Delmar, NY

As predicted, a cool and cloudy Saturday up on Piseco-Powley 🌦️

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Not a lot of rain today though enough that I needed the rain coat 🧥 when I walked up to Powley Place. None of rain was heavy, it was mostly showers and not all day. Mid morning though was cool, I actually nodded off for a while listening to a podcast over the warmth of the propane heater. ♨️ Fortunately thought I didn’t fall on the heater.

We had a bit of sun and blue skies both in the morning and evening, though not a lot. But it was everything I expected and I had lots of time read 📖 besides the ten 🔟 miles I walked today mostly along Piseco Powley Road.

Traffic Counts – Delmar

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I went for my morning walk about a half hour later then normal and noticed how busy the traffic. I thought it would be interesting to bring up the traffic records locally to see how many cars were moving at rush hour.

We had some blue skies to start out the morning on Saturday 🌥️

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Not a lot of sun though you could see it peaking ☀ through the clouds as I was floating in the tube ⭕ in the East Canada Creek. Then it clouded up again but at least I had a chance to get cleaned up a bit and some time floating down the river.

No-see-ums were biting like crazy this morning 🐜 that I pretty much rushed into the screen tent 🎪. That said it was fine, I spent my breakfast and then after in the tent. Sprinkles 🌧️ kept me from setting up the hammock today.

I am a bit chilled through 🥶 from floating in the tube but I have the heater to warm myself up. ♨️ I have a full tank of propane so I don’t have to worry about running out.

I plan to read 📖 some today, listen to podcasts 🔊 and do some hiking along the East Canada Creek. Maybe hike all the way to Powley Place, though that’s a pretty good distance and I don’t want to get too far from camp should the sky really open up. Often just sitting by the Potholers makes me happy 😊, the falls provide solitude.

Might not be the nicest summer day, but I’m glad I’m away from it all, with not even a radio 📻 to deliver the bad news 📰 back to the back country. My selection of podcasts and downloaded videos is far better than any crap I’d be listening to on the news.

I can’t complain too much the rain held off for most of the day. 🌦️

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Rain started around 6 o’clock ☔ when I was walking back from my hike to House Pond, which I bushwhacked along the Brandy Brook to the Old Edick Road snowmobile trail. While the bushwhack wasn’t difficult, the Brandy Brook is hardly even a brook and didn’t have any particularly interesting waterfalls. Mostly just very conventional low land Adirondack woods, not many old growth trees back there.

Read 📖 for a few hours in the hammock, mostly the book I got about bicycles 🚲 and their repair. I guess I’m learning something from the book, a lot of it is about the physics of bicycles and the chemistry of the metals used to make up their frames. I guess I never thought how scientific bicycles are.

I was going to swim 🏊‍♂️ this afternoon, or more likely float in the tube ⭕ and fir a short while the sun came out and was quite delightful but then more clouds 🌥️ pushed in, the wind picked up and my mind was changed.

Black flies were horrendous and I was quite happy to hide out under the bug net I use with my hammock. 🐜 It works good but it does feel kind of claustrophobic when your surrounded by such a little screen. Basically when I wasn’t under the bug screen in the hammock I was in the screen tent 🎪 or applying DEET although out hiking wasn’t so bad.

Then laying back in the hammock🤦 I turned left and somehow pulled a muscle in my neck and now hurts when I turn too far to the left, especially if I am looking left and up. It just hurts hard when I do that. 🥲Looking right or turning my neck the other way is fine but I’m thinking if I don’t recover it’s going to make merging on the expressway a challenge though I think I can do like I did coming out here and take the local roads home. I’m sure I’ll recover fine on my own or I’ll be calling my new doctor 📞 come Tuesday. 🧑‍⚕️

Day 2 Juneteenth Weekend Camping 🏕

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Good morning, Happy Friday as we head into the Juneteenth Weekend, that I decided to get a jump start on. Yesterday was quite beautiful out for a while but fairly cool, though I enjoyed swimming and floating in the tube on the East Canada Creek. Hiked up to the Potholers in the evening and sat down there for a while.

Expecting rain today ☔ but I have tarps set up and brought my heater and rain coat and plan to do some reading 📖 this afternoon. Chopped up enough firewood for tonight and Saturday night so I’m case everything gets soaked from the rsum.

This morning though I’ll hike Old Edick Road, check out the swimming 🏊 hole along the way though no swimming but maybe later today depending on how cool it is.

Repatched the tube ⭕ that I patched last year after snagging a tree, I the new patch is holding better after I applied extra rubber cement. I also got a new air pump as the old one wasn’t working well but boy oh boy did it make a lot of black smoke when I tossed it in the fire 🔥 last night lol.

Campstove is working good 🍲 though I’m down to one burner as the other rotted out again. Not leaking propane like it often does. Got 7 summers and roughly 500 meals out of it but I think winter and rainy day camping was tough on it plus the heat from the camp oven and letting pots boil over on it. I was looking at getting another stove using gift cards from work I had saved up but I was worried it would arrive when I was camping then get rained on or grabbed by the porch pirates. I’m thinking about getting a stand alone unit so it can drain out better and not risk burning the table like in the past. I want to have a good stove, especially before Summer Vacation as I do a lot more cooking these days. 🏖️

Your Flag Decal Won’t Get You Into Heaven Anymore 🇺🇸

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Seems like the most appropriate John Prine song for this Flag Day 2023. I was going to post it Memorial Day being the irreverent SOB that I am but whatever. Loving America is also about criticizing it when our leaders are wrong. But what do I care, I’m leaving this town come tomorrow morning for the Adirondacks.

Good morning! What day is it? Flag Day, of course. 🇺🇸 At least in the parts of America that still celebrates such things. You can taste the wood smoke, cow shit and heavy fog 🌫 around 52 degrees in Delmar, NY. It’s kind of nice when you live enough on the outskirts of the city to have the smells of the country. 🐮 Calm wind. The dew point is 51 degrees. The AQI is 43. The skies will clear tomorrow around noontime.

Woke up at 5:30 this morning and had reheated egg quiche 🍰 with coffee ☕. Went out for my morning walk 🚶 and came back home and ran to the bathroom 🚽 and splattered shit all over the toilet and my boxers. They were fun to wash this morning. 💩 I almost thought about tossing them as they don’t really fit anymore. In my rush to get out to the Bike Rescue 🚲 last night I decided to have the last chicken patty I had left in my freezer from before I decided to cut out processed unhealthy food from my diet. 🐔 I think it might have already gone bad or maybe I’m not used processed food, though I had it with plenty of beans, celery, onions and brown rice to supplement it. But it left me hungry and feeling sick 🤮 for the rest of the evening. It had a ton of salt in it and pretty high on fat too. My gut doesn’t like change, I had a similar situation when I first started eating a lot of oatmeal and fiber rich foods. I still don’t feel great but I think I’m past that now all cleaned up and showered. 🛀

Today will have a chance of showers, then showers and possibly a thunderstorm after noon. Some of the storms could produce small hail and gusty winds. 🌦 High of 74 degrees at 12pm. Five degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around May 27th. Maximum dew point of 60 at 2pm. 🏖️ Light southeast wind becoming south 5 to 10 mph in the morning. Winds could gust as high as 20 mph. Chance of precipitation is 90%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies. The high last year was 83 degrees. The record high of 96 was set in 1892.

I drove down to the Trinity Center last night in the South End 🚲, hoping to get some advice on rebuilding the back wheel of my old bicycle.I was still hoping for some advice on the wheel, but when I got there, the door was locked on the Trinity Center and the lights were off. 🚪 I walked around back to see if I missed, then moved my truck a little closer, deciding to double check that nobody was there, ringing the door bell but nobody arrived. Maybe they didn’t have volunteers, that happens, they’ve been closed the past few weeks. 🤷‍♂️

It’s fine, I decided I’ll bring the rear wheel to the Adirondacks this weekend and play with it some more. I am starting to doubt though that I’ll ever get this bicycle back on the road, 🚳 as I keep discovering new issues. The thing about it was when I was unloading my bicycle I noticed my front wheel is now out of true, among other issues. But I do want to learn how to replace spokes, and learn more about bicycles. 📚 I got two books out of the library about bicycle repair, 👩‍🔧 and I want to learn more about bicycles before I plunk down money for another used or rebuilt one. I think I will continue to cannibalize parts from this bicycle, and eventually donate it somewhere, but the mean time I can store in the crawl space. But next time I’ll call or email in advance ✉️ before going down there.

It’s fine, I needed to get propane, some supplies from Walmart and fuel for my truck. ⛽ All much too expensive but I wanted to have everything I need for the trip, including an new air pump to inflate my tube or in case of emergency, a little bit of extra rubber cement to patch any leaks, some more kidney beans, olives, and a few other groceries. 🏪 Going to get fresh veggies and fruit on my way up to camp, probably stop in Gloversville at Price Chopper to get those things. Often the quality is better then Walmart, and it will be hopefully more fresh shopping on Thursday. But more expensive. Everything has gotten so darn expensive these days. 🍏

Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:56 pm with sun having an altitude of 70.6° from the due south horizon (-0.2° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 2.1 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:52 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (296°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-northwest (304°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 8:35 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 27 seconds with dusk around 9:09 pm, which is 27 seconds later than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 9:55 pm. At sunset, look for rain 🌧 and thunderstorms 🌩 and temperatures around 63 degrees. The dew point will be 58 degrees. There will be a south-southeast breeze at 6 mph. Today will have 15 hours and 20 minutes of daytime, an increase of 29 seconds over yesterday.

Tonight will have showers and possibly a thunderstorm before 10pm, then a chance of showers. Some of the storms could produce small hail. 🌧 Low of 56 degrees at 3am. Two degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around June 8th. Maximum dew point of 59 at 6pm. 🏖️ South wind around 6 mph becoming light and variable. Chance of precipitation is 80%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch, except higher amounts possible in thunderstorms. In 2022, we had clear skies in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 57 degrees. The record low of 42 occurred back in 1985.

Heading out of town for a Long Weekend starting on Thursday morning. 🏕 I was going to take off Friday and Tuesday, but it looks like the legislature will be back on Tuesday, so I best be back on Juneteenth. Plus Thursday looks like one of the best weather days of the long weekend. Friday looks cold and wet. I am going to bring my propane heater, along with the tarp for sure. It will be nice to be away from it all for some time. My radio doesn’t work, so I will be fully off-grid without cell service. 😎 Hoping for some sun for swimming and to keep hte solar working well so my batteries are good.

Kind of a mixed bag but cool for the long weekend. 🌦️ Thursday, sunny and 78. Friday, best chance of showers on and off all day, high 72. Saturday, showers likely, mainly after 2pm. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 71. Chance of precipitation is 60%. Maximum dew point of 59 at 11am. Sunday, a chance of showers after 8am. Partly sunny, with a high near 76. Chance of precipitation is 50%. Juneteenth, mostly sunny with showers late. High near 78. Maximum dew point of 58 at 10am. Typical average high for the weekend is 80 degrees.

As Looking ahead, next Wednesday is Summer ️⛱️ when the sun will be setting at 8:38 pm with dusk at 9:11 pm. On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy, rain showers and temperatures between 70 and 51 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 81 degrees. We hit a record high of 97 back in 1938. That means the Mine Kill Pool should be open then 🏊 so if it’s nice that’s a lot of fun. But next weekend is a way off and I want to look at bicycles that weekend first before deciding if I want to go swimming. But also it would be great to get some fresh produce at the farm stands in the Schoharie Valley, do some camping and adventures not so far from home.

Powley Bridge