Notes
If not for the wind 🌬️
I’m just not ready to accept November but I think these four or five days in the wilderness are helping.
I woke up early around six o’clock and started breakfast 🍳 under the lantern and electric light 💡. Apple pancakes and coffee ☕ 🍏, the sun rise with the clouds was kind of lame. Going to head out fairly early as I want to set up camp in Brookfield and have an early dinner before the rain ☔ comes. Maybe I’ll do some of the Chenango Canal or my bike 🚲 or ride around Hamilton though truth be told I just kind of want to hang out at camp 🏕️.
Taking down camp once again. 🦆 Duck hunter left the lake so maybe I’ll go for a ride or walk 🚶 around the lake but it’s kind of cold ❄️ with the wind. I probably should just head home today but I don’t so the next stop should be Brookfield. I could ride the Chenango Canal Trail again but I’ve done that a few times or explore Hamilton but I kind of just want to spend the day hanging out at camp. I don’t know, I’m kind of tired. Horse 🐴 camp is in the hollow so it’s less likely to be quite so windy but I definitely see the rain coming by evening in the east. But it will clear out by morning if I want to ride again tomorrow or just take a leisurely drive home 🏡 and get cleaned up before visiting my folks on Veterans Day.
The trip so far has been good, 😀 I’ve enjoyed seeing some new places – namely Otisco and Skeantales Lake and the farm country out that way with the big dairies. 🐄 Lots and lots of cows from all that silage and grass grown in the fertile soils of Southern Onondoga County. Otisco Lake Causeway was okay but the Hinchcliff Preserve was neat and then I got to watch the sun set 🌇 over Cazenovia Lake. And then came back to camp and had a fire 🔥.
My take on Trump now that he’s President again… Worth a try not that we have much choice 🐘
You hear some of the liberals, and they’re like it’s a dire emergency that President Trump was elected. Things are going to be so bad, democracy is going to end, liberals are going to be sent to concentration camps and don’t forget the planet is going to die with no climate change action not that much occurred under the Joe Biden administration.
I voted for Trump. A lot of my friends did too. I’m a Democrat but I crossed party lines in this one race, as I think he’s kind of novel and if anything is a much needed shock to system with all the crazy things he says. Plus I think he will be good on gun rights, and fair policies when it comes to second amendment will encourage a whole new generation of gun owners and responsible sportsmen who will be actively involved in conservation.
I like many others don’t believe a lot of campaign rhetoric that Trump spouted to get elected. But only time will show how much he pushes for and how much actually gets done. He can stock the government with loyalists and those who share his policy vision – indeed he should be vigorously fighting for the policies that the voters want – but ultimately laws and constitution may get in his way and he has to maintain public support. Even the Republicans in Congress, who may sympathize with Trump on many issues, ultimately care about one thing – their re-election.
Liberals often act like the MAGA movement and supporters of Trump more generally are a cult but they’re not. They may like his locker room talk, his rhetoric about blowing up the system but most of them aren’t big fans of an over bearing government. Opposition to tyranny is a big part of MAGA and they’ll only support the president elect if he gets conservative things done and doesn’t implement government policies that infringe on their rights.
I’m sure Trump will put on a big show over the next four years and then he will be gone for good. But it will mostly be a show, trying to cover up for his fundamental incompetence. It’s just not possible to roll back prices half a decade, nor is it possible to place absurdly high tarrifs on imports without hurting domestic manufacturers or the economy more broadly. I’m sure there will be immigration raids, much publicized but they’ll be relatively small and inconsequential. And it will prove to be a lot harder to lock down the borders as the president may want as most immigrants have a right to be here, or at least a good case to ksir in front of a judge of that right.
We will see. We don’t have the power to change the will of the American people as decided by the election. We just have to live with the consequences for good or bad. And remember it’s only four years, new ideas are worthwhile to try and maybe it will or will not work out for the best.
For a long time I’ve been much too fascinated by Ostico Lake Causeway 🛶
Finally made it there. No public access to the east side of the Causeway, public access only to the shorter western side. It’s pretty much just a boat launch, but I’ve always been interested in the fake Finger Lake, which really is swamp and muck lands drowned by a City of Syracuse water dam after the city’s industrialization had fouled Onondoga Lake, plus they sought out a reliable gravity fed water supply.
Was it anything more than a highly developed lake with relatively few good public access points besides the narrow causeway? Yes, and difference in water color and texture really isn’t as pronounced as aerial photos suggest. Still it was interesting to check out.
It got cold ❄️ much too quickly
I didn’t expect it to get cold so quickly. It’s not that I don’t have warm gear or are prepared for the cold but it seemingly hit me so hard this year, coming out to camp with the stiff breezes and cloudy skies yesterday and the sun but even colder weather today.
Autumn always is just a twinkle in one’s eye, a few seconds to treasure before it’s done. But this year running those campaigns and the whole data operation, things went by so much quicker. Plus there was always so much I wanted to do yet never enough time to get it done.
Another cool November morning ☀️
The sun is shining and the breeze not consist though when it picks up it definitely feels a bit chilly. At least not as blustery as yesterday.
I am up and going after eggs, 🥚 and coffee ☕ and some fried apples. 🍏 I walked down to the lake this morning and there is still enough of a breeze to make it feel chilly. Indeed yesterday, I ended up retiring to bed around 8:30 due to rain ☔ showers from the Lake Effect having shifted south.
Rode about 30 miles yesterday 🚴 … Chittenango to Dewitt and the Canalway and some side trails. It was a nice day but cold at times with the wind. 🌬️ The trail became a lot busier as I got into Dewitt and closer to Syracuse, though the portions east of Green Lakes I had virtually to myself. A lot cloudier for most of the day then I had expected.
I am thinking of heading out to Otsico Lake 🏞️ to check out the Causeway and maybe the Ripley Hill Preserve. I was originally thinking of doing some riding around Cazenovia today but I’m thinking maybe not this trip. Tomorrow I could depending on how nice the weather is but I might instead poke around Hamilton before overnighting in the rain at the Brookfield Horse 🐴 camp and then driving 🚘 home relatively early, although a lot depends on how cold and wet Veterans Day ultimately becomes.
Alma Pond
Alma Pond is a 36-acre reservior east of Bolivar just north of the Pennsylvania border on the Honeoye Creek. Public access is provided from the north shore on Four Mile Road. There is a hand launch for small boats such as canoes and kayaks. Largemouth bass, black crappie, bluegill, pumpkin seed, yellow perch, carp, brown bulhead and nothern pike can be found in this lake. The eastern half of lake is UTM 17, the western side UTM 18 so be careful with a GPS.