, but we were not able to find it. On the way to New Berlin, we spotted another old cemetery and we stopped for a minute or two to check it out.

We had a late lunch at the New Berlin Diner which had recently reopened. On the way back to Carol's house, we noticed an old schoolhouse in the town of Columbus and we stopped to take a couple of pictures. The sign said that arrangements can be made to go inside by calling a certain number. I hope to do that during another exploration/adventure.

From top to bottom, the pictures are me on the bridge leading to Little Cross Cemetery, a view of Little Cross Cemetery, the diner in Brookfield and the Columbus Quarter Schoolhouse.

Richfield Springs and Van Hornesville, New York Day Trip October 19,2009

Clock in Richfield Springs, NY Park
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

On this date, my friend Carol (Coopercar on geocaching.com) met in Oneonta around eleven a.m. We had a quick lunch at Taco Bell and then headed out for town of Richfield Springs, New York. It was a gorgeous fall day, warm and sunny and we just wanted to be out and about and in the fresh air. Geocaching in Richfield Springs offered us a perfect opportunity to do that.

Upon arriving in Richfield Springs, we started looking for a geocache. We drove in a huge circle, ending up back on Main Street. We noticed an interesting shopping center which had a dollar store. Carol wanted to pick up something at the supermarket, so I told her I would go into the dollar store, look around a bit and ask directions to the park where the cache was hid. I purchased a few items and asked the cashier and it turned out we were very close to the road leading to John D. Cary Park. There is a good parking area and after parking we set out. The cache was not far away and involved a short downhill walk in the woods before Carol found it. It was a large, well stocked cache.

Then we located the other park where a cache was hidden, it is right on Main Street. The clock in the picture is at this park. Click on that picture to go my flickr page for the clock, where there is a little bit of information. The park is aptly named Spring Park because a natural mineral spring is located there. I never knew about this spring. We walked around the park a bit and then started looking for the cache. This one was a micro, and micros are small and usually a bit harder to find. Carol found it in the same spot I had already put my hand, she just reached in deeper. When we sat down on a bench to sign the log, we noticed a guy watching us. He came over and offered to take our picture, and at first I said OK, but then I had a funny feeling and I pretended the batteries in the camera were dead. I just had the feeling he might take off with my camera. While not an expensive camera, its all I have and I did not want to take any chances. I took some pictures of the park, which are up above.

Carol noticed a consignment shop across the street from the park (she LOVES consignment shops) but it was closed. We decided to head for Van Hornesville to look for the Amish area. Carol had been to it before, when she had a harness repaired by an Amish man who has a shop there. On the way we stopped and found another geocache, this time just outside of a cemetery.

In the Van Hornesville area, just off of Route 20, we noticed some dining room table chairs for sale and Carol wanted to stop to look at them. I saw the old washing machine at the same location and took a picture. Then I noticed the old library across the street. Unfortunately, my picture does not show the year that was on the building.

Carol was able to tell me where to turn on Route 20 to get to the repair shop. We found it, but it was closed and a sign gave a new address. The picture way up at the top shows the sign for the original repair shop (before it was moved). Unfortunately, it was starting to get dark, so we decided to put up off exploring the Amish area until another time. We headed back to Oneonta where Carol had left her car. We agreed to return to the Amish area sometime soon and do some more exploring.

Unfortunately, as of today, January 18, 2010 we have not been able to work out a day to do that and I think we may have to wait until spring.

Mini-Adventure November 7, 2009

The day was so nice, and I noticed a new cache listed hidden in Barbour Brook State Forest near Masonville, New York. I called Luckless and asked her if she was free, and it turned out that she was. I was getting ready to leave my house when I got called into work for a four p.m. shift. I decided that there was enough time to get to Masonville, find the cache and return to Oneonta in time to start that shift. I grabbed an extra set of clothing (just in case) and put that in my car, too.

We found the road to the cache. Since it was steep and looked like it was getting narrower, I parked my van and we started to walk up to it. It was only supposed to be .2 of a mile, but we never seemed to be getting any closer....perhaps the road was twisting and turning just enough so that we really weren't. After a few minutes we realized the road was probably OK and we walked back to my van and got in and proceeded up. There was a small parking area near where our GPSs' told us to go. I parked and we grabbed our gear and headed into the woods. Just before entering, another group of geocachers arrived. We talked for a minute, but we did not enter the woods together.

Getting to this cache site involved a LOT of bushwhacking, since we never found the trail that was mentioned in the cache information page. We finally got to the area of the cache and Luckless found it right away. She backed off and let me find it on my own. It was a large cache, AND we were first to find!!! We signed the log and started back to my car. It was a good thing that Luckless has a good sense of direction, because I would not have known which direction to head. The other group of geocachers were heading towards the cache when we got back to the road.

As we went through Masonville again on the way back to I-88, I noticed a very interesting appearing general store right at the four corners. Unfortunately, we didn't really have time to stop and check it out. I got back to Oneonta in time to pick up a take out meal from a chinese restaurant to take to work and I arrived at exactly four p.m. for my shift.

Sharon Springs, NY Day Trip October 16, 2009

Adler Hotel, Sharon Springs, NY
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

My friend Terry wanted to do one more day trip before cold weather, so we chose Friday October 16th. She told me to decide where to go and what to do. She had never been to Sharon Springs, New York, but I had been several times and I still love it there, so I chose Sharon Springs.

We left early in the morning and headed out. Our first stop was at Glimmerglass State Park, just north of Otsego Lake. Terry had never seen the covered bridge there. Our second stop was at TeePee Pete's a souvenier store shaped like a huge TeePee along Route 20 near Cherry Valley.

Our third stop was just before Sharon Springs. I had read about the former Commodore Cabins which closed in the l960's. The small separate units are now used as storage spaces that are rented out. Talk about creativity and practicality! We drove in and around. The cabins have been maintained well and appear to be in top notch condition. The large building in front was originally used as the motel office, restaurant and residence. It is located at 428 Highway Route 20.SInce we were approaching Sharon Springs from a different direction (avoiding I-88) I got a little bit lost, but we only wasted about ten minutes.

We arrived in Sharon Springs. I parked in front of the old Imperial Bathhouse and we set out on foot. We looked around the Imperial and went to the spring next door before heading to the Adler Hotel. On previous visits, there had not been POSTED or NO TRESPASSING SIGNS, but they were there this day, along with orange snow type fencing across the entrances to the huge front porch. So we avoided the building itself, walking around to the back. This was the first time I had seen the Adler's swimming pool. It seemed rather small for a hotel this large. We quickly continued to walk around the hotel, stopping to snap a few pictures, and then got off of the property. If you click on the picture of the Adler Hotel and Spa up above, you can see a few more pictures and a bit more information on my flickr.com page.

We walked and drove around Sharon Springs, generally just looking and reading historical signs. We had lunch at THE BLACK CAT and it was very good. There is another shop in Sharon Springs that is quite interesting: COBBLER and CO. It is in the building that was once used for shoe repair, and the old sign and some of the old equipment is displayed in the front room.

After lunch we drove around Sharon Springs a bit more. We stopped to take a picture of a house (shown way up at the top) which I was able to go into a couple of years. It had just been purchased and the owners allowed my sister, my Dad and I to go in and look around. That particular building had been used as a rooming or boarding house. The new owners said their plans were to fix it up and turn it into a Bed and Breakfast.

Then we decided to head towards Van Hornesville along Route 20. We stopped a couple of places along the way and found geocaches.

The reason we wanted to go to Van Hornsville was to drive through the Amish area, but we were not successful in finding it. The closest we came to it was seeing a sign with an Amish buggy on it. We did see something very interesting though on a back road in Van Hornesville and that was the limekiln in the picture up above. I cannot find any information about it online.

On the way home, in Springfield Center we went into a gift shop and a very interesting antique shop in Springfield Center. Our last stop of the day was for supper in Oneonta.

October 30, 2009 Visit to Local Monastery

Holy Myrrhbearers Monastery, Otego, NY
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

A couple of weeks earlier, I was driving down Main Street in Otego and saw a sign for Holy Myrrhbearers Monastery. I turned down the side road, thinking maybe I could locate it, but I could not find it that day. At home later on, I did a mapquest and got an exact address for it.

I asked my friend Linda, who is Roman Catholic if she would be interested in checking it out and she was. So, on October 30th, we set out early in the day. With the help of mapquest, it was easy to find.

We were met at the door and welcomed in. The nun who let us in handed us over to Sister Michaela (pictured to the left) who gave us a tour and visited with us and answered all of our questions. Sister Michaela was an Episcopal nun for a long time before she became an orthodox nun. We attended a short prayer ceremony at noon, just before the residents were going to have their lunch. Linda and I were not the only "civilians" there, there were two young girls who I think were staying in the retreat house.

The outside of the monastery is rather plain, but the inside is very beautiful as you will see from the attached pictures. They rent rooms out in their retreat building and raise farm animals and vegetables. The monastery is very small, I think there are six nuns living there.

After leaving the monastery, we headed to Bainbridge where we went to The Frogpond, a huge fruit and vegetable stand, and we also had a buffet lunch at a restaurant there.