From June 25 – June 30, my husband John and I were in the Boise, ID, area. We chose Boise because we wanted to do something memorable for our 25th anniversary, and I’d never been to Idaho. We divided our time between walking around the downtown-Boise State U. area and hiking on trails in Bogus Basin, which is north of town. I think Righteous Basin is a better name.
The weather for the first few days was completely clear and the sky was so dark it looked like the underside of a turquoise bowl. In the pictures where the sky is darker than the land, that’s not the camera being weird. The dark blue persisted once some clouds came in a few days into our trip. High temperatures were — and remember that it was a dry heat, so you didn’t sweat, you just grew salt crystals — 94 to 104 degrees, depending on the day. It was surprisingly not oppressive. And for a week or two before we arrived, Boise had gotten an unusual amount of rain. This meant the grasses and wildflowers were unusually lush.
In the town itself, there are lots of trees. Boise’s town planners long ago decided it would be a good idea to have 25 miles of walking and biking paths through woods, parks, and other green spaces along the Boise River, and some of the pictures show how green it is. Boise has a population of about 600,000, which is half the state’s population. There were many pride flags, interesting art, a memorial park to Anne Frank that is in the picture where John is reading the memorial, a great farm-to-fork restaurant, and an excellent boutique hotel (Inn at 500 Capital Street) that was also friendly and affordable.
Heading away from town to the north you get to sagebrush steppe hills, which were astonishing. We saw at least 15 kinds of grasses and many kinds of wildflowers, some of which are in the pictures of a low altitude (appx. 3,000 feet) trail we hiked in Bogus Basin on our first day there: the ironically named Dry Creek Trail. We made up names: art deco green spire grass, iridescent ponytail grass, fluffy chartreuse waterfall grass, blue wavy grass, mauve bushy top grass, and so on. We couldn’t walk more than 10 feet without stopping to look at more grass.
Farther up in the hills, above about 5,000 feet, is where the pine forest starts. John and I did most of our hiking here, specifically on Freddy’s Stack Rock Trail. This is a 12.5-mile lollypop-shaped trail that has lots of views but surprisingly little elevation change. It snakes along many hills, each of which has two microclimates. On the north-facing slopes are pine and hardwood forests that are refreshingly shady. These get enough mist that club moss grows on the pines, which look like Muppet trees. On the south-facing slopes is sagebrush steppe with expansive views. Stack Rock is a large formation at the far end of the round part of the lollypop. If you pull in on the nobbier part of it in the picture, you can see a guy free soloing it. It’s bigger and a lot taller than it might seem.
John and I would go back to Boise, especially at the time of year we went. This is because we’re more into hiking than downhill skiing, which is also a big deal there.
After visiting our son Nathan, daughter-in-law Bri, and our 4-month-old granddaughter Eliza in Boston, Randy and I camped at Lafayette Place campground in New Hampshire.
The campground was all right but somewhat noisy because of its proximity to a super highway.
In the morning we set off up to the Greenleaf hut, which is at the base of Mt. Lafayette. As we went up, the going got rougher, with boulders to navigate at every step.
But after a 2,500′ elevation gain we arrived at the hut, a very nice place where you can reserve a sleeping mat in a bunk bed along with dinner and breakfast for about $135 a night.
We enjoyed our lunch with a grand view and headed back down, which was the hardest part.
All photos by Nancy L. and Randy O. There are lots more beautiful pictures in their photo album.
I was reviewing some of the older pages here last night while I sat in on Nancy H’s writing group on Meetup. After reviewing Stephens older post on his personal favorite top 12 hikes I decided it was a good time for me to compile my own list. I’ll probably have more commentary associated with my choices than Stephen had for his.
In no particular order:
1- Monkey Run, North side. Currently hike #5-01 on our hikes page. This is one of our go-to hikes that we’ve done repeatedly since I’ve been with the group, and it never fails to be a fun hike for me.
2- Kennedy State Forest. Cortland county. Hike # 36-1. Another of our hike standards. I was worried that recent logging work in the area would ruin the appeal of this hike for me, but the logging had minimal impact on the FLT footpath through the forest.
3- Shindagin Rim Trail. Hike #26. A very visually enjoyable hike for me.
4- Monkey Run south side. Hike #6. This route has so much to offer in terms of visuals and just sheer fun for me while I’m hiking this trail!
5- Six Mile Creek South Hill Rec Way from Crescent. Hike #2. While the hike route itself is very nice in its own right, I’m always amazed that this hike exists so close to the city of Ithaca.
6- Lower Treman Loop. Hike #8-02. I took the existing lower Treman out-and -back FLT hike and made it a loop hike by adding the Rim and Gorge Trails. I worked at the two Treman state parks for many years in the 70s and 80s, and this hike covers parts of my favorite trails in Robert Treman State Park.
7- Hammond Hill State Forest. Hike # 31-5. A recent addition to our hike options for Hammond Hill, this route covers just about all of my favorite parts of the state forest as it starts from Star Stanton Hill Rd and takes hikers in a clockwise loop hike over the green and yellow trails.
8- Potato Hill State Forest Hike #29-1. The FLT from Level Green Rd to Blackman Hill Rd and beyond. This hike has only gotten better after the recent footpath changes.
9- Virgil Mountain, Cortland County. Hike #40. I’m not normally a fan of the out-and-back hikes, but I like this one.
10- Dabes Diversion Loop, Cortland County. Hike #48-1. Combines Dabes Diversion Loop, the FLT and the Kuzia Cutoff into a fun loop hike in any season. Some nice views across the fields at the junction of Dabes and the FLT!
11- The FLT from Eastman Hill Rd, Tompkins/ Tioga county line. Hike # 50. While parts of the abandoned parts of Eastman Hill Rd make this loop hike somewhat sketchy in bad weather, the rest of the hike makes up for it. We’ll be losing this part of the FLT soon due to a trail re-direction.
12- Loop Trail: Bald Hill Rd to Dianes Crossing and back on the FLT. Hike # 20. Combines parts of the Abbott Loop, Doves Trail and the FLT into a loop hike worthy of being on my favorites list.
Honorable mention:
13- Fischer Old Growth Forest. Hike #15. This is a great hike locale, but the fact that we can’t *quite* get a two hour hike out of this one keeps it out of my top 12 list
14- Lick Brook. Hike # 7. This hike is a favorite for many hikers in the group, but for whatever reason doesn’t quite make my top 12 list.
15- Lime Hollow, Cortland County. Hike #37. While this is a little more of a “civilized hike” than the others on the list, we have a nice route we hike in this nature preserve that I find very enjoyable.
Eleven hikers met in Cortland County for a hike of the Lime Hollow Nature Preserve. There were no dogs, due to preserve policies.
Some hikers had voiced concerns about overgrown trails, but we found the grassy trail portions to be mowed and well maintained; we observed a couple of different trail maintainers along our route on this hike day.
It was a pleasant day for a hike as we made our way down the Lehigh Valley Trail to the High Vista Loop. After circling Baldwin Pond, we returned to Lehigh Valley, crossing that trail and continuing south on Hermits Way. We then returned north via Fen Way to the Lehigh Valley trail.
By that time, we’d hiked fast enough that we crossed over Lehigh Valley and continued on Fen Way before turning south on the Art Trail, in order to burn up some extra minutes.
We hiked back to the parking area on Gracie Road, with some hikers opting to end their hike early. The rest of the group continued on Lehigh Valley to Maple Run and the Chicago Bog. We changed up directions a bit here as I unintentionally took a wrong turn in the maze of trails, so we ended up doing the Phillips Memorial Trail as well as the Esker Connector in the opposite direction of how we normally hike those trails. The change of direction was actually quite nice, so we may do that route in the future.
After completing those loops we returned to our cars with just a few minutes to spare in our allotted hike time.
Photos by Mary W.
Saturday July 2
Shindagin Hollow State Forest
Hike report by Jim
Fifteen hikers and two dogs met on a cool, damp morning. The ground was slightly wet from the overnight rain but not badly so, as it seemed that most of the rain had been absorbed into the ground.
This was a bit of an unusual hike. Historically the Braley Hill to Shindagin Rd hike on the FLT is an out-and-back hike. Like many in the group, I tend to prefer a loop hike over an out-and-back hike that covers the same ground
I had looked over the various Shindagin maps and thought that we could try a somewhat different hike route by incorporating some of the bike trails into our route. Often this is not possible on summer weekend hikes due to the number of mountain bikers, but for whatever reason the bike trails on this day were empty.
I arrived early and hiked one of the bike trails a short distance in from the road. Once the group arrived, I proposed that we try something different by walking the outbound leg on bike trails and the return leg on the FLT. The group was up for the new experience, so we headed south on the blue trail #6 from Braley Hill Rd.
This proved to be a great hiking experience, with wide trails that were well maintained, as were the various wooden bridges and trail maintenance in general.
Trail 6 winds its way along streambeds, through stands of pines and hardwoods.
Unlike the return leg , much of the initial outbound leg of the hike was more or less a straight trip with only a turn or two.
Eventually we encountered some campers along the trail before coming out onto the southernmost parking area on Braley Hill Rd. Having missed the turn to the blue 4 trail that would have taken us north towards the FLT, we corrected this mistake and set off on the blue 4 trail. Unlike the blue 6 trail, had a number of 90 and 180 degree turns along the route, but this was still a very enjoyable trail passing through a variety of terrain.
Part of our problem during this hike was that before leaving my house I’d been looking at the Shindagin bike trail map, but had left that map on the table. During the hike I had only the FLT and snowmobile trail maps, neither of which lists the bike trails by color or number; anyone attempting this hike in the future should bring the current color DEC bike trail map.
In addition to the various twists and turns of the trail on the return leg, the bike trail splits at various points and isn’t always blazed with the blue trail discs at regular intervals. This required stopping periodically at intersections to confirm that we were in fact headed in the correct direction.
Eventually, believing that we’d missed our intersection with the FLT we opted to take a snowmobile trail directly back to Braley Hill Rd. In fact, we had made that turn just before crossing the FLT, so we found ourselves coming out onto Braley Hill Rd immediately south of our parking area at exactly the two hour mark. Either hiking an additional distance on blue trail 4, or jumping back onto blue trail 6 from the snowmobile trail would have accomplished the same result.
A light rain started to fall almost as soon as we reached our cars.
Despite the glitches I believe that everyone enjoyed this as a substitute for the regular FLT hike, so I’ll be adding it to our Shindagin hikes.
Bock Harvey Forest Preserve and Riemen Woods, Enfield
Hike report by Jim
Sunday’s hike included 21 hikers and two dogs. The day turned out to be sunny, with light breezes — an almost perfect day to be in the woods.
We set off from the parking lot and stopped at the lean-to for a group photo. From there, we churned our way up the blue-blazed access trail to the white-blazed FLT.
We made our way to Porter Hill Rd and crossed that into the Rieman Woods, where we seemingly flew down the loop, soon finding ourselves back on Porter Hill Rd. Walking back to the FLT we returned to the woods, hiking east and north through woods and open fields. The group was abuzz with conversation, a happy conga line of hikers behind me. At one point, several hikers discovered a mass of ripe raspberries along the trail and all forward momentum temporarily stopped until the berry pickers had completed their task.
When we came out out onto Rockwell Rd., some hikers chose to end their hike early, and road-walked back to their cars. The rest of us turned around and retraced our path along the FLT until we re-entered the Bock Harvey boundaries. Once there, we jumped on the yellow-blazed trail back to our cars and the end of the hike.
A warm welcome to Aiko on her first hike with the group!
For anyone working toward an FLT60 patch, this hike counted as 1 FLT mile.
Photos by Gilbert
View Gilbert’s professional photography website here: gilbertbhammer.com
FLT South from Harford Slaterville Rd. through Robinson Hollow State Forest
Hike report by Jim
Eleven hikers met on Harford Slaterville Road on a warm, sunny day for an out-and-back hike on the Finger Lakes Trail. There is a beaver pond at the trailhead, and as we set out several hikers watched a beaver swim across the pond toward the lodge.
The trail goes gradually uphill from Harford Slaterville Rd. Then we encountered rolling terrain with gentle elevation changes. After we crossed an old stone wall, the trail went steadily downhill to the turn-around point.
Before we turned around, we explored the ruins of an old homestead, including a partial foundation and fragments of what we thought was an old woodstove.
Throughout the hike, there was minimal mud on the footpath, and we returned to our cars on time.
Photo by JimIf you look closely, you can see a swimming beaver in the foreground, carrying some leaves back to the lodge.Photos by Leigh Ann
A group of 14 hikers and 3 dogs met near the Connecticut Hill cemetery on a beautiful morning for a look at areas new to many and get a glimpse of the area’s history.
We descended a long hill to a stream crossing marked by pilings at the site of a bridge now long gone. (I surmised it may have been wiped out in the Flood of ’35, a major event that affected the entire Southern Tier: https://www.pbs.org/video/upstate-history-documentaries-flood-35/.)
We followed the old roadbed beside a tributary creek to the site of another bridge, this one retaining the steel joists of the bed. From there, the trail wandered on along the creek to rejoin the old road just short of the gravel bank to which it had provided access. A steep climb to the top of the bank provided a view of another of the foothills, before we headed on to complete the loop.
Another 45 minutes of deep forest, rolling hills, stream crossings, and an invigorating climb brought us back to the cars just three minutes short of the two-hour goal.
Most of the group stuck around to explore the cemetery, an interesting mix of 19th-century tombstones and evidence of recent rituals.
The entire time, the weather remained clear, and the temperature comfortable, with a welcome breeze now and then. A good day!
Photo by Nancy H.
Sunday June 26
Deputron Hollow Road and Olsefski Road, Danby
Hike report by Jim
Fourteen hikers and two dogs hiked from the junction of East Miller and Marsh roads in the town of Danby to Deputron Hollow Rd., for an out-and-back hike. The day was sunny and dry; we had some decent winds cooling us down as we progressed downhill on Deputron Hollow Rd. The sun and leaves combined to make pools of shadow on our journey; before I realized how far we’d come we were stepping out onto the paved bottom part of Deputron Hollow Rd. near Coddington Rd.
We got to Coddington Rd. with five minutes to spare for the outbound leg of the hike. After pausing for a quick photo and to make way for some vehicle traffic, we began the return journey back up the hill. The breezes that had been our companion on the first hour seemed to dissipate almost entirely, and other than the periodic pools of shadow along our route there was little to shield us from the sun and humidity.
Despite this we soon found ourselves back at our cars, saying our goodbyes and already planning the next hike.
Warm welcome to Hollie and Brian, on their first hike with the group!
