Nomad exploring life wherever I am
Last time I passed through Watkins Glen, the parking lots were stuffed full of cars and I was towing a trailer, so I didn’t stop and check it out. This year, I planned way better: four nights at the state park campground, giving me plenty of time to wait out the rain and heat (yes, there were both!) and hike the famous Gorge. It was definitely worth the wait.
One of the most interesting things about Letchworth State Park in western New York is the Autism Nature Trail (ANT), designed to give autistic kids time and space to experience nature in the ways most comfortable to them. I visited the trail one quiet Sunday morning and was pretty impressed by the design and implementation.
Tucked away in a two-story building in downtown Indiana is a little gem of a museum, the Swope. And, by golly, it’s also free. (They have a cool donation station where you dip your card to donate $5 but it’s not at all a high-pressure deal). I went to see a photography exhibit on the second floor but I was also captivated by the Indiana Impressionists special exhibit on the first floor. And it’s not every day that you walk straight into a Renoir, either.
It only took me six years but I finally camped by the shores of the all five Great Lakes: Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan, and Superior. Surprisingly, I camped in just two states to achieve that bucket list item: Michigan and New York. And, no, I really can’t pick a favorite Great Lake, that’s asking way too much of me, a person who has a deep devotion to any body of water bigger than a rain puddle.
After starting the month of June in Arkansas, I made a quick stop at Big Spring, Missouri, before surviving the weather weirdness in Illinois and Kentucky that defined my mid-month. From there I had three stops in Indiana before ending the month in Ohio. So, yeah, six states in 30 days. I’m definitely making tracks eastbound.