Le Bon Trottoir à La Belle Vie

In case you've been wondering where I've been, as there has been a deficit of postings, I've been out searching for sidewalks!

Since my last posting, my feet have sampled a number of sidewalks and I have to say that the more I hit the pavement the more I crave.

I've put on a few miles walking on concrete, asphalt, cobblestone, and more over the past five months.  Can't say that I prefer one over the other, as they all seem to work by getting me from one place to another.  And, of course, as my wife tells me, I can't complain about any sidewalk because all that she seems to hear from me (her story) is that I want to walk out our front door and be able to connect feet to sidewalk and get somewhere, anywhere!

May seem that I'm fickle, but not entirely.  At times, sidewalks lead to places that one has been to before or one you need to go to; other times, they take you to places that are new to your experience and give all the credit in the world to your desire to try out a new-to-you sidewalk. There is a method to my sidewalk madness...they connect you to new people and new places.

Last month, they connected us to Watkins Glen.

My wife wanted to escape town for a few days and she announced, "I have a great sidewalk to show you!"  Always up for a trip that involves a path to somewhere, I packed quickly and happily and was soon in the car to head west.  It's a four hour trip from our non-side-walked home, but worth it for the scenery, the lure of sidewalks and for something else that I knew was in the area, wineries!

What the wife hadn't told me is that the sidewalk she had in mind to visit was of the vertical kind.  She drove us to the Watkins Glen State Park.  There, one is treated to a two mile hike...up!

Well, one way is up.  To get back to the car you get to walk down!

Carved out by water, for probably more than a few years, a gorge ascends between 200 foot cliffs and features a stream that descends 400 feet.   They advertise no less than 19 waterfalls, and you get to run under and around some of them as you make your way up 800 steps...yes, 800.  How do I know that?  I counted every single one of them.

You should check out their site here:

http://www.nysparks.com/parks/142/details.aspx

Worth the trip if you like waterfalls, and gorges, and getting spit on by mother nature, but more so because it's just a short drive to Penn Yan.

And, what's in Penn Yan do you say?

Sidewalks.

And stores and shops and a rail trail that goes between a couple of those Finger Lakes that are surrounded by wineries.  Over one hundred of them.  More wineries than we could do in one day, turns out.  We tried, well that's another blog.

The best thing about Penn Yan is where we stayed.

I'm fairly certain that my wife used the lure of sidewalks to get me to a B&B that she had visited a couple of years back. She and a college roommate had done a winery and yarn trip (yet another blog) and stayed at a place about which she raved upon her return.

She talked up the wineries (a favorite of mine), the towns (ergo sidewalks), and some good restaurants, and then said, "Let's stay at this place I went to."  She described it as a pretty Victorian House, run by a nice couple, and they make a great breakfast, and you get to talk to people (another fact...sidewalk deprived folks don't have many people to walk to and talk to) and "it has a sidewalk that leads you to town and to stores and to restaurants, just like where you want to live."

I'm not hard to please, really...give me a sidewalk and I'm off.

We did the steps (did I mention 800 of them?), lunch in town, a winery or two (okay, five of them), and then landed in Penn Yan at the aforementioned B&B, "La Belle Vie."

My wife was a little off in her description of the inn.  Pretty?  It was gorgeous.  Victorian?  Highly so, and Italianate...impeccable inside and out.  And, a wonderfully hospitable couple, Laurel and Llewellyn, greeted us in the driveway as we arrived and took care of us as though we were many-times-returning friends.

I've been in the hotel business for over 35 years and have always said, "Clean room, good food and good service and I'm set."  Well, the proprietors of "La Belle Vie" have set a new standard for me.

I've also stayed in a few B&Bs in my day, but have never felt the warmth of the owners such as here and the place was spotless.  And the, the breakfast...amazing!!!  I don't think I've had a better breakfast anywhere, ever.

Laurel cooks, Llewellyn serves and you don't want it to stop.  The scones and the pancakes were beyond belief.  And, perhaps it's because Llewellyn waits on you (have you ever seen that at a B&B?), the eggs were the best I ever had.  Coffee?  Served.  Breakfast?  Served.  Are you sure you're done?  How about seconds?  Of course!  And this is a B&B.  In another such place you might find a buffet laid out with muffins and boxed cereal, without a person in sight, with signs, "help yourself."  Not here.

I have to mention the menu and I don't want to get this wrong, but I think the pancakes were Lemon Ricotta.  And, Lemon scones...I didn't want to leave the table.  This reminds me to ask for the recipe, though I doubt they'd taste as good without the company of Laurel and Llewellyn.

Once the breakfast is served, with Llewellyn at your beckon call, Laurel joins all in the Dining Room (we were one of three couples that day), and great conversation ensues.  I all but forgot about sidewalks!

Our bedroom at "La Belle Vie"  The Macintosh Room

The whole place is about relaxation and comfort and the proprietors make everything happen in a gentle and relaxed fashion...just really nice.

Now, I like to visit wineries, and I like to go to towns that have sidewalks, such as Penn Yan, and really just enjoy traveling to different places to see the sites, and the places we stay are usually the means to the end, but you need to know that I would make a trip back to the Finger Lakes just to stay at "La Belle Vie." 

You have to check them out, here's their link:

http://labelleviebb.com/

The next installment of my blog is in the works, so don't fret.  We did visit about twenty wineries and have made a few other trips over the past few months, so more to come soon.  But first, I must get that recipe from Laurel and Llewellyn at "La Belle Vie," so that "ma vie sera mieux."

In Step with Summer

Speaking of steps (as per the title of this posting), we recently traveled to Watkin's Glen so that the wife could show me the gorge located there. She had visited there earlier this year and wanted me to see it. We thought we'd do a two day trip, but it dwindled to one and we made a dash to the Finger Lakes the Saturday before Labor Day.

The weather didn't look promising. It did rain on the trip there (four hours door to door), but when we arrived the clouds parted and the sun shone down on us as though to say, "Welcome, we knew you were coming and we want you to enjoy this place of natural beauty."

Okay, it wasn't that dramatic, but it did stop raining for a bit and we were able to make our way through the gorge, a sprinkle here and there, but no deluges.

Back to the steps...the story board at the base of the gorge notes about 800 steps. Intrigued, I started counting as we made our way up the gorge. Not a small stream wending its way around the base of a small hill, as I remember the gorges of my youth, it's a cavernous expanse cut into the side of a small mountain. We made our way up 787 steps (yes, I counted each and every one of them), ascending hundreds of feet as we took in the views.

Fortunately, I can multi-task. Counting steps, taking in the views, chatting with the wife about the many formations, climbing the steps, dodging rain drops, inspecting water falls, and dealing with hordes of photo hungry visitors kept me real busy. My head was spinning when we got to the top. Not sure if it was the altitude or all of that work...how do you relax at a park when you have so much to do?

The place is quite amazing. The gorge is at least a hundred feet deep in spots (maybe more) and at one time, about 10,000 years ago they say, it was all level ground that led to a large waterfalls. The glaciers (those darn pesky several mile thick ice cubes of time gone by) and subsequent running waters tore through rock to take a waterfall that emptied directly into Seneca Lake and created a series of many smaller falls and streams to end up in the same place. Seems like a lot of work, over a long time, to accomplish the same goal, but what the heck...it is an amazing site and that's nature for you.

Someone had the idea to make a walkway, with those sept-hundred plus steps, so many could take in the views (and pay for the privilege) and walk under and around falls, get splashed on by water running off the sides of the hills with droplets bouncing off the pavements and protective walls, and it's a beautiful couple of hours. At one point, where the largest falls comes in front of the walkway, seemingly hundreds of people posed for loved ones who tried to capture their visage "under the curtain of water." It's a small space and I kept getting stuck within groups of photographees...I'm certain there are scores of people looking at their pictures, now that they're home, saying, "Who's that guy? He looks like someone famous!" In a hundred years, historians will gather pictures from various groups to study the cultural habits of us humans and find one common link from that day of photos at Watkins Glen...me in each picture...then I'll be famous!

We keep moving. Shallow and deep pools, streams, the aforementioned falls, moss, flora and fauna (and who was the third fairy in Cinderella?), and at the very top the quintessential state operated gift shop! What a site...I looked to see if they carried little Statue's of Liberty, I lost mine somewhere. No luck. But they did have a snack bar, and rest rooms, and a bus to take you down the mountain if you didn't want to hoof it back.

Not to be detracted from our morning of exploring nature, and noting we could avoid the steps by taking one of two trails back down, we chose the Indian Trail. I am a bit bewildered that it hasn't been renamed the Native American Trail, but that's another blog.

Off we went, and it was smooth going. About halfway down we ran into a "trail closed due to storm damage" sign and were directed back to the stairs. Fortunately for us, we got a second chance to stand under the falls with all of the people with cameras trying to take pictures of all of their friends and family, and getting me in most of their shots, again, as we tried to squeeze by those who appear to be walking behind the curtain of water and stopping me from making much progress for a bit of time (although now I'm thinking they were trying to get me in the shot for better aesthetics). Not as dramatic as Victoria Falls in Africa, one could do a bit of photo cropping and make it seem that one was surviving torrents of water!!! Cool!!!

I would recommend the trip highly not only for those who enjoy the outdoors and the happenings of nature, but also for the fact that they conveniently located the gorge near 600 wineries! Guess you know where we spent the afternoon. More on that some other time.

We ended the day with a boat ride on Seneca Lake. A couple with a small child sat in front of us and through the bulk of the trip the child was more fascinated with me than with the surf and turf all around. I have that effect on people, you know. I think I'm in a couple of their family pictures now, too! This is all going to work for me, some day!

Anywho, I recovered from the ascension of the steps at Watkins Glen (there are a couple of "just eighty steps in this group," heart pounders for certain), thanks in part to generous applications of Yoga Balm to knee joints and a very nice Chardonnay or two, and we are talking of returning again. I will say this about that day. It is a spectacular park, the scenery is stunning, New York State does not make a great red wine (one with the punch the French can deliver, sorry), and I'm going to start charging for being in people's pictures...I realize fame will come, but I won't be around when that happens and I would like some of the cash now!