4th week in the Finger Lakes Region

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Sunday: Went for a hike along 6 mile creek to a small waterfall. I say small but it would probably be a main attraction and large waterfall in any other region 😊 It was pretty warm and the water was very appealing. Unfortunately I didn't remember until today that I got rid of my water sandals in Miami back in March due to being super uncomfortable... and I never replaced them. Copper also is not a water dog. I still need to test if he will swim if I'm in the water. He won't go in on his own, or to chase another dog even. He did a little bit of swimming back in Florida but did not seem to enjoy it. Really missing some water sandals to wade in the creek and cool off- such a perfect place for it but oh well!

Monday: Evening hike to "Tinker Falls". Huge drop for a waterfall but even when it has rained a lot recently the waterfall is pretty low. Still very pretty and you can hike behind the water and not even get very wet with the splash. Since it was a Monday evening I had the entire place to myself. Never saw another person at all- which is quite nice but also sometimes a little creepy when it's that empty.

Thursday: Night 1 of free live outdoor music 😊 Went back to the downtown summer concert series. This time it was a band playing almost exclusively 80s pop cover songs. Defnitely a nice crowd and good weather (though always a big humid here). It was nice to see Copper adapting to the environment. The previous evening he had a little anxiety with the loud noises and people around, but this time he was totally learning it was ok and much more comfortable! Sometimes I wonder about him and how we always go to new places, this showed me he does like returning to places, but at the same time he's learning to be so adaptable it's great.

Friday: Night 2 of free live outdoor music 😊 This time it was on the Cornell campus in their "Arts Quad"- a large grassy area between academic buildings. They do free live music every Friday night in July. A temporary stage was put up and the lawn is nice, big and sprawling with a slight incline too for good viewing. There were a few food trucks that showed up and lots of families and dogs chilling out. The concert ended about 10 minutes before a thunderstorm came in too, such good timing! Also interesting the lead singer in the band was the same as the father/daughter folk duo from the Farm to table dinner a few weeks ago. It was her singing with a different band this time.

Saturday: With the thunderstorm Friday night came slightly cooler weather. I headed to the 3rd main Ithaca state park and gorge called "Taughannock State Park'. I still have not figured out how to pronounce it properly though! One thing I've noticed about all these gorges is the lack of trail name originality or layout. They all have a "Gorge Trail' which heads up the center of the gorge and usually follows the water. Then they have the "Rim Trail" which goes along the Rim of the gorge and has views down. Usually these 2 trails meet to make a loop. Taughannock falls spiced it up and they have a gorge trail, a north rim trail and a south rim trail! Wowza.

Night 3 of free live outdoor music was at Taughannock State park. After the hike I ate a packed dinner and a concert was on the lake front of the park at 7pm. It was the first night of the "Concerts in the park" which runs every Saturday in July and August. It was also the first one since 2019 so pretty awesome to be back. I guess it's not quite free since you do have to pay the state park entry/parking fee. But it would be free if you walked there!

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