Good morning! Happy Sunday. Final day of vacation, plan to make the most of it. 🏖️ Summer not expected to last. Five weeks to Average High 70 🎑 . Partly cloudy and 73 degrees at the Watkins Glen State Park. ⛅ There is a south-southeast breeze at 6 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 62 degrees.

The morning started out chilly 🌤️ but the clouds parted. I made up coffee ☕ and finished up the muffins. 🍪 I am surprisingly less hung over then expected, I had a few Genesee’s with dinner last night and they’re the kind of beer 🍻 you drink when you are having more than one. 🤮

Sat back, paused briefly then made a final video 📹 of my campsite. 🏕️ I find it hard to believe that I’ve been camping here for 8 nights and nine 9⃣ days, it seems like I just set things up yesterday. ⌛I think camping here in one site all week made the time go by faster.

All packed up, site is clean 🏡 and after visiting a few more places in the Finger Lakes it will be back home. 🛣️My goal is to be home by dusk 🌆. I am not terribly worried about getting unpacked 💼 tonight although I’ll need to grab the cooler and empty that out ❄, grab my clothes 👕👖and unpack things like razors and toothbrush.

I am going to go for a swim 🏊🏻‍♂️ once the pool opens. I wanted to be here early in case the lot filled up with social distancing. Seneca Lake looked so calm this morning, I was tempted to go for a paddle but with things heating up ☀ the wind 🍃 is picking up. This afternoon I want to explore Catharine Creek Marsh 🦆some more wildlife observation 🔭 this time with binoculars. I could go for a paddle later. 🛶 I don’t know though time is limited but I made sure to leave the sleeping pad so I could get the kayak off my truck if choose. Then starting to head home, I want to visit Danby State Forest 🌲and check the overlook out there.

Today will be partly sunny 🌞, with a high of 81 degrees at 3pm. Typical for today. Maximum dew point of 62 at 10am. Southeast wind 6 to 8 mph. A year ago, we had partly cloudy skies in the morning, which became thunderstorm by afternoon. It became sticky as the day progressed. The high last year was 81 degrees. The record high of 97 was set in 1936.

Solar noon 🌞 is at 1:13 pm with sun having an altitude of 61.2° from the due south horizon (-9.7° vs. 6/21). A six foot person will cast a 3.3 foot shadow today compared to 2.2 feet on the first day of summer. The golden hour 🏅 starts at 7:30 pm with the sun in the west-northwest (283°). 📸 The sunset is in the west-northwest (289°) with the sun dropping below the horizon at 8:08 pm after setting for 3 minutes and 3 seconds with dusk around 8:36 pm, which is one minute and 28 seconds earlier than yesterday. 🌇 The best time to look at the stars is after 9:15 pm. At sunset, look for partly cloudy skies 🌃 and temperatures around 74 degrees. The dew point will be 61 degrees. There will be a south-southeast breeze at 6 mph. Today will have 13 hours and 50 minutes of daytime, a decrease of 2 minutes and 32 seconds over yesterday.

I thought it was a pretty good week, ☺ with about the best weather one could hope for during these times. Everything was a bit off and the wood full of people during these times of social distancing. 👨‍👨‍👧‍👦It’s really good that people are getting outside and enjoying nature but I do miss the solitude especially around Foster Pond – the nights 🌌star gazing with no one else around. While my campsite was far back from the road and quite remote, every time I hiked in the woods it didn’t seem quite as quiet 🤫 as years past. While I’d be pressed to say that I couldn’t find solitude but things just weren’t like years past.

The Finger Lakes are a very different place than the Adirondacks. 🐮🌱🌾🌿🕸️🦋🍷 I think it’s a fun summer place, a lot lighter and more relaxing than the Adirondacks. 🗻 Everything in the Adirondacks is much more touristy, while the Finger Lakes are more rural and the gas stations ⛽ and groceries 🛒 aren’t so overpriced as they are up north. 👃🏻 The smell of the silage and grass, the gentle mooing of the cows is a nice change.

There are definitely a lot of places on my 🅱️ list I’ve gotten to see this week and enjoy that would have otherwise been overlooked. I think it’s good to think outside of the box 🗃 and look for new places to visit in the same general area I’ve been before but previously overlooked. 🐦

One of my annoyances that seems to be a problem all over this year is the amount of litter 🚮 dumped in the woods. Seems like this week there is a growing pile of trash 🗑 dumped at Foster Pond, the same is true for the campsite on Backbone Trail. Now I’m not calling for more jack booted thugs 👢 to unsuccessfully patrol the woods and stop dumping but folks should be more responsible. 👮 You can’t stop 🛑 people who want to dump trash when no one is looking.

Bring your gawd damn deposit cans back for the nickle. 💵 Bring your aluminum foil, cans and glass home for the recycling bin ♻, it’s not that much trash if you smash it. Chances are your having a fire 🔥 so you can burn the rest of the largely burnable packaging 📦, just make sure to pack out anything that doesn’t fully become smoke or water vapor. And bury your poop 💩 and toilet paper 🚽 deep in the woods. ⚰️ Personal responsibility not jack booted thugs. ☠️

If people want to drink 🍻 and have a little fun in the woods 🤣 then good for them. Public lands are for the publics use but they shouldn’t trash them. 🌲🌳🧔🧔🏼👱🏾‍♀️👱🏼‍♀️I had my fun but my campsite was cleaner than when I got there – I cleaned up abandoned fire pits, removed bottle caps and made sure things were generally more organized than when I got here.
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I am hoping by next summer 🏖 things will be a bit quieter and back to normal. 👾 Been such an odd summer and while I’ve made the most of it I could see doing some things differently next year. 💭 I’d like to spend some time in Pennsylvania, maybe later this autumn. 🍂🍁 Yeah, while New York rednecks are fun, Pennsylvania rednecks are more fun as they have more guns 🔫 and everybody out in the country burns their trash and everything else that burns from brush piles to old mobile homes. 🔥

Continuing to read that book about hog farming. 🐷 There is a lot I didn’t know about pigs, 🐽 they are kind of fascinating creatures. I figured start my summer reading program with cattle, then pigs and maybe then goats 🐐 and chickens 🐔. Pigs are a lot more accessible to a beginning homesteader than cattle 🐮 plus they can do a lot to help restore rocky ⛰️ worn out soils as can often be found in areas with affordable acreage. 💩 I’m sure that’s why North Country Off Grid makes pigs such a big part of his homestead in North Idaho. Plus bacon 🥓.

I am thinking about getting a clip on telephoto lens 🔭for my smartphone 📱. I am quite happy with the quality of the photos 📸 my phone takes but I would like to be able to zoom 🔎 in closer to wildlife. 🦅🦉🐸🐦They aren’t really expensive either. 🖼

Tonight will have a chance of showers, mainly after midnight. Mostly cloudy 🌧, with a low of 62 degrees at 5am. Two degrees above normal. Maximum dew point of 61 at 7pm. South wind around 6 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. In 2019, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became cloudy by the early hours of the morning. It became very sticky as the night progressed. It got down to 67 degrees. The record low of 40 occurred back in 1979.

Today in 1916, the Migratory Bird Treaty between Canada and the United States signed. 🐦 It was designed to save Migratory Birds by giving them international protection for the first time by placing limits on hunting and other means of taking. Good day for walking in the marsh. 🐸

In 1989, a solar flare from the Sun creates a geomagnetic storm that affects micro chips, 🌞leading to a halt of all trading on Toronto’s stock market.🖥️

Also, in 1993, Debian Linux is announced, 💾it would become the basis of many forms of Linux like Ubuntu Linux, which is currently what I run on my home computer.

And in 1966, the House Un-American Activities Committee begins investigations of Americans who have aided the Viet Cong.🏛️ The committee intends to introduce legislation making these activities illegal. Anti-war demonstrators disrupt the meeting and 50 people are arrested.

Looking ahead, there are 5 weeks until Average High 70 🎑 when the sun will be setting at 7:07 pm with dusk at 7:35 pm. On that day in 2019, we had partly sunny, patches of fog and temperatures between 79 and 42 degrees. Typically, the high temperature is 71 degrees. We hit a record high of 90 back in 1946.