Meanwhile Back at the countdown of the states…

Yes! New York State, not the city although I have been to New York City several times.

I have to check off New York State because that’s where I grew up. The old homestead is right in the heart of the Adirondacks.

When I was growing up the town of Bolton was a little place with only one stop light. We joked that there were more bars than churches and for a little town we had a lot of churches, Catholic, Episcopal, Methodist, Baptist.

Our school wasn’t a one room but it was a one building, kindergarten through 12. The size of my class changed a little through the years but most of the folks I graduated with had been in my class from the day I started in kindergarten. Final count of graduates…27.

I didn’t learn to ride a bike until I moved to Massachusetts as an adult. I grew up in the country and I had a horse. Why would I want to pedal up and down those hills when my horse could do the work?

We also had cows and pigs, sheep and goats and chickens as well as my horse. I learned to feed the animals, groom them and muck out stalls. In the fall we butchered some of the animals and my father, and eventually my brothers, went hunting for deer. We all loved venison. Once Lake George froze over we had lake perch to eat. Ice fishing was popular and to this day yellow perch is a favorite dish.

We went tubing on the Schroon River before tubing was popular.

We cut the tall grass in the field…haying we called it….first with teams of draft horses and then later with a tractor. We loaded the hay into wagons with pitchforks.

We didn’t sit inside watching TV. We went outside to play and roamed the fields and woods using our imaginations to avoid the “Indians” or search for “fairy rings “.

I rode the Ticonderoga and the Mini Ha Ha, cruise ships on beautiful Lake George.

I worked with the photographer for the Sagamore  Hotel where I witnessed elaborate dinners and dance lessons on the portico.

Eventually I had to grow up (as much as I ever have…I have a strong streak of Peter Pan Syndrome) and headed to Albany, NY to attend college at SUNY Albany. That was at the end of the 60’s and beginning of the 70’s. The “Free Love” Movement and Hippies predominated. Then the Kent State tragedy cast a pall over the riotous college atmosphere and I headed back to the country.

My visits to New York City have been short. It isn’t my favorite place. I’ve been to stage shows on Broadway and stood in Times Square. I’ve been in Grand Central Station and some of the museums but most of the time my trips are quick hits…run in, do what I must, leave.

Heading off to the west I’ve made it to Buffalo and Niagara Falls. I’ve been there twice but it was many years ago. I’d like to go back again.

Recently I was at a travel show and met a group of travel agents pushing Lake George. I picked up the brochures and by the time I finished reading them I was ready to take my next vacation right back where I grew up.

Glens Falls hosts a Balloon Festival every Fall. I went in 2012.

Missed it this year but am planning for 2014. I haven’t even touched on all there is to do. New York is a big state. There’s a wine section in the Finger Lakes Region and caves to explore.

The “I love NY ” slogan is very fitting. If you go, you’ll love it too.