Report to Hikers: week of Oct 8-Oct14

 

Hello Hikers!

 

Wed Oct 10

Six Mile Creek, south side rim trail starting at Crescent Place

There’s a little story with this photo  —  the hikers abruptly decided to start walking a few minutes before we were scheduled to depart  —  you can see me in my bike helmet in the right background shouting and cursing at them to wait until 9:30  —  they just kept going

Won’t happen again ….

Official head count:  19H, five D

More photos:

Annie

 

 

 

Sat Oct 13

Hammond Hill SF, ski trails in the north and eastern areas

Another rainy Saturday morning ….

The woods looked great in the gloomy, misty atmospherics  —  I had a wonderful time

Two hikers failed to make it back to the cars with the rest of us  —  luckily, one had a working phone, not always the case here  —  they’d fallen behind and gotten lost  —  no map  —  the trails in this part of the forest are completely confusing and it took us a while to figure out by phone where they were, referring to a good map that Tiger had the foresight to bring  —  they made it out 45 minutes after everyone else …. a little distressed by the experience

Official head count:  16H, nine D

More photos:

Jack V

Get-together at Hopshire to look at Jack V’s photo show

A lot of fun  —  pizza and sandwiches in addition to the usual salty snacks

 

 

 

Sun Oct 14

Bock Harvey Forest Preserve, Enfield

Official head count:  26H, eight D

More photos:

Annie

Jack V

Report to Hikers: week of Oct 1-Oct 7

 

Hello Hikers!

 

Wed Oct 3

Treman SP  —  west on the FLT from Route 13

Another rainy dark morning  —  but the rain was so light it hardly registered under the trees, and we had a lovely walk

Official head count:  14H, five D

More photos:

Annie

Jack V

 

 

 

Sat Oct 6

Shindagin Hollow SF, Braley Hill Road to Shindagin Hollow Road on the FLT

The forecast just before the hike said it wouldn’t rain until afternoon  —  but it started to look ominous at the trail head, and then it got exceptionally dark in the woods  —  started to rain about 1/3 of the way into the hike  —  then it started to pour  —  I hadn’t brought a rain coat

Luckily it was very mild, and the rain slacked off after a while

Fantastic atmospherics

It was very muddy in spots and very wet in spots  —  we had a visiting hiker who wore dress shoes and corduroy pants  —  he somehow managed to navigate without getting any mud on himself

Official head count:  18H, three D

 

 

 

Sun Oct 7

Michigan Hollow Road to The Pinnacles Look-out on the south leg of the Abbot Loop, Danby SF

One of our muddiest hikes ever, and generally very slippery  —  slow going for most of us, but  a small group managed to race up to the Pinnacles and get back  in two hours despite the poor walking conditions

Official head count:  26H, eight D

More photos:

Annie

 

Report to Hikers: week of Sept 24-Sept 30

 

Hello Hikers!

 

Thursday Sept 27

YMCA and EcoVillage property, West Hill

Official head count:  14H, four D

More photos:

Annie

 

 

Sat Sept 29

Van Lone Loop, Schuyler County, followed by a get-together at Randy and Nancy’s house near Jacksonville

Official head count:  21H, five dogs

More photos:

Annie

Jack V

Get-together

This was extremely pleasant  —  lots of great food  —delightful way to wrap up a distant hike

Randy, who is the hiking group’s official chicken cook, grilled chicken skewers and shitake mushrooms; Nancy made a cake and a couple of dips.

 

 

Sun Sept 30

Monkey Run Natural Area, south side of Fall Creek in Varna

It was raining lightly but steadily before hike time  —  this possibly (probably) caused some people to stay home  —  the rain stopped shortly after we stepped off  —  fantastic atmospherics for the rest of the walk

Official head count:  13H, three D

More photos:

Jack V

 

 

Report to Hikers: week of Sept 17-Sept 23

 

Hello Hikers!

 

Wed Sept 19

Bald Hill Road to Smi9ley Hill Road and beyond on the FLT, Danby SF

Official head count:  20H, six D

More photos:

Jack V

 

 

Sat Sept 22

Roy H Park Preserve, Dryden, followed by an 87th-birthday toast to Eckhart at Hopshire Brewery, Freeville

Official head count:  32H, 10 D

Get-together at Hopshire

 

 

Sun Sept 23

Monkey Run Natural Area, north side of Fall Creek at Hanshaw Road

Official head count:  18H, five D

 

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Here are the last of our current regular hikers

 

 

 

Dave and Joanna  —  Joanna retired as a teaching assistant at IHS for 26 years (math specialist in special ed dept, then math and science computer lab tech specialist).  Dave retired as a math teacher at IHS  —  he is the author of several top-selling math textbooks and workbooks.  They spend part of the year near Asheville, NC.

 

 

 

 

Gopi  —  HS math teacher  —  later spent 28 years living and working at an ashram in the Catskills

 

Report to Hikers: week of Sept 10-Sept 16

Hello Hikers!

Special report this week:  Meet our regulars!

We’ve accumulated a large number of subscribers to this web site  —  there are 314 as I’m writing this  —  but the number of people who actually hike with us is a lot smaller.  That leaves a lot of subscribers who, if they look at the photos, probably don’t have any idea who’s pictured  —  they just see the same anonymous faces week after week.  Today I’m going to introduce everyone to the real people in the shots, so you can get a better idea of who we are.

The hikers pictured below are the regulars who hiked with us on at least one of the three hikes we did this past week.

Photos from Wednesday:

(If you click the photos you will see a larger very crisp version)

Jim  —  deputy sheriff  —  Ithaca native

Stephanie  —  real estate investor and landlord  —  McLean native

Norm  —  independent native plants field investigator, specializing in moss and liverworts

Dick  —  retired chemistry professor SUNY Cortland  —  spends the winter in Virgin Islands

Judith  —  retired labor economics consultant in NYC  — married to Dick

Robin  —  retired graphic artist who created the Silk Oak clothing and home furnishings line  —  later a special ed teacher  —  currently has a blog

Virginia  —  fine arts painter  —  retired art teacher at CSMA

Elizabeth  —  retired Cornell neurobiology professor

Regulars who hiked Saturday:

Casey  —  independent saw doctor (saw filer) to the sawmill industry  —  participates in organized go-kart and frozen-lake car racing

Linda  —  recently moved here from Memphis  —  retired clinical psychologist

Dennis F  —  retired math teacher  —  active stock market investor and trader

Moc  —  retired computer engineer  —  spends half the year in Venice, FL

Jack V  —  retired math instructor at IC  —  official Ithaca Hikers nature photographer

Bud  —  retired soil scientist for the US government, based in Ithaca

Eckhart  —  retired commercial horticulturist  —  retired part-time Cornell librarian  —  our most senior hiker

Leigh Ann  — social psychology professor at IC

Dave R  —  retired librarian at SUNY Cortland  —  part-time labor organizer

Regulars who hiked Sunday

Dennis R  —  retired social psychology professor at Cornell  —  married to Elizabeth

Roger  —  owns a company that buys, leases and sells heavy construction equipment  —  native of McLean

Nancy H  —  part-time writing instructor at IC  —  technical writer  —  author of a 6-book urban fantasy novel series available at Amazon

Tiger and me  —  photo taken at Dryden Lake  —  Tiger is the official hike photographer  —  retired textile artist and fine arts painter in NYC  —  I was a civil engineer in NYC  —  moved to Ithaca 2003

There are other regulars  —  I’ll get to them sometime ….

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Hike report:  Wed Sept 12

Ellis Hollow Nature Preserve

Official head count:  13H, two D

Hike report  —  Sat Sept 15

Woodard Road east into upper Treman SP on the FLT

Official head count:  25H, seven D

More photos:

Jack V

Hike report  —  Sun Sept 16

Layen Road to Bruce Hill Road and beyond, Danby

Camera shoot-out in the big field

We wanted to do a group portrait with Eckhart in honor of his 87th birthday, which is coming this week.  It turned into an experiment.  I lined the hikers up with the sun behind them, though many of them protested that they should be facing the other way.

Jack V was one of the people who said I had the lighting wrong.  He turned the group around so the sun was shining straight on them.

What was the difference caused by the direction of the sunlight?  Here are close-ups from each photo  —  judge for yourself.

Mine:

Jack’s:

Can you see the difference?  Do you have a preference?

…. Back to the walk ….

We had some unwanted excitement.  The walk includes a short but very steep hill that you have to navigate very carefully.  Several hikers were stung going up the hill on the outbound leg  —  quite a few more were stung coming back down.  Most people got stung more than once.

Official head count:  30H, five D

More photos:

Jack V