We enjoyed two sleepovers in Ithaca: visiting Keith [Joan's cousin] and Marty. Both are fine and truly enjoying retirement in Ithaca.
Ithaca in at the southern end of lake Cayuga, one of the five finger lakes. It's also the home of Cornell University where Keith taught.
We were shown many highlights of Ithaca and managed to liberate the camera from the trunk to make a few shots of waterfalls. It was April 1, the opening day for fishing. There are three fishermen in the picture below and at least two of them are fly-fishing. It was way too cold for anything but ice fishing as far as I'm concerned, but then, that would be uncomfortable also...
The next shot was made after walking closer to the waterfall.
The fishermen like to fish in the many pools that formed below the falls over the centuries.
Here's another shot of the gorge right next to Cornell's very large campus.
Nearby, I found this tree rather interesting: like many others in the area, it was covered with dead English Ivy leaves [or something similar]. It sure gave the truck and bigger branches a strange complexion. You can click on any picture to see them all larger.
This is Taughannock Falls. It's taller than Niagara Falls, just much narrower. It's really hard to judge perspective from this vantage point but you can get a reasonable idea by looking at the tourist bridge at the bottom of the picture.
Closer to the falls, you can see the huge chunks of ice and snow at the foot of the falls; literally a glacier in the making that will melt long before it reaches glacier status.
Next is Buttermilk Falls; I didn't have a tripod to make a time exposure that would have turned this shot into buttermilk...
The local municipality has created a very large and safe swimming pool at the foot of these falls. What a great place to spend time with family and friends: some sitting among the flat rocks of the waterfall. others diving into the deep end of the natural pool, or just having fun in the shallower parts.
Of course, it's not a bad place to skip stones when the water is ice cold.
The entire valley walls that hold all these and many more waterfalls is made up of shale and large slabs of limestone. You can see the frozen 'waterfall' of the weeping shale below. Much of it has melted already and it will likely be gone if predicted warm days develop.
On the way back to the centre of town, we stopped in at this wholesale orchid business. This showroom, plus about five times more blooming orchids will likely be sold by the end of the month. This business buys its stock from Thailand, repots the plants, and grows them to bloom for sale. They have a very large turnover, and when plants fall out of bloom, or remain unsold, they are disposed of. The chap told me that there were a lot of dumpster divers nearby...
Keith then walked us around where they live, downtown.
I loved the humour of this sculpture, a mere donkey or something, in front of the Merrill Lynch sign. Their Logo is a charging bull... Ok, Ok, I found it funny.
About 100 meters in front of Keith & Marty's front door is a pleasant walkway beside this river that runs through town. Ithaca is very progressive and showcases a lot of sculpture throughout the area.
Next are two pieces just in from of the building.
After leaving our friendly hosts, we headed home and arrived here just after 3:00pm. The car has been emptied, the clothes sorted and stashed, and all the boxes, bags, luggage, and stuff has mainly been dealt with. Mind you, there will be laundry... And then there's the mail...
The house is in fine order, the orchids blooming profusely, and once more, the world is unfolding as it should. Now if spring could just show up at the party...
