John Boyd Thacher State Park, is situated along the Helderberg Escarpment, one of the richest fossil-bearing formations in the world. Even as it safeguards six miles of limestone cliff-face, rock-strewn slopes, woodland and open fields, the park provides a marvelous panorama of the Hudson-Mohawk Valleys and the Adirondack and Green Mountains. The park has volleyball courts, playgrounds, ball fields and numerous picnic areas with nine reservable shelters. Interpretive programs are offered year-round, including guided tours of the famous Indian Ladder Trail. There are over 25 additional miles of trails for summer hiking and mountain biking, and winter cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, hiking, and snowmobiling.
The answer is probably no. As much as I like traveling on the weekends or an occasional week of vacation, I actually kind of like the ordinary routine of going to work, taking the bus back and forward, and my boring old apartment, walking down to the library and around town.
1) I’ve never been one for driving — I was hesitant to get my drivers license until I was age 18 — but sometimes it’s necessary, especially if I want to spend time in the wilderness.
2) Camping gets tiring after a number of days — it’s a lot of work to set up, take down, and the other tasks at that are part of camping.
3) I miss having hot showers — One of the things I don’t like about camping is the lack of showers. I like to be able to get clean, and outside of the summer months when there are parks and swimming holes to clean oneself off.
4) Rainy cold days are a drag in woods — While on the balance most of my road trips are enjoyable, rainy and wet days can be a drag, hiding out in the hot tent or truck cap. My apartment is small but still much larger than a tent.
5) I like having consistency, a plan for tomorrow. The truth is working a 9-5 job may be boring but it’s a consistent paycheck and as long as I work hard and don’t screw too many things up. It’s not a search for a new job or a little thing to make it through the next day.
6) Traveling is remarkably expensive. Even when you camp in the wilderness there are a lot of consumable expenses from fuel to food. Having a good 9-5 job helps save for a better tomorrow.
Now there is a lot more of America I’d like to see in the coming years – not the big tourist destinations but the backroads and the lesser venues that I can enjoy.
Going to need to turn on my beloved brass lamp when I get into the office. Definitely not riding my bike to work today but I will try to get in early so I can walk in the Plaza for a while before work. I’ve had my work email turned off on my phone, I can only imagine the size of the research production book since the week I was gone.
Good morning! Monday’s come back around again. Got to go back and chase the money, lol. 😂 Rain and 45 degrees in Delmar, NY. ☔ Calm wind. Temperatures will drop below freezing at Wednesday around 11 pm. ☃️
I am glad fresh homemade bread 🍞 is cooking this morning as is pea soup. 🍲 Also honey butternut squash and another squash I got at Annuto’s yesterday. 🍏 Apple – banana – oatmeal 🍌 pancakes 🥞 are cooking. Going to be a good breakfast. If time wasn’t so tight I probably would have cooked many of those things in West Virginia but I did not. Such a dark morning but with good eats. 😋
Today will rain before 2pm, then a chance of showers, mainly between 2pm and 5pm. Patchy fog before 10am. 🌧 High of 48 degrees at 1pm. Eight degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around November 18th. Calm wind becoming northwest 5 to 9 mph in the morning. Chance of precipitation is 100%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies in the morning with some clearing in the afternoon. The high last year was 64 degrees. The record high of 80 was set in 1946. 1.2 inches of snow fell back in 2020.❄
Solar noon 🌞 is at 12:40 pm with sun having an altitude of 33.7° from the due south horizon (-37.2° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 9 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 5:13 pm with the sun in the west-southwest (245°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-southwest (252°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 5:53 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 3 seconds with dusk around 6:20 pm, which is one minute and 22 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 6:55 pm. At sunset, look for rain 🌧 and temperatures around 47 degrees. There will be a northwest breeze at 9 mph. Tomorrow will have 10 hours and 25 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 35 seconds over today.
This evening 🌃 I need to get to the laundromat 👖 and wash the dirty clothes from camp and get groceries. I could have gone yesterday but I was dog 🐶 tired 😴 and I figured the laundromat is always packed on Sunday evening. Still tired today but so be it.
Tonight will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a low of 33 degrees at 6am. Three degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical night around November 10th. Northwest wind 7 to 10 mph. In 2022, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became partly cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It got down to 37 degrees. The record low of 18 occurred back in 1988.
Might be a great weekend on tap. 😎 Saturday, partly sunny, with a high near 58. Sunday, partly sunny, with a high near 59. Typical average high for the weekend is 54 degrees. That said I’m not taking off next Monday for a long weekend to Madison County until I have better confirmation of the weekends weather.
As previously noted, there are 2 weeks until Average Night Below Freezing 🌌 when the sun will be setting at 4:36 pm with dusk at 5:05 pm (Standard Time). On that day in 2022, we had partly cloudy and temperatures between 49 and 36 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 50 degrees. We hit a record high of 69 back in 1964.
1,201 miles, 77.4 gallons of fuel and 24 hours and 47 minutes of driving the 2023 West Virginia road trip comes to an end. Average speed 48.8 mph, fuel economy 15.9 mpg. Numbers adjusted for the 35s.
Every autumn I play the game of how long I can go without turning the heat on in my apartment. 😨I actually like keeping things colder but I know at some point I must turn the heat on to keep the pipes from freezing up.
Except in the coldest weather, I usually keep the heat in the low 50s, only turning it up to 60 in the evening when I’m home to be comfortable come the morning. 👏The thermostat often overrides as it’s located downstairs near the heater and heat rises upstairs. Come the coldest time of the year I might leave it constantly around 55 or 60 to ensure it remains warm.
Figuring that I eventually will forgo centralized heating when I own my own house, I doubt I’ll ever get used to keeping it real warm as fires often die down during the night. 🔥Plus keeping it cold can help save energy, cut climate emissions and reduce utility bills.
One of the things I like to do while traveling is to listen to the local accents, especially of working folk. That said, the once distinctive working class Appalachian accent really has faded away more and more into a generic rural accent similar to what you might hear in small towns in virtually any part of America today.
I think the small town accent is furthered by country music that is largely nationalized these days, the rural identity nowadays more important than being identified by any one specific part of the country today.
If you ask most people, outside of the most dedicated deer hunters, probably November wouldn’t rank on their short list of the best months of the year. But it really is my favorite.
November is that time of year typically before snow is on the ground and things are icy and slippery. It’s a time when the leaves are off the trees and the woods lays bare for all to see. Wildlife is busy gathering food in preparation for the long winter ahead – or simply heading south as is the case with the birds and geese.
The trees gone bare reveal many a vista hidden by the leaves of summer. You can see contours of the woods once hidden, the old farm garbage dump in the gully. The deer are in their rut, carelessly wandering around the woods mostly looking for does to impregnate. The air has such a nice cool but refreshing feel. It’s so nice to be able to put that vest back on again.
With colder weather upon us, folks fire up their woodstoves and outdoor wood boilers, giving small towns across the area that very homey back woods smell of wood smoke. Farmers who have harvested their crops are busy applying manure, hoping to fertilize the ground before its frozen. It can be tangy and pungent but it’s part of the season.
I like the cool long nights of November in the woods. I like wearing my vest, sitting down by the campfire. I like how quiet the woods is, the starry nights that start early and how the moonlight shines through the trees. Or the deep blue skies and the browns and grays of the autumn months.
One thing that always surprises me is that the Mid Hudson library system has no books on Geographical Information Systems. 📚
Seems so odd with GIS being such a big topic these days and powerful GIS software like QGIS widely available – with mapping, GPS and aerial photography such a big part of our lives today. YouTube, free web classes and internet documentation is great but it sure would be nice if they had books that one could read about at the library.
