Back to our origin (July 4th)

As we ate our peanut butter sandwiches along the Susquehanna River outside of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, we realized that we might not be able to find a place to stay for the night due to the holiday.  As Bruce drove, I started making phone calls to various campgrounds looking for a spot.  Luck was with us, and we reserved a spot at the Camp Bell Campground near Corning, NY.

It does say "Welcome to New York"

As we passed by the “Welcome to New York State” sign, we both tried to remember the last time that we might have been down that way driving through.  Some of our early vacations with our girls took us down that same route through Pennsylvania and into the south.  New York is such a beautiful state.  Like the others I’ve mentioned, it is lush and green, with farmhouses and barns dotting the countryside.  It’s sad to see so many farmhouses abandoned and neglected and barns rotting away.  The small farmer has it pretty rough today, and those big old houses are probably pretty expensive to heat and cool.

Camp Bell campground looked like a place that Bruce and I would have enjoyed spending some time in but it wasn’t going to happen on this trip.  It was nice to relax a bit and enjoy the wood smoke of the various campfires throughout the grounds.  Then the fireworks started and the dogs were barking.  So much for getting to sleep early!