BOOK VILLAGE ADVENTURE

Terry and I took advantage of the warm fall day to go to Hobart, New York. I had read about it being called a BOOK VILLAGE because of the number of bookstores they have, and wanted to visit.

We met up in Oneonta around 9:45 a.m. and headed towards Stamford. Once in Stamford, we stopped at the old Rexmere Hotel and went inside for a few minutes to see the exhibits regarding the old hotel. Then we found a geocache and then we drove around a bit and I pointed out some of the old hotels I have seen during past visits.

Then it was on to Hobart, about three miles down Route 10. We arrived shortly at Hobart's Main Street and were struck by how quaint and interesting it was. Our first stop was at one of the bookstores. I purchased a paperback copy of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. I read it when I was a teen and want to read it again. Then we visited another bookshop right across the street. By this time it was getting close to noon so we went to THE COFFEE CUP.

The Coffee Cup: diner in Hobart, NY
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

We had a great lunch, and we enjoyed the memorabilia on the walls and shelves.
I don't recall Twinkies with this type of frosting, but Terry remembers them. Maybe they were only available a short time, or in certain areas.
After lunch (I had a reuben and Terry had her usual Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich) we went to more bookstores. Terry found a book for her friend in the nursing home. By then it was close to one p.m., the time I had agreed to phone the woman who had agreed to open the Historical Society for us. I called her and we met up with her. Here is a picture of the Historical Society. The building used to be a Masonic Temple.
We were taken upstairs to see the room where the masons used to meet. You could just picture the "grand poobah" sitting on that throne at the head of the room!


After that, we drove around Hobart a bit, before heading back to Oneonta. Terry wanted to stop at the Davenport Garden Center to purchase a butternut squash so we did that.


Later that day, Terry and I met up at her place in Otego and went to a ham dinner at a church in Unadilla. Yummy!

Apple Adventure

Middlefield Orchard: Middlefield, NY
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

It was a gorgeous INDIAN SUMMER DAY, and five of us set out for a STAFF FUN DAY.

First stop: Middlefield Orchard in Middlefield, New York. This was my first time ever to go apple picking and it was delightful. The apple farm is beautiful. We parked and met up with the owner in the shop where he sells apples and other fruits and vegetables. He offered us samples of "Honeycrisp" apples............he cut them in half with a machete!

Then we were off to pick our apples. The trees were all small and we were able to choose the ones we wanted. Then we picked some raspberries in an adjacent field.

After leaving there, we headed over to Fly Creek Cider Mill in Fly Creek, New York.
We sampled many of their items before having lunch at their outside stand.

Mary suggested we all go to her club (Otsego Sailing Club) and relax a bit and maybe walk over to Brookwood Gardens. So that is what we did. I put my feet in the water and it was so refreshing.

We all walked over to Brookwood Gardens. They were setting up for a wedding which must be tomorrow. I thought that since it is so late in the season, that the flowers would be gone, but there are still a lot of beautiful flowers to see and take pictures of.

One last stop before heading back to Oneonta: Stewarts in Cooperstown. We stopped there and had ice cream. Then we split up, so Mary and carol could go pick up an item for an upcomng chinese auction, and Geneen, Kim and I headed back to Oneonta. We stopped at a roadside stand in Milford and Kim purchased a couple of pumpkins for her kids.

Reservoir Adventure

We are having some glorious pre-fall weather and Connie and I wanted to spend some
time outside this afternoon. Leslie had mentioned in an email that there was a new geocache hidden at "the reservoir" in the Laurens/Mt. Vision area. At first I did not know what she was referring to, but I realized I have been there before, but that I did not know it was a reservoir. I just knew it as Wilber Lake, a place I geocached at a couple of times in the past.

Soooooooooo, after work, I met up with Connie in the parking lot at the corner of Winnie Hill Road and Chestnut Street. Connie drove and we ended up at the parking area on the Airport Road side of the lake.

A minute or two into our hike we noticed this interesting structure:
We went into the woods and checked it out. We do not have any idea who built it or what it is for. It appears that a log was hung up in the middle to be used as a place to sit.

We continued walking until we got to the lake. I asked Connie if she wanted to find a geocache and she said OK. So we followed the trail to the left and then went into the woods. It was fairly easy to find. Connie and I both signed the log and I took a piece of a WW2 bullet that the owner or one of the previous finders left. COOL!

Then we went back to the main trail and crossed the bridge to the other side of the lake. We saw a tiny snake on the path, Connie said she thought it might be a baby rattlesnake.

The neat thing about this trail is that it used to be a road, and the signs are still up. Here is a picture of one of the signs.

We reluctantly headed back to Connie's van. We met up with a college student who was taking some pictures for an assignment and we told him about the "mystery structure". It was a great afternoon! What a treasure a nice day is!

OLD PLANES and GARLIC Adventure

My friend Carol M. and I went to the Old Plane Fly-In at the Cooperstown-Westville Airport today for the OLD PLANE FLY-IN. The last time we went, it was cancelled due to the weather being to windy, but we lucked out today as the weather was beautiful. We really enjoyed seeing the planes fly in and out. Not all of them were old though, many were more contemporary. Apparently, the pilots fly in for breakfast (they were serving pancakces) and they they fly out. While walking around looking at the planes "parked" along the runway, we saw three very old cars, here is a picture of one of them:
Here is a picture of one of the many planes we saw, I think this might be one of the old planes:

After we left the airport, we went to the Susquehanna Valley Garlic Festival at Wood Bull Antiques in Milford. There were booths set up by various vendors and they offered products and food items to eat on the spot.

Garlic Festival at Wood Bull Antiques in Milford, New York
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

I had pasta with garlic and tomatoes at one spot. It was really good. We sampled garlic and garlic products.
Carol went inside the huge barn where Wood Bull has most of their antiques. I had never walked around the outside, so I took that opportunity today.
I was surprised at how many items they have bedind and to the side of the barn.

I had geocaching information with me, but Carol was having a hard time with the sun, so we skipped it today. Back in Oneonta, we stopped at BROOKS so I could purchase some BBQ sauce, the library and at FSA.

It was a great day!

AFTON MUSEUM ADVENTURE on 9/11/10

AFTON MUSEUM: Afton, New York
Originally uploaded by JuneNY

It was a gorgeous September day and my friend Terry and I set out for Afton, New York. Terry loves to go to museums and historical societies and they agreed to open the museum up for us today, even though normally they are closed on Saturdays. We arrived a few minutes before eleven a.m. (the agreed upon time) and went inside. Nobody seemed to be around, so we signed the guest book and started looking around. A few minutes later, Charles (an elderly man) showed up. He walked through the rest of the museum with us and explained several items and answered questions. The house is full of amazing stuff. You can see pictures I took here. http://www.flickr.com/photos/juneny/sets/72157624934799554/ We also spent some time in the bar behind the museum, which holds a lot of farm and household equipment, some dairy farm items and some Mormon artifacts. After we left the museum, I took a picture of a small abandoned laundromat right next door to the museum.

Then we drove a few miles towards Ninevah to see the homestead of a man (Josiah Stowell)who housed and employed Joseph Smith (of Mormon fame). Here is a picture of the homestead:


After that it was back to Afton where we had lunch at the Afton Grill and Bakery, a very nice small restaurant on Main Street.
The food and service were really good! Then we located a private residence across from the Afton fair grounds that used to be a schoolhouse.
Then we headed down Route 7 to Bainbridge, where we went to the FROGPOND. With the pumpkins and the plants, it is very colorful there now. Here is a picture.
I spent eleven dollars and got bananas, potatoes, onions, carrots, plums, pears, a tomato, grapes and a couple of apples.

Then we did some geocaching, finding a geocache behind the Scout Cabin in Bainbridge.
On the way to Wells Bridge for more geocaching, I noticed some old cars parked in front of a shop and we stopped to take pictures.
We were successful in Wells Bridge, finding the geocache hidden in the middle of the old foot bridge. Its a good thing I had a tetanus shot in July, because I scraped my leg up on the rusty bridge. While there, I checked on my geocache hidden on the Route 7 side of the bridge. It was intact and in good shape.

I dropped Terry off at her apartment in Otego and returned home. I recorded my two geocache finds, downloaded pictures to flickr.com and started this blog!

From Norwich to Earlville and In Between Adventure

Carol K. asked me to go to her daughter in laws art supply shop in Norwich for a GRAND RE-OPENING today.
We met up in New Berlin and drove to Norwich. We arrived a bit early and looked around THE ARTIST'S PALETTE. It is a great store and it is also an art gallery. Here is a picture of Jill Kraft (Carol's daughter in law) in front of her store.

A guy dressed like BIG FOOT (a guy named Jesse) arrived and he tried to attract visitors by standing in the road with a sign.
They had free hot dogs and cookies and soda. I purchased a turquoise bracelet and a book.

When we were finished at the art gallery/store, Carol drove me around Norwich, showing me some points of interest such as train depots, parks, etc. We had a really nice time at a park along a river, we even put our feet in the icy water. Then Carol drove me around Norwich a bit more, showing me two old train depots, a cute little
(old) diner and a ghost sign on a huge building near one of the depots.

Carol wanted to show me a house she and her family used to live in, in the hamlet of
Preston. It is a gorgeous area and we found the house and looked around a little bit. Preston does not really have much to offer, they do not have a post office.

After that, we headed towards Earlville, where we planed to have a roast pork dinner at the fire hall. On the way we stopped in Sherburne, to look for a geocache. We were not successful, and decided to take a slight detour to go to Smyrna to look for a geocache. After a quick stop to pick up some bottles of water, we headed to Smyrna. Once in Smyrna, we found the geocache, went to a yard sale and then explored the Main Street area a bit. We found a really neat and very old Mom and Pop type store. Here is a picture.


We arrived in Earlville around 4:30 p.m. and had the pork dinner at the firehall. It was very good. Then Carol drove me back to New Berlin, where I had left my car.
We got held up a bit because of a parade that was setting up to go down the main street in New Berlin.

All in all, it turned out to be a great day!

Franklin and Walton Adventure

Connie and I took a day trip to Walton today, stopping in Franklin along the way. The main purpose of the trip was to go to Tony's Shoe Store in Walton. Connie had heard about Tony's from her handyman. Tony is known for his adjustments to shoes to make them fit better.

We met up at 8:40 at Home Depot. We headed towards Walton. We stopped at the BEEHIVE (restaurant) in Franklin. We bought muffins and then continued on our drive. We arrived at Tony's Shoe Store about 9:40 a.m.

I was lucky enough to get a parking spot directly across the street. Connie wanted to take a few minutes to have a snack, so I took my shoes and went in. I met Frank (the owner of this 98 year old shoe store) and told him about my shoe issues. He agreed to stretch the two pairs of shoes I had. He brought out some New Balance shoes in my size and I tried them on. I purchased two pair, one black and one white.

By this time, Connie had joined us. I was finished, so I took off to look around Walton while she finished up her business with Frank. I just did some general exploring. I found a couple of abandoned buildings, took a picture of an interesting church and also found a huge beautiful mansion called THE MUSIC HOUSE. I took a couple pictures of historical signs before heading back to TONY's. I was lucky enough to get the same parking spot directly across the street and Connie walked out of the shoe store just as I pulled up.

We put her bags in my car and I suggested we go up to the diner for lunch. Papa's Diner is a classic old time diner complete with all the shiny metal.
We ordered lunch and took it to a rest area along a river a couple of miles away.

After lunch, we went into four antique shops. I made a couple of small purchases at Craftiques, and here is a picture of the owner of that delightful small shop:
and then I went back to Tony's to pick up the shoes he was stretching for me. Then we went to a nearby park where a geocache was hidden. We found the geocache and enjoyed our walk in the woods.

Then it was time to head home. Once again we stopped in Franklin for a few minutes break. It was a great day!