Tail O the Pup

First, I have to be honest. I love this place. This pic from last year sums it up. It is cheesy, touristy, mediocre food , high prices but I love the concept: outside, picnic tables, ribs, lobster, live music, outdoor pool tables, fire pit, playground, big cold beers, bottles of root beer for kids. The boys talked me into going tonight because it had been "weeks" since we were there. They left me to play pool and I realized I even liked it without a big table of friends or family. Really fun. I had blackened tuna sandwich and it was... pretty ok. To get there from Lake Placid, take 86 toward Saranac Lake and you'll see it on the left after you pass hwy 35 intersection. Look for the gigantic lobster.

Our Day at Lake Colby Beach

Not a Lazy Sunday

So after a late wake up due to watching serious films like Planes, Trains, Automobiles and Starsky & Hutch, we certainly made the most of today. We started out at the Wild Center. I had heard all the hype but I have to say it was really impressive. Small indoor exhibit space but very well done. I don't know if it was the way it was executed or the fact that it felt closer to the boys' world but they were much more interested in reading and learning about the environment, flora, fauna, wildlife etc. than a typical museum. The otters were of course a big hit. Then we hiked the outside trails for a bit. Loved the parking designations. Twas embarrassing to be in our big gas guzzler and that's a good thing. After that it was on to Oscar's first golf lesson. Saranac Inn Golf Course offers junior golf clinics from 4-6 pm Sunday all summer for $10. Bargain! After that.....well we had to pass Donnelly's on our way home.. and it seemed a tragedy to keep driving right? Donnelly's, it is a summer ice cream institution. One flavor a day, pick your size and grab a space on the grass for a fantastic view of a few of the high peaks. For flavor schedule, see sidebar

Night on the town

Last night we dropped the kids off at the Palace Theatre in Lake Placid to catch a movie. This theatre is one of those great old-fashioned places, beautiful decor, community atmosphere, great prices. The kids chose "Live Free or Die Hard". Not one I would have chosen but it was intense negotiation as Clarke wanted to see Harry Potter and Oscar wanted to see Ratatouille and neither wanted to see Transformers. Joe and I headed across the street to the Brown Dog Cafe (you'll notice that most of these places don't have websites so I sometimes will link to another review with address etc.). We started off with a lovely Miner Viognier at the bar while we waited for our table. There are only about 6 tables in the restaurant with a big window overlooking Mirror Lake which make a really great atmosphere. We split the duck quesadillas, a Joe non-negotiable and jumbo prawn (they were the size of Oscar's head) with mint, spring pea risotto and asparagus, a Bridget non-negotiable. We ordered a Pinot which was "eh" and then I had a yummy dessert wine from Hungary, called tokaji. Really subtle and lovely with a beautiful pinkish color. Somehow we skipped dessert. Shocking but the items looked terrific anyway. Overall, the food was really well prepared and the menu was creative and fun, while still showing the favorites of the area - meat! As this was a wine bar, the selection was great. Service was efficient but not overly friendly or helpful. After dinner we were walking to meet boys and stumbled upon them on the street. Joe and I hung back and watched them. They had snuck into a candy store and were walking down the street with their bottles of root beer, and sharing a bag of candy. It was pretty adorable. They finally caught us and home to the barn we went.

Waterfalls!

Ok, so this isn't all technically hiking just the 46ers. We had to write about this great hike. I found a book at the Regis Canoe Outfitters in Saranac Lake called Adirondack Waterfall Guide: New York's Cool Cascades. (could have bought on amazon for less!). Anyway, there was an amazing 10 mile hike that covered multiple waterfalls. I have been obsessing about waterfalls and thought boys and I would give it a try. Sadly sadly, my dumb camera decided not to work so I took a few shots with my mobile. This was an amazing hike. We started out at the Ausable Club. Incidentally, what a weird place! I felt like I entered 1950. "Nobody puts Baby in a corner". Ok I digress, once we hiked past the plaid wearing, scary people, we turned right at Lake Road and found trailhead of West River Trail. The entire trail is skirting the Ausable River. It was a fantastic hike. Sometimes it was a trickle, sometimes raging, sometimes we were high up looking down and sometimes we could dip our toes in. The first waterfall was Pyramid. We had to go off main trail only about .2 but were quite disappointed. (or we never actually saw the right waterfall.) From there, we headed to WedgeBrook waterfall, which was absolutely lovely -three different levels with pools and streams between. We had lunch on the rocks there and that had to decide if we were going to continue because we had only hiked about 3 miles. We decided to definitely make it to Beaver Meadow Falls and then decide from there if we could do Rainbow Falls, the grand-daddy. I am really happy we decided to forge on because the next two were in a different league. At Beaver Meadows, the trail gets you close enough to feel the spray from the streams. It was "magical", as Clarke is fond of saying. Of course, we forged on to Rainbow after that. It was really beautiful and the grandest. It was more difficult to get up close to Rainbow then the others. I had the boys crocs in my bag but it was looking like rain and we decided to high-tail it outta there. The great news is the Lake Road is accessible from Rainbow so we didn't have to take trail back, as the boys were getting pretty tired. Lake Road is a flat road that runs parallel to the East and West River Trails. You miss all the beauty and fun but it direct, and paved, and flat - so a great way to head home. We hiked about 8 miles total. Then of course, we called Joe(who was working all day) to meet us at Casa Del Sol for dinner. Margaritas and shirley temples for all my friends

Giant

For # 3 of our 46er summits, we decided to do Giant Mt. It was our longest and hardest climb to date. I will let the boys add any details but Joe and I were absolutely amazed at their stamina and good nature. We hiked for over 7 hours including ascent and descent. It was only a 3.1 mile hike to the summit but it was steep from the moment the trail started. There was also quite a bit of bouldering. We took the shorter Ridge Trail, not the Roaring Brook trail. We had heard the Roaring Brook had a path along a waterfall but was longer. Nevertheless, we were treated to a few small waterfalls along our hike too. We also came upon a really neat lake, about 3/4 of the way up, called the Giant Washbasin. We were really running out of steam and Oscar was ahead. We saw him scamper up a boulder and then turn, smile and raise his hands above his head. We knew we made it! Summit was crowed but fun. There were a few cute dogs to pet and we had a lovely picnic lunch. Descent was tough because of the boulders and incline. Clarke was challenged by a sore twisted ankle but handled. Lots of falling and slipping and sliding. At the end of the day, we all enjoyed a great sunset and evening. I made shrimp fajitas and the boys had root beers. Joe and I were struggling to keep our eyes open and the boys were....outside playing baseball. Youth! We think for our next we will get a very early morning start (before 7am) so we can relax a bit on the way up.

Cascade and Porter

We did this on April 1st, but when we were publishing this, it got lost and we didn't save it. We tried to remember it.

For our first 46er, we decided to do Cascade. It was the beginning of spring, so there was snow and ice on the ground which made my shoes slippery, even though it was somewhat warm outside. This made the whole hike a little bit harder. In the beginning of the hike, we could hear the streams under the ice. The hike was pretty easy for a 46er mountain. We decided to eat lunch at a spot about 7/8 of the way up to the top. It had a great view. At the end it was completely bald and me and my crazy little brother Oscar rock climbed very fast. At the summit we touched the summit marker, looked at the view for 5 minutes and went back down.
When we reached the cutoff to Porter, we decided to do it since we had lots of energy left. So we went off. We were all together, until me and my mom started to go ahead. All the sudden Oscar and my dad were way behind us, we stopped and called their name; no reply. We decided they probably had to stop to tie Oscar's shoe or something like that, so we kept going. The sign said it was only .8 miles to Porter, but we were pretty sure we should have seen it by now. We realized we should go back when there were signs to go to some place called "the garden". So we went back, very confused, to find Oscar and dad. We were calling for them for at least 20 minutes until we got a reply. We finally found them , and went back to our car. We got there just before sundown.

When we got home, we researched and found that Porter is the only 46er without a summit marker.

Clarke