Up Through Long Lake and Beyond

I was driving up to the farm on Route 30 with all six dogs in the car. I arrived in the Adirondack town of Long Lake and parked near the Adirondack Hotel. When Tropical Storm Irene came through, the road in front of this hotel and the parking lot were flooded right up to the building:

And directly across from the hotel is a beach with pontoon planes parked (docked?), awaiting tourists for sightseeing tours, sportsmen heading for the interior or businessmen in a hurry:

Long Lake is quite beautiful and, needless to say, extremely long. The town and this beach are located at a particularly narrow spot in an otherwise narrow lake:

 There were numerous pontoon planes parked along the shore:

After taking a few pictures, I resumed my journey. But when I passed this magnificent waterway lined with bog plants and spruces and with a mountain for a backdrop, I just had to stop for another photo:

Route 30 is a beautiful road with great scenery:

And I began to pass small ponds as I neared the town (and the lake) of Tupper Lake:

There are lots of ponds just south of Tupper Lake and they sure are spectacular. Notice the clouds drifting across the top of that small mountain. That's one advantage to driving through the Adirondacks in rainy weather. The dogs wanted me back inside the car - either that or they figured they should be allowed out:

All along the shoreline of this pond were birches and other hardwoods showing their autumn colors. Clouds drifted slowly across the mountaintops:

I love watching the clouds moving across the mountains. They seem to skip over the valleys and then get caught on the high points:

The Final Leg Of The Journey Home

The dogs and I had had a grand trip up to the farm and were well along on our return trip home. We'd traveled south through Tupper Lake and Long Lake and then headed southeast on Route 28N towards the Northway, the main highway between Albany and the Canadian border. But it was time for a rest stop, so when I spotted what in sunnier times had been a field of wildflowers, I pulled off the road for the dogs to do their thing:

We headed directly across the little field and down into the brush adjoining the forest. You can see my little red car parked along the road from this location and an abandoned cabin on the opposite side of the road. There was no traffic at all on that chilly Sunday morning:

Wally's eyesight had been problematic all during this trip (he's now permanently on medication for it), but he and Winky had no problems staying with the rest of us:

The big problem was that someone had dumped crackers, cheese and cantaloupe on the ground. The ravens were enjoying a feast when we arrived and scattered to the forest where they croaked angrily until we left. But I didn't want the dogs to eat any of it. As you can imagine, keeping six dogs away from such a dump of crackers and cheese was not easy:

Winky may be getting elderly, but he certainly had no trouble trotting rapidly through the snowy field:

A short video of our rest stop and my efforts at keeping the dogs away from the crackers and cheese:


We loaded ourselves back up into the car and continued on our way. But only a short way farther I passed this historic marker and just had to investigate:

Directly behind the sign was this abandoned building, a remnant of the days of Teddy Roosevelt:

It must have been a grand old inn back in 1901, but it's now only a shell:

This was the final leg of our journey home and the views of the mountains, some nearby and some distant, were beautiful:

Just before joining the busy highway I took this photo of two houses with world class views. Then it was time to join the rat race south toward Albany:

From Tupper Lake To Long Lake

Tupper Lake, the actual lake that is, extends from north of the town of the same name down past the heart of the town and continues to the south below the town. It's a large, long lake. Although it has a town on its eastern shore, it appears to me to be pretty much wilderness on its western shore. So as I continued my homeward journey, I also continued to drive alongside Tupper Lake:

There's a long stretch right in the town where the highway skirts the lake and pull-offs are provided for tourists such as myself to stop for the wonderful scenic views:

The two Papillon puppies watched out the window at the passing scenery when they weren't snoozing. In the back, Seamus is also a big scenery watcher but the other three just sleep:

South of town, the lakeside scenery becomes wilder, more classically Adirondack:

There were small islands dotting the lake:

It was a serene winter landscape and I noticed that the surface ice was less extensive at this southern end of the lake:

But we were driving south and heading toward the next town named after a lake, Long Lake:

In the town of Long Lake I stopped at the remarkably styled Hoss's Country Store with its birch siding and twig art railings:

On the front porch were bears, eagles and other critters of various (but all large) sizes, made of stuffed fabric or carved wood:

Inside was a giant stuffed plush bear. This was my favorite:

So I set my camera on a shelf and took a photo with Mr. Bear. But we were heading home and I had to get back in the car and continue the journey. I'll continue the postings about the trip tomorrow: