Taughannock Falls State Park, Trumansburg, New York

We cooked breakfast before packing up and driving through the foothills of Pennsylvania before crossing into New York State wine country. We drove the Seneca Wine trail along the finger lakes to Taughannock Falls State Park. We have a beautiful, huge wooded site on the bluff overlooking the lake with the north rim trail passing by our campsite. We have our choice of wineries to pick from along Cayuga Lake.

Our campsite at Taughannock Fall State Park

View from North Rim Trail

View from North Rim towards the lake

Breathtaking falls

The Diamond Express Train ran in the 1890's

Tall, tall trees we were trying to identify from the raised bark

Long stone staircases

More birds out and about

Impressive stone bridgework

View from the trail

We fixed a yogurt and granola breakfast before we headed out through Ithica to Robert H. Treman State Park to hike another gorge and rim trail around Lucifer Falls. We then drove through Trumansbourg along Cayuga Lake to Lively Run Dairy to see the goats and do a goat and cow cheese tasting. We stopped at nearby Lucas Vineyard and Estate Winery for an outdoor wine tasting since they advertised nautical-sounding wines. We then stopped at Frontenac Point Winery for a flight of dry wines on their outside deck. Our last stop was at New York Pizza for a wide selection of pizzas by the slice where we grabbed four slices to go and enjoy back at the campground. 

Hiking the gorge trail at Treman State Park

We  spotted a hawk above us

Beautiful stone staircases

Hiking down 

A field of day lilies

Lucifer Falls

Wild about the wildflowers in tiny pinks

Rosy reds

Sunshine yellow

Awesome falls

Mill stones

The old mill had four floor of interesting exhibits on inner workings

Goat greeting us at Lively Farrms

Super tasting of goat and cow cheeses

Rustic barn

Josh Winery

Beautiful vista

Cherry trees and grape vines

Decorating with wine barrels

Second wine stop

Amazing view of Cahuga Lake

Dry reds and a white to sample

Laurel Hill State Park, Somerset, Pennsylvania

 Last evening, we used our air fryer to roast chickpeas as appetizers and since we had a big lunch of bratwursts we then baked oatmeal raisin cookies. Since we were on a roll, we made blueberry biscuits for breakfast before heading north to Pennsylvania. We did mostly interstate today and then crossing from West Virginia we were on the back roads through Confluence where we stopped for ice cream. We have a beautiful grassy and shady campsite at Laurel Hill State Park for two nights. A few miles away we stopped at Glade Pike Winery for a tasting of dry red wines on the way to Somerset.

Our campsite at Laurel Hill State Park

Our groundhog visitor at next campsite

Glade Pike Winery

The winery ships in grapes from California and New York to make their wines

A beautiful afternoon in the '70s for a wine tasting

The vineyards beyond the wine tasting porch

Happy flowers

It was misty early in the morning before we cooked breakfast outside and then headed to the trail heads at the state park. We started with the Pumphouse Trail to the dam built by the Civilian Conservation Corp and then ended up on the Waterline Trail back to the parking lot. We stopped at the boat launch and picnic area for a snack before heading on the Hemlock Trail along Laurel Creek. Since we were within 20 miles of the Flight 93 Memorial Park in Shanksville we drove there and were glad we did. It was an impressive memorial to those 40 who died on 9/11. We finished the day by stopping at Tailgatez Pub in Somerset for some yummy pulled pork nachos before heading back to camp.

Beautifully maintained shady trails

Reflections

Jones Mill Dam built in the 1930's

Trails wide enough for snow mobiles

Picnic and bird watching by Laurel Creej

Beautiful stonework and trout fishing in the creek

We got some hill climbing in

Flight 93 Tower of Voices

Tower has 40 wind-driven chimes for the 40 victims

The crash site is an old reclaimed mine planted with wildflowers 

The visitors center and overlook had the impressive story of the terrorist hijacking

The memorial wall with the 40 names of heroes

A runway showed the flight path to the crash site

Forty trees planted in memory

We walked the  path that circled the crash site giving us 10 miles for the day