Our fall adventure began with an overnight stop at Stoever’s Dam Park, a county park in Lebanon, PA. It’s a small park, with only 7 tent sites and 7 RV sites with electricity, all in a row with picnic areas behind the sites. There is no dump station and no water available at the campground, no bathhouse, only a couple of porta potties. But since we were only planning to stay one night, we just brought our water and planned to dump tanks at the next campground.
Driving there was a bit of an adventure — my GPS brought me to the Community Theater site rather than to the campground, and I had to do some online searching and mapping to figure out how to get to the campsite. It was only a mile or two away, but I had to drive back out to the road and down a different entrance.
Once at the campground, settling in was easy. The site was level and I only had to plug into shore power.
Stoever’s Dam Park
It was a lovely campground, next to a lake, with lots of ducks and geese. Several times, flocks of Canada geese on their way south flew over. I tried to get a picture but I always just missed them.
Stoever’s Dam Park
We stayed the night of Oct 26th and headed to our next campground in the morning.
Arrived at Watkins Glen State Park and settled into my site. I was right next to the entrance to the loop in a nice level site with tall trees surrounding it. But somehow I never felt really comfortable there. The sites were tight and weirdly angled, so there wasn’t as much privacy as I’d have liked. You can see in the picture that the trees, while many and tall, were sparsely branched at the lower levels, so you could easily see through them to neighboring sites. The car campers in the spot behind me were clearly visible. But I was lucky to get a spot at all — the campground is large, with 276 sites, but most are primitive and only 90 have electric hookups. My sister-in-law had reserved their site earlier, and the electric sites were all booked up by the time I tried to get a spot to join them. I had to get on a waiting list for Watkins Glen and for Robert H Treman State Park, the other park they were planning to visit. I was lucky that a spot opened up at Watkins Glen and couldn’t be picky about the location. I never did get a reservation at Robert H Treman, and ended up skipping that part of the trip and going home after Watkins Glen.
Playground at Watkins Glen State Park
Near the entrance to the campground is the visitor’s center (which was closed at the time), with a playground, pool (also closed), bathhouses, and the entrances to several of the park’s hiking trails.
Bottom of the gorge at Watkins Glen State Park
The campground may be nothing special, but the real attraction of the park is the many gorges and waterfalls and beautiful hiking trails throughout the park. On Monday, our first full day at the park, we drove down to town and stopped at the visitor’s center at the bottom of the gorge. We spent several hours wandering around the trails and enjoying the beautiful scenery.
Jacob’s Ladder
The trails vary from flat and easy to very steep and strenuous. We tended to stay to the easier ones. There was still plenty to investigate if you stayed to the flatter trails.
After visiting the gorge, we drove around through the town of Watkins Glen and stopped for lunch at Jerlando’s Italian Ristorante & Pizza Shop. I had a yummy caprese sandwich with fries.
Gorge Trail
On Tuesday, we parked at the campground entrance and hiked some of the trails that led from there. My brother and I took the longer but more level fork of the trail, while my sister-in-law took the shorter but steeper route.
Gorge Trail
We met up at a bridge overlooking the gorge — the same view we’d seen the day before, but from higher up this time.
The next day, Wednesday, was a lazy day at the campground. I visited J&J at their trailer for a while in the afternoon, but spent most of the day futzing around on the computer, playing games, watching videos, and reading.
Lakewood Vineyards
On Thursday, we visited some wineries, starting with Lakewood Vineyards. The setting was really beautiful.
Inflatable wavy arm guy in the vineyard
The high point for me was the pink inflatable wavy arm guy out in the vineyard. Possibly acting as a scarecrow or something. Or just a fun addition to the scene.
And then we visited Castel Grisch Winery, one of the highlights of the trip before we even reached the parking lot! The entrance to the winery wound through fields filled with dragons, dinosaurs and all sorts of figures. We were told that the owner put up the decorations when he got bored during the years when everything was closed for the pandemic. Now, they hold a Festival of Lights during December and January where they light up all the exhibits.
Castel Grisch Winery
The kitsch goes on, with gold Buddha statues on the front porch, and a Delorean parked near the entrance.
T-Rex in the piano room
Inside, there are more fun decorations, including this T-Rex guarding the fireplace and piano.
Nickel’s Pit BBQ
We ate dinner at Nickel’s Pit BBQ. I had loaded tots (without the bacon) and they were delicious!
Friday we parted ways. J&J went on to their next campsite, while I drove home. I was glad to go home, because my cat Davey had not been doing well during the trip. On several days, I came home from our sight-seeing to find him lethargic, breathing fast and making little groaning noises, and not eating. I thought maybe he was overheating hiding under my sleeping bag while I was gone, even though the weather wasn’t that hot. Thursday — our longest day out — was his worst, and I determined that if he was still sick in the morning, I’d call the vet and try to get an afternoon appointment for him and take him in as soon as we got home. But he was fine Friday morning and has been since, so I decided from then on not to leave the bed up during the day, and roll up the sleeping bag so he can’t get under it while I’m gone.
Other than Davey’s trouble, it was a good trip! It was the first time I hadn’t spent the night in the van before heading out, and I ended up forgetting some things that I would have brought if I’d been in the van to notice. Oh well. Finally got the Waggle set up and decided it was fairly useless, since the battery ran down so quickly and there was rarely good enough cell service to connect anyway. Also finally got the Winegard set up and enjoyed streaming some TV with my Roku but ran out of data pretty quickly.
Every trip I come home with a list of things to remember to bring next time, and things to leave at home. I’m still finding the van sort of cramped and inconvenient to camp in, but so much easier to drive and park than the truck and trailer that the inconvenience is worth it. I’m gradually finding ways to make it more comfortable. As long as I’m traveling with J&J and camping at sites with electric hookups, I can go exploring with them and leave Davey in the van with heat and A/C to keep him comfortable. But if I ever decide to go camping on my own, I’m not sure how it would work with a cat in the van. If I go exploring with the van, I will need to park at places where I won’t have electricity to keep the A/C on in case it gets hot. I would either have to 1) upgrade the solar & storage batteries so they could run A/C without shore power (the batteries I have now could probably run A/C for an hour or two, but no longer); 2) take Davey with me everywhere in a backpack or stroller when we’re not plugged in (took the cats into Walmart in their stroller on my trip moving across country, but not everywhere allows cats, and in any case Davey is so nervous about being in strange places, I’m sure he’d hate it); 3} find a way to bring along some sort of electric bike or scooter to explore with so the van can stay plugged in; or 4) just stay at the campground the whole time. Not sure how much camping on my own I’m going to be doing, though. Traveling with my bro and SIL is more fun, anyway.
We arrived at Sampson State Park at around 1 PM on Sunday. This time, it was only Davey and I, as my cat Mister had passed about a week before. I was sad to lose him, but he was very sick and I couldn’t bear to see him suffering any longer. Traveling with only one cat, and one who was in good health, was much easier and less stressful, however. Davey didn’t like being in the travel carrier and complained off and on during the drive, but didn’t get sick or overly stressed out. He just yelled until he got tired of it, then fell asleep.
Davey in the van
My brother and his wife had arrived earlier with their trailer, but new arrivals weren’t allowed to check in before 1 PM, so they left their trailer in the parking lot (I parked beside it) and went for a walk while they waited. They returned as I was finishing checking in, so we both got to our campsites at the same time. Our campsites were right next to each other, with a shared electric hookup between the sites. The park’s website had warned that the electric hookup could be 50′ from the site, so I’d bought a 30A extension cord, which was needed to reach the hookup!
We spent the rest of the day hanging out and settling into our sites.
3 Brothers Winery
Monday was a day for visiting wineries and breweries along Seneca Lake. Our first stop was the Three Brothers Wineries & Estates, which included the War Horse Brewery, where we we did some shopping and tasting.
War Horse Brewery
J&J shared a beer and cider flight, while I had a craft soda flight, which included four delicious sodas: Black cherry, root beer, orange cream, and lemon-lime, plus grapefruit hop water. The hop water was unusual but interestingly flavored, unsweetened with hints of pine. I bought a 4-pack to take home.
Ventosa Vineyards
Next stop was Ventosa Vineyards, where we had lunch at the café. I had a delicious veggie wrap.
Muranda Cheese Company
Our last stop of the day was the Muranda Cheese Company, where we had a cheese tasting. I bought several kinds of delicious cheese and a “honey flight” with four small jars of honey.
Since we’d gone north of the campground on Monday, on Tuesday we went south. Our first stop was Stoltzfus Family Farm for some grocery shopping. I picked up some bread and crystallized ginger.
Boundary Breaks
Then we stopped at Boundary Breaks Vineyard. J&J had a wine tasting while I had a bowl of olives. They were a bit overpriced but I felt like I should get something. They were good olives, though.
Idol Ridge Winery
Next stop was Idol Ridge Winery. They had a nice gift shop with lots of fun stuff, including some fudge which I bought to nibble on while J&J tasted wine.
Lamoreaux Landing Wine Cellars
One more winery! We stopped at Lamoreaux Landing Wine Cellars, where I decided to have some wine for a change. I had a pour of sparkling wine while J&J had a tasting.
Scale House Brewery
Our final stop of the day was the Scale House Brewery for dinner. I had a margherita pizza, which was rather scant on the fresh basil so it was more of a cheese pizza, but very tasty nonetheless. I took a couple of slices home for lunch the next day.
Sampson Military Museum
On Wednesday, we spent the day visiting the Sampson Military Museum, located on the Park grounds. It was a Naval training base during World War II and an Air Force base during the Korean War. The exhibits, which included artillery, uniforms, sample meals and supplies, furniture and photographs, were all donated by veterans who trained there. My sister-in-law’s father trained there, and she brought copies of his discharge papers to be added to the binders of documents.
Small plane at the Sampson Military Museum
Outside were pieces of artillery, boats, a small plane, and a memorial wall. Very interesting and informative place.
Seneca Lake
Thursday was a lovely warm day, so we packed a lunch and ate at the beach. I bought a pair of surf shoes at the boat shop and tried them out in the water at the shore. A lady who was sunbathing went into the water briefly. Pretty cold, she said.
Friday we packed up and hit the road for home. Got home a little after noon. Wonderful trip!
