Our next morning, Wednesday if we’re keeping track, was our last breakfast in the campervan. By now we had the science of making our turkey bacon, potato, and egg burritos pretty much solved. The only new challenge was cooking them without getting countless mosquito bites. After breakfast we cleaned up and then decided to do a little exploring in the Hapgood Pond recreation area. Our campsite happened to be right next to the trail that leads to the Pond so we took the quarter mile trail to check it out. As it would so happen there were flush toilets (and showers – insert head exploding emoji) in the main recreation area. I only killed four mosquitos while going to the bathroom, much better than fighting off the swarming cloud of flies at the toilet by our campsite. And with that we said goodbye to our last campsite of the trip. Today our objective was to drive to the town of Geneva, which is located at the top of Seneca Lake, where we had rented rooms at the William Smith Inn.
Along the way we had our first “road trip stop.” That being I saw this random giant monument off in the distance and said “what’s that??” To which Adela told me it was the Bennington Battle Monument and then redirected our destination to there. This battle was supposedly where the tide of the war turned from favoring the British to favoring the Revolutionary Army. The gift shop/information center was closed so we relied primarily on Wikipedia for our knowledge of the monument and the corresponding battle. Scenic destination complete, we got back in the van and continued the journey to our next stop: the Women’s Rights National Historic Park in Seneca Falls. It turns out this area of the country was the birthplace of the Women’s Suffrage movement back in the 1800’s! The first meeting was held in Seneca Falls, in a church right next to the visitor center. Progress was lightning fast back then because the first meeting was still presided over by a man. But by the second meeting was presided over by a woman! It was fascinating seeing some of the arguments presented for why women shouldn’t even want the responsibility of voting. Seems like time is a circle with that one. We stayed basically until closing and left with a suitable quantity of merch.
Seneca Falls is pretty close to Geneva, so we just drove straight to the bed and breakfast instead of stopping for food. We were greeted by our hosts, who are an adorable retired(ish) Canadian couple who have been running the bed and breakfast for several years now. They gave us pretty detailed recommendations of where to go, including a heavily circled local map, before escorting us to our room. I think Adela chose the room we were in because it was named after the first woman to go to medical school. For dinner we walked to downtown Geneva and ate at Twisted Rail – a theater converted to a brewery with a railroad theme. It had a lot going on inside, but the food and beer were pretty good. Not quite sated we stopped for some cocktails on the way back at a place recommended by our hosts. We left when it started to get crowded and a little too rowdy for Wednesday night in July.
Breakfast at the William Smith Inn was at nine – which is a solid choice for a relaxing vacation morning. Our hosts were fantastic cooks too. Our first breakfast consisted of some coffee, fresh fruit, banana bread and then a potato, peppers, and poached egg skillet. Shortly after breakfast was done we got picked up for our next adventure: wine tasting along Seneca Lake. We had chosen this tour because it also included lunch at the Belhurst Castle along with tastings as three wineries. The first wine tasting was… low effort to say the least. The second tasting was a little more interactive, and we got to hear the story of the ghost at the house of Miles winery. Supposedly a young couple bought the farmhouse, and shortly after they moved in the husband died trying to change the oil in their lamp. Not too long after his wife also died and now she haunts the winery. The third winery we went to, Fox Run, was by far our best tasting experience of the trip. We had a great “guide” who gave us all the tasting notes for the wines and also gave us her thoughts and kept it interactive. Our fourth winery stop wasn’t very good. Not because of the wine, but just because I don’t recall anyone saying anything to us the whole time we were there. Wine aside, the group we had for the tasting tour was really cool. It was me and Adela, a couple from up from Virginia, and a retired couple from Rochester. We had a great time talking about everything and really brought me back to the wine tour we had in New Zealand where we ended the trip making friends and talking with new people.
We got dropped off early-ish in the afternoon and then got ready for dinner at Sapalta. Our hosts had recommended it to us, and we were able to get a reservation for an outside table. It’s located at the Plum Point Lodge, which is a small hotel basically right on the lake – I think the hotel might even have its own dock that’s how close it is. The food and drinks were absolutely spectacular and were only overshadowed by the scenery. After dinner we sat on a bench right on the lake until the sun started setting. While there we either saw one bald eagle three times (this is the likely scenario) or three different bald eagles. The lake was just so serene in how it reflected the setting sun.
Breakfast the next morning included some delicious lemon blueberry scones and French toast that I think might’ve been soaked in syrup before being served (it was absolutely delicious, so no arguments from me there). After breakfast we packed up and started our road trip down back to Lancaster. First were three more “road trip stops” though! The first stop was to the Muranda Cheese Company, where I think we probably had the most informative tasting of our entire trip. We got a couple bricks of cheese and then started down the highway. Part of the way down we made the executive decision that we needed to stop at Hector winery, if not just to tell Adela’s dad we went there. And our last stop was for some quick fishing at Gillett! Adela couldn’t resist the pull of her fishing rod calling to her that it wanted to be used to catch some fish. The lake looked a little green though, so we were glad we weren’t planning on swimming. We made it back home uneventfully and the next morning drove the campervan back to the totally not sketchy parking lot in Maryland. And yes, of course we stopped at the same Chic-fil-a while we were there.
