This spot, the corner of Hill Road and Curtis Road, is a great spot if you’re into road walking. There are three different walks, all excellent, that begin here. Two are woods roads; the one we did is paved.We began by walking east on Hill Road toward South Danby RoadI love rolling hills and old farmhouses nestled in hollows, so I’m a big fan of this stretch of the roadNow we’re on the way back from South Danby Road — great distant view — there’s basically no houses visible from here — you can really see why this is called “Hill” Road if you click on the pphoto and look at how the road undulates and risesThis one stretch past the farm houses looks equally great when you look at it from either directionBack at the starting point, first leg of the walk finishedThe group’s now walking north on Curtis Road toward Route 96BI love overgrown fields like this in winter, especially on a gloomy day Not the most prosperous-looking farm countryside, but very picturesque ….…. assuming you like decayed barnsThis little dome house is quite out of place — straight out of the Whole Earth Catalogue 1970
Stewart Park to the Farmers’ Market along the lake — followed by a belated New Year’s get-together
I was afraid we’d have to start the walk in the rain, but the storm (which wasn’t predicted) moved off shortly before hike time. One result was that the only people who turned out were hikers who don’t stay home just because they might get wetThe storm left behind some fantastic atmosphericsNot everyone shown ….
Get-together at the small pavilion in Stewart Park
The weather changed shortly before we got back to the pavilion — sun came out — wind picked up a littleThe breeze wasn’t all that strong but it was enough to feel really cold if you had your gloves off, which everyone did so they could handle the food. The nagging wind got oppressive and we broke up a little early.
Layen Road to Bruce Hill Road and beyond, Jersey Hill, Danby
Very bad weather was being predicted shortly before hike time — snow and rain likely, and high windsThis walk includes a long stretch through wide open fields — I was here once in the winter when the wind was so fierce we had to turn back after just a couple of minutesIt wasn’t bad at all this time.
Somehow, we never manage to get all the hikers into the formal portraits ….Notice the guy in the black shirt not wearing a jacket? That’s Casey — amazingly cold-hardy — though he suffers from cold hands so he wears fancy heated glovesMaybe the trees that surround the field were holding back the wind — in any case, it wasn’t particularly cold or miserable at alVery nice in the woodsThis is Bruce Hill RoadOnce we reach this point,time starts to run short — there are two attractions to be seen up ahead, a picturesque quarry and another large and dramatic field — unfortunately, if we stop for the quarry, there’s not enough time to reach the field ….We chose to go straight to the field — stood around for a couple of minutes, then had to turn backThere’s a very striking and beautiful gorge in the right side of the photo — too bad you can’t really discern it.
Didn’t rain, no more than a few specks of snow. Very nice walk
Gorge Trail, Mark Smith Road, Finger Lakes National Forest
Part of the fun of hiking out in the country is you get the chance to drive through some wonderful rural scenery on the way to the trail head. I’ve loved this farm house along Mark Smith Road since the first time we came here, years ago. The terrain and the massing of the forest behind create a setting of great appeal and charm, the kind of spot you can spin out an idyllic fantasy about. I grabbed this photo hastily — I need to spend a bit more time next time and see if I can capture the scene better.
That’s the road in the background — gives you an idea of how steeply the trail ascends right off the batAll the ponds were frozen. The ice looked quite thick and I asked for a volunteer to test it out. No takers.It was horribly muddy on the trails on the broad level top of the forest preserve, so we shifted to Burnt Hill RoadWe took a detour to check out this gorgeous pond — there’s a trail that heads through the pine woods in the background, but it’s muddy even in dry weather ….We saw a couple of parked cars — this was the only one in motionThis was a great road for a walk on a gloomy damp mild morning
Another hike morning with a beautiful coat of fresh snow draped over everything.A small group of hikers decided to start early and race well beyond the point we normally turn around — they wanted to see Lucifer Falls. They got back to the cars 20 minutes late. The main group maintained their discipline and didn’t try to start ahead of timeThe snow cover was a bit thin, but deep enough to create a lovely effectThis is one of a handful of spots where everyone is required to pose for an official group photo. The advance group was long gone, of course — four other hikers were also missing from this shot. The Certified Head Count is listed at the end of this report.I managed to squeeze under this fallen log myself — wondered if I’d make it. Most hikers walked around rather than crawl under.The snow was melting fast by the time we got back to the cars
Official head count: 29H, seven D
More photos:
Jack V was with the fast-moving advance group. You can see his shots here
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Want to see a short video of our Christmas get-together?
It turned out Norm made 1:45 video by wandering around and documenting the scene. Good chance to see what our get-togethers are like. Technical note: The video would not open for us in Windows 10, but it worked fine on a tablet computer running Android. The video is here.
Hike #1: Special flat hike from Town Line Road to Yaple Road, Danby
Official head count for the flat hike: 17H, five D
Hike #2: Steep hike along Lick Brook down from Town Line Road to Route 13 and back up
Tiger and I both walked with the flat hikers, so there was no one to take photos or get an official head count for the Lick Brook hike. There were at least 10H and three D that we were aware of — could have been more too ….
Get-together at Katharine’s
Katharine was working under a real handicap to get this event ready — she broke her wrist a few weeks ago and she has a hard cast on her left forearm so she can’t use the hand — still able to pull everything together beautifully — great organization and traffic flow past the food and into the seats — very festive and lively — we left just before 2 pm and people were still coming
Diane’s Crossing to Hill Road and beyond on the FLT, Danby SF
We finally had a sunny morning for a change, and Norm, who’s concerned about sun exposure, decided to try out a nose protector he created from cardboard. His verdict: It worked well
Danby SF: Loop trail from Bald Hill Road to Diane’s Crossing and back
We’ve been very lucky this fall and gotten an unusually large number of mornings with fresh snow draped beautifully over the woods — this one was the best so far — in fact, it was probably the best winter-wonderland scenery we’ve had in some years
Normally I load the hike photos onto the web site in the sequence they were taken, so the hike report becomes a chronological narrative of the walk — this time I’m just putting the most dramatic scenes first, so you can get a quick idea how apectacular it was
This is Michigan Creek looking south from the little footbridge at Diane’s Crossing ….
…. everyone was bowled over by the spectacular scene
This part of Danby SF is a perfect setting for a very clingy snow because of the mix of evergreens, mature deciduous trees with lots of small branches, and thick-growing bushes. The situation was even more special because the snow wasn’t deep, so it wasn’t a struggle to walk, just a little bit slippery
Even the half-mile stretch of road walk looked great — as promised, no traffic ….
Bald Hill Road as we headed south toward the entrance to Dove’s TrailI got this shot from the rear — that’s the official hike photographer Tiger out front — great forest sceneryAt the end of the hike, a few hundred feet from the cars …. typically the draped snow would have started to fall off the branches by this point but it really lasted this time.Everyone was sorry to see this one end
I’m happy to report that we fixed the way the photos display — you can now click on any photo and see a large high-resolution version. I also went back and repaired the links in last week’s hike report so all those photos are now clickable.
Wed Dec 12
New trail from lower Buttermilk Falls SP to the cemetery on Stone Quarry Road
The temperature was just above freezing — the condition when microspikes are likely to clump up and make it almost impossible to walk smoothly. Photo by Jack V
Stevens Suspension Bridge, Forest Home, to the Varna Cliffs in Monkey Run
Official head count: 18H, four D
Sat Dec 15
Special out-of-town hike — Steege Hill, Corning
Photos and hike report by Jack V
Jack’s report: 4 of us did the first of the longer hikes at SteegeHill. We hiked 7 miles in 3 1/2 hours. Steege Hill earned its name ‘hill’, most of the hike was either going up or down. All of the hike was in the woods so there were limited views.
