Jenny Lake Fun

Happy 4th of July!

We have been so busy living this Jenny Lake life-style, that it has been difficult to find time to do a blog update! But here it goes.

We arrived here Tuesday afternoon, in time to have a great dinner with Gram and GrandDad. It was a beautiful day with more promised in the forecast. Wednesday dawned clear and sunny so Jim and I drove to the Conklinville Dam, parked the car and started our bike ride around this end of the Sacandaga Lake. This is probably my most favorite bike ride, with an exception possibly being the last day of any RAGBRAI ride! This loop around the North Shore Road, across the Batchlorville (sp?) Bridge, and back on the South Shore Road, provides 30 miles of hills (both up and down!)  and beautiful scenery. I love riding across the bridge, but I know some people do not. We go early enough in the morning that we get to smell breakfast cooking as we ride by some homes and do not have to deal with too much traffic. Add in a stop at the County Store after 16 miles of riding for a treat, and it is a great ride. Here is the view from the front porch of the Country Store.

We did that ride today also (Friday). If the weather cooperates, I will ride my bike on Sunday from camp, down the mountain and head home. I will ride about 30 miles and then Jim will pick me up with the Beetle and we will continue to Rochester. 

We have been swimming and out in the rowboat. Jim has caught several fish. I have been spinning and today got my plied yarn into skeins with Jim's help.  We then took the 2 skeins of Syracuse Orange yarn down to the lake, dipped them in and the skeins are now drying on the deck. I am really pleased with how they turned out. They hang straight, which means that I am not putting too much twist in the fiber as I spin. Practice makes perfect! 

Yesterday was a rainy day, but we did not get any of the severe storms that were a possibility. It was a day off from biking so Jim wanted to go somewhere to run. He suggested that if he ran in Saratoga, I could go to the yarn store there. So that was our plan as we left here at 9:30 AM. Gram came with us to go shopping with me. We dropped off Jim at the Saratoga Springs State Park and we went into downtown. We looked at many beautiful yarns in the yarn store, but came away with all of our money in our pockets! We then visited a couple of other shops, but I am a terrible shopper and was ready to quit after less than an hour! So we returned to the State Park to pick up Jim and he was just finishing up his run. 

Last night we took Gram and GrandDad out to dinner at at restaurant outside of Edinburg, on the North Shore Road. I have seen this restaurant every time I ride this loop, so we decided to give it a try. The owner told us that they were a bit overwhelmed with the crowd that showed up on a Thursday night, so the service was pretty slow. The food was OK and we enjoyed the local flavor of the place. On our way to the restaurant, we stopped in Edinburg to check out the covered bridge that spans a creek there and read about the history of the place. The photos below show the bridge and the view of the waterfall, as seen from inside the bridge.



It was a very pretty place. This is another spot that I have gone by on my bike many times, but never stopped at because it is right in the middle of a long uphill climb. It was worth the stop in the car this time. After dinner we continued our tour around the Sacandaga Lake and then went into Corinth so Gram could get some books at the library and I could buy some ice cream. In June, when Uncle Bob visited he reported that the recipe for our favorite ice cream, Adirondack Bear Paw had changed and it wasn't as good. I had to see for myself. So I stopped at Stewarts and only bought a pint, because I heard it was going to be a disappointment. Well, I wished I had bought a half gallon because it sure tasted as good as ever to me. Even Gram agrees that my pint tasted like we were used to, not like the stuff they had with Uncle Bob. So maybe Bob got some outdated stuff, but the good news is that all is well in the ice cream world.

I am able to write this entry because of neighbor net here at camp. Howard got high speed internet and we can access it (with his permission) if we sit with the computer out by the wood shed! If you want privacy, I suppose you could sit in the outhouse! 

This last photo was taken on Tuesday before we left for camp when I took Sherri out for her birthday breakfast. As a low-calorie birthday treat, I knit her a cupcake! It turned out quite cute and was a hit!

Life is good here at camp. Hope all is well wherever you are.

Weekend Miles

I've gotten some good biking in this weekend, a good start to my serious training for RAGBRAI. Yesterday morning rain and thunder moved through so I did alot of errands between the rain drops. Then I noticed that the sun was out so I jumped on my bike and rode 26 miles, in the sunshine. I have been doing most of my training rides by myself and I realized that Bob K. was home alone and may want to ride with me today so we made our arrangements. 

Jim and I went to church this morning and heard a good sermon about Random Acts of Kindness. After we got home, I changed into my biking clothes, ate a PB&J sandwich and waited for Bob to arrive. We decided that we would ride a loop with Bob riding here and then we would ride together for a while, going back to his house and then I would ride home from there. While at church, I invited Jim and Pam to ride with us since Bob and I could take a route right past their house. So that's what we did. Unfortunately, right before we arrived at J & P's, Pam hurt her back while pulling a couple of weeds. She tried to ride  her bike but knew that it wasn't going to work before she got to the end of her driveway. So, it was me and the guys. 

We ended up doing 40 plus miles with threatening skies approaching as we dropped off Bob at his house. Jim and I rode as fast as I could taking note of the changable winds and the sudden temperature drop. About 5 minutes after I got home, the thunder started shaking the shutters and shortly after that the rain started. Not a gentle rain that an experience rider could manage, but a torrential downpour with lots of thunder and lightening that an experienced rider knows is a dangerous situation. Jim had to seek shelter under the eaves of a house not far from here and called Pam to come to pick him up. A wise choice indeed! 

Jim and Corey are watching the TV coverage of the Track and Field Olympic trials. There is never enough quality coverage of track according to those guys!

Here are a couple of photos that may be of interest. The first one is one that Tucker sent of him and his colleagues with the snowman they built at the end of May in La Sal, UT. 

This photo is a bad representation of the Baby Surprise Jacket that I made for the baby that one of my colleagues  is expecting. The dark stripes are green and navy blue but that is difficult to tell. I do like that pattern and the "surprise" part of the jacket is the design of the pattern. One piece of fabric is knitted and then magically folded up so that the only seams that need to be sewn are the shoulder seams. 

Tomorrow I have to start to pack for our trip to Jenny Lake on Tuesday. We will be there from July 1-6. 

Hope all is well.