Original Plan for the next stop was to move a short distance to Burlington, Vermont - do laundry, clean up some gear, etc... and from there visit Fort Ticonderoga (about an hour away) - we wanted to stay in a campground with full hook-ups and hopefully some TV reception (that possibility improves near bigger cities).
Burlington, being on Lake Champlain, we learned meant that we would end up having to take a ferry to get over to the New York side at that point so we re-figured. Instead we headed south towards Ticonderoga crossing Lake Champlain at that point on a bridge near Crown Point and headed to Ticonderoga, New York with the trailer in tow.
Lake Champlain Bridge |
Champlain Memorial and Lighthouse |
Weather was beautiful - the drive through the Vermont countryside was really nice getting over to Ticonderoga and we spent a few hours there - lunch in a downtown café called Burleigh's that was a treat and then a couple hours at the fort. I'd been reading the book "1776" so many of the areas we've toured have historical significance mentioned in the book....especially Fort Ticonderoga.
Fort Ticonderoga |
Fort Ticonderoga |
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So, being already on the New York side of the big lake, we headed on up to Plattsburgh N.Y. and parked in an RV resort there. We had full hook ups AND several TV channels. When the TV finished searching for channels the UGA -vs- Tennessee game was on - PERFECT!
30 Sept - Maintenance Day
This was a down/maintenance day where we got laundry done, washed the truck and camper and did some replenishing of supplies in preparation for our next move. We did manage to take time late in the day to drive around Plattsburgh to just look around the town. They have a beautiful waterfront on Lake Champlain .
1 Oct
We headed out of Plattsburgh, New York which is on the eastern edge of the Adirondacks on Lake Champlain and headed on into the Lake Placid area with plans to spend three nights and two full days of touring that area. Again the weather is not looking favorable - the travel day was cloudy with off and on rain with more in the forecast over the next day.
After checking into the North Pole RV park in Wilmington, New York (close to Lake Placid) we begin plotting our explorations of the area. As we drove in it was obvious that the color on the trees here was getting better so we're really enjoying the riding around. We have several things on our "to do" list so we plot the way to get the indoor things done on the heavier rain predicted time. For now - it was overcast and foggy but not raining so we head over to the Olympic Ski Jumping complex.
Ski Jump from top - Nervous Photographer |
Ski Jump viewed from the bottom
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From that vantage point we were looking down on the tree tops and enjoying the beautiful colors that are really starting to pop. I wouldn't call it full peak but there are definitely some bright red, yellow and orange colors showing.
View of countryside from Ski Jump |
2 Oct
Rain most of the night and predicted also for the day here so after a relaxing breakfast and enjoying our coffee and the news we head to one of our indoor scheduled points of interest - the Olympic Museum which is in Lake Placid Village. The museum is located in a building that also houses two Olympic ice skating rinks - the one used in 1932 Olympics AND the one used for the 1980 Olympics. I believe the latter is also still used for hockey competitions.
The museum, although fairly small, was pretty nice with a lot of memorabilia on display from both of the winter games held there. They even had some of the material on display that is used for the summer ski jumping that we saw the day before and wondered about - it is like a tile material with round knobs on top that the skis apparently just glide over. We also learned that the summer jumping is not just a training thing but a pretty big/popular thing here all summer long.
The highlight of the museum for me was the section for the "miracle on ice" - if you recall when the underdog American hockey team defeated the Russians in the 1980 games to win gold in that sport. They had a corner of the museum set up with the game playing on a TV monitor - as the game ended and the Americans won the crowd that had gathered to watch cheered again! One local person commented that they have had the video of that game playing non-stop since 1980.
Hockey Rink - Miracle On Ice |
3 Oct
We've learned to appreciate a day without rain and that was the prediction for this day. We still had some pretty cloudy/foggy conditions and few spells of misty weather but at least no rain. We head out for a trip to the village of Tupper Lake to visit a place called the Wild Center of the Adirondacks.
View from the Wild Walk |
She couldn't resist :-) |
Roadside Stop |