Journey to Keene Valley

[nibot]

View from the road.

I couldn't sleep one night (a consequence of a diet of chocolate and coffee), and, laying awake, I suddenly realized it was July. July! You'd think I'd have realized it from the fireworks outside. But July meant Bree's birthday, and suddenly the Adirondack trip became mandatory. Even if small matters such as how to get home again were not yet figured.

I tagged along with JP and a friend of his; they were on their way to Montreal. Watertown was a disturbingly abandoned town and we ate bad Chinese food there. I was surprised at myself at how whimsically I set off on this adventure. It was summertime, after all, and summertime travel is easy. JP and his friend left me off at a traffic light somewhere outside of Watertown, and the adventure was begun. The plan was to hitchhike 120 miles to Lake Placid.

It was a good hitchhiking spot, right on Highway 3 as it left town, right after a traffic light and where the speed limit was still slow. Drivers had a good view of me and plenty of space to stop. I got a ride in ten minutes. The early part of the hitchhiking was excellent and lackadaisical. When I was dropped off, I walked the highway, through farms and forests, thumbing as cars passed.

Rides there:

1. A cheery contractor-type, with a clipboard in a new SUV with the air conditioning blasting. A few miles.

2. A cantankerous army man, army haircut and army fatigues, from nearby Fort Drum. Every other word was "fucking," but he was accomodating enough, just tired of the army after twenty four years. Drinking a beer, on a pizza run. A few miles.

3. A twenty-eight year old, one time high school cheerleader. She stopped the car way ahead of me, I didn't notice. When I walked up and asked "Did you stop for me?" she asked for my license. Okay, I handed it. On the phone she said, "Write this down," and repeated my name, drivers license number, and date of birth. "Oh, it's this hitchhiker I just picked up. Oh don't worry, he looks nice. He's like a freshman boy," she continued, obviously reassuring the person on the other end of the conversation. "He's wearing an engineering shirt, he's a dork!" She covered the phone and said, "Sorry" in my direction. Off the phone she invited me into the car and we were off. "That was the Sherriff," she noted. It was a small town and they knew each other. I asked her name and she said Karen, then giggled and said, "I just totally lied to you, that's not really my name." A couple miles, to Natural Bridge.

In Natural Bridge there is some kind of cave / underground river / natural bridge phenomenon, and for fee a local entrepreneur will take you on a tour of it, possibly even in a boat. There is a nice cafe there, too, where I refilled my water bottle, with ice water. I continued walking the road. It was very pleasant. Imagine me skipping along, if you will, with birds chirping, through forests and cornfields.

5. A soft-spoken, kindly man, who introduced himself by saying, "I used to do this all the time, I know how hard it is to get rides. I saw you there and knew I had to help you out." He, too, worked at Fort Drum, in a hospital I think. Took three semesters at Berkeley, studied horticulture at the Botanical garden, studied Geology too, with an interest in clays for ceramics. Cultivated plants and fish, sold his fish to a prominant acquarium in San Francisco when he moved. Told me about the regulations of Adirondack Park, about the zinc and talc (?) mines we passed. 32 miles, to Star Lake.

6. An elderly couple, on their way to their church's annual meeting. I sat on the back seat next to a pile of Annual Reports of the Adirondack Presbytarian Church, and they dropped me off at the lakeside wooden building of the same. 14 miles to Cranberry Lake.

It was growing late and I was anxious for the next ride. Traffic had become sparser, and was mainly in the wrong direction. The land alongside the road was marshy, with cattails between the trees, and I did not relish the idea of camping within them.

6. Two quiet 20-somethings, a couple, the guy with a well-groomed red goatee and an accent I'd call French Canadian, though he hailed from Oswego. Working at a boy scout camp near Tupper Lakes, as the kitchen manager and the acquatic director, respectively. Drove me considerably out of their way, despite my refusals, 46 miles to Lake Saranac.

In Saranac I called Bree, who was as surprised as joyous, and eagerly came to pick me up.

Comments

[limegreensneaks.livejournal.com]

That's where I'm getting married (not on Lake Saranac, but in the town Saranac Lake)!!! Isn't it AWESOME there?!

[cassiusdio.livejournal.com]

Awesome! I am encouraged to try hitchhiking myself. And I need to go to the Adirondacks too.