One More Small Adventure Along The Way

The dogs and I had passed through the town of Tupper Lake on our way through the Adirondacks heading toward the farm for a visit. We were on the final leg of the trip, Route 458, when I noticed that the gates into a favorite section of State land had been opened for the season. So I turned the car onto the tiny dirt road and ascended a very steep hill. When I parked and let the dogs out, they immediately ran toward an old cabin. It had formerly been closed up and locked, but that day the door was wide open:

No shrinking violets, my dogs ran boldly inside to check it all out:

My guess is that this had once been someone's private hunting cabin until New York State purchased the land. It's been closed up and locked ever since - until, that is, some vandals broke open the door. Seamus felt it was his duty to sniff every inch of the place:

When I'd cleared all the dogs out of the cabin, we all took a walk along a narrow dirt road which began in a grassy field and then headed deep into the forest. Now we were on a hike, though I knew it'd have to be a brief one:

The road was level and the walking was easy. The scenery was lovely. Only the black flies spoiled an otherwise perfect moment:

On and on we walked, going deeper into the forest:

But I decided that we had to turn around and go back to the car, especially with Winky along. Otherwise, I'd have wound up carrying him:

When we arrived at the car, my curiosity won out over my good sense. I just had to see where that flat dirt road led to. So we all got back into the car, rolled the windows up to keep out the black flies and headed back into the forest to see where the road would take us. It was several miles before the road began looking unsafe. It took some searching to find a place to turn around, but I did so and we drove back to the highway to finish our journey to the farm: