Monthly Archives: June 2017

A Visit to Clarence

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Ever been to Clarence? Neither had we.

*Clarence lies on State Route 5, the straight shot between Batavia and Buffalo. When we decided we wanted to spend a couple of days visiting New York’s second-largest city (see last week’s column!), we cast about for a place to stay, and Clarence fit the bill very nicely.

*Despite its proximity to Buffalo, Clarence is a rural town, with no incorporated villages. Driving along three-lane Route 5, much of your way on both sides is lined with old stone walls (or stone fences), often with meadow or woodlot behind them. It’s not just an affectation, either, for they line the country lanes too. Almost next to our motel was an old dairy barn, and working farms endure. A bike/hike trail runs south of the highway, then across and off to Akron.

*The settlement of Clarence Center is a very pleasant hamlet, and we enjoyed breakfast one morning on the porch of the Clarence Center Cafe. Even though the Cafe is on the corner of the main intersection, the meal was peaceful (perhaps because we had missed the school buses).

*The stretch along busy Route 5 is known as Clarence Hollow, and at the eastern end of the stretch you can see why, as the road dips down from the plateau. Clarence Hollow is largely linear, lying along both sides of the road. The high school is here, with its “modern” clock face in the tower. This where we ate dinner twice (at Gianni Mazia’s Pizza & Pasta), and breakfast twice (at Emily’s Family Diner), and enjoyed them all.

*While a business community along Route 5, and 13 miles from Delaware Park in Buffalo, by nature is going to get a good deal of transient traffic, we were delighted to see the dining rooms packed with local folks who were clearly steady, happy customers. While there were a Kwik Fill and a Sugar Creek, the “chain” establishments were otherwise missing, giving the place a “home” feel (much like Hammondsport).

*(If you need some chains, just slip down Route 5 to the north-south Transit Road, or Route 78. There you’ll find Panera, Applebees, Barnes & Noble, Dairy Queen, and plenty, plenty more. That’s also where the three-lane turns to four-lane.)

*Even our motel, the Clarence Inn, was “unchained”… my wife continuing her success at finding us interesting, pleasant, well-priced, vintage but up-to-date places to stay.

*The town hall campus, off Goodrich Road, includes a VERY nice modern public library, and a lovely arboretum where you can stroll or jog the paths, scaring the killdeer and enjoying the fountain’s spray on a hot summer afternoon.

*Despite being a rural town, Clarence has made its mark. Over the years five members of Congress have made Clarence their home. Joan Baez lived here, and so did Joyce Carol Oates. An early priest in a German-speaking parish went on to become a Catholic bishop, and then the first American bishop to be named a saint.

*Having previously lived in Vermont, Rhode Island, and Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, we were repeatedly struck by how flat the country is around Clarence. The dome of the sky took on a different character for us, with huge cloud banks stretching almost 180 degrees.

*Two more items to mention. First, for those (like me!) who go in for that sort of thing, Dave & Adam’s Card World is just down the road at Transit and Sheridan… a huge, clean well-lighted space purveying trading cards, comic books, sports memorabilia, and all sorts of pop culture treasures.

*Second, the Clarence Hollow Association has produced a brochure-sized visitors’ guide, and it is a model of its kind. It has the advantage of concentrating on the single-axis Route 5, but I just cannot say enough about how helpful this is, and how easy to use. (In my work I’ve seen a lot of visitor’s guides, and this one’s small but outstanding.) The map is perfect and unambiguous, the features laid out in numerical order, side streets and traffic lights clearly marked… bravo, Clarence Hollow Association!

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We saw horrifying steel darts, tossed from biplanes onto World War I soldiers. We saw a huge model railroad layout. We visited Tim Russert’s office from “Meet the Press,” and we saw President Fillmore’s carriage.

A week or two back we visited the Buffalo History Museum… formerly the Buffalo and Erie County Historical Society, and before that the New York State Building at the 1901 world’s fair.

This is a lovely turn-of-the-century “temple” perched overlooking the lake in Delaware Park, just a little down from the Buffalo Zoo. While the rest of the fair was torn down at the end of the season, they built this place to last, and to be a major museum. Mission accomplished.

From Bath to Buffalo might seem a long trip to see a local history museum. But Buffalo and Erie County are big enough that their “local” history is also state and national history. So the gallery dedicated to the centennial of the Great War is not a ho-hum collection of faded uniforms and I-was-there medals, but a large space that comes to grip with the experience of the war… “over there” and “over here”… using Buffalo and Erie County as the starting point.

Glenn Curtiss was a major wartime employer in Buffalo, and photos tell the story of his airplane factories. Other items (canteens, mess kits, knapsacks, trench periscopes) were either MADE in Buffalo/Erie, or USED by somebody from Buffalo/Erie County.

Nurses’ uniforms make an opportunity to remind us that real young Buffalo/Erie men died, or suffered horrendous agony. Although the exhibit captures the patriotic enthusiasm, it doesn’t “whitewash” the war.

A large space on the main floor exhibits wartime posters in glorious garish colors, appealing to patriotism and enemy atrocities as reasons to join up or otherwise support the war effort. This exhibit correctly points out propaganda, although it is also true that atrocities were a long-established part of the German war plan, and it was Kaiser Wilhelm who first described his soldiers as Huns.

Religious banners and artifacts, and materials written in non-English languages, reveal Buffalo’s rich ethnic and religious history. This is not my first trip to the museum, and I’ve always been impressed and pleased that the museum does not soft-pedal racism, prejudice, and segregation. Most local history museums just nervously ignore the topics, but Buffalo History Museum is upfront about them.

Tim Russert, long-term moderator of “Meet the Press,” was a proud citizen of Buffalo, and after his premature death his office was moved to the museum, where old friends and TV fans alike can enjoy his overflowing space. This gallery also covers Mr. Russert’s life, including his work on Daniel Moynihan’s staff and his efforts recruiting federal help in the 1977 blizzard.

Where else in the world are you going to find a life-size cutout of Millard Fillmore? The former president was also the first president of the Buffalo Historical Society. His carriage, as we mentioned, is on exhibit in the street of shops, commemorating actual stores from Buffalo’s past.

A vast model railroad layout highlights the transportation history of the area, and is sprinkled with tiny copies of structures from the region. We didn’t get to see the model trains in operation, but I’ve seen them in the past, and it’s terrific.

We left in a downpour, but the following day was clear and blue and pleasant, so we came back to stroll the Japanese garden, which lies below the museum along the shore of the lake. It’s a lovely place, fitting well into its unforgiving space.

The museum’s a great place, though there were some drawbacks. My wife was using a walker following an injury, and the handicap entrance is an obscure door in a space where you can’t park. You ring to be buzzed in, then enter behind and above the model trains, work your way down a looooong ramp to the lower level, make your way to the other end of the building, and ride the elevator up to the main floor for admissions. Near admissions is the only handicap-accessible rest room, but you wouldn’t know it from the visitor’s map.

Some of the labels or signage could be placed higher and closer… and/or could be written larger… for the ease of the visitor. Also, some of the labels and exhibits are starting to look tired… they could use a little attention.

On a VERY hot day, there was no air conditioning to be noticed… whether it’s not there, or wasn’t working, or just couldn’t keep up, is more than I can say. It didn’t stop us from enjoying the museum, and we joked that we were experiencing the place as the original visitors would have. That summer of 1901 was murderously hot, which was part of the reason that the Pan-American Exposition never met its attendance expectations, and wound up going broke. (President McKinley being killed at the fair, just as temperatures moderated in September, didn’t help either.) That connection also led us to play a little what-if game. Did Glenn Curtiss visit this building, on his trip to the fair? Did Theodore Roosevelt?

None of the drawbacks we mentioned stopped us from enjoying ourselves, and being happily impressed! We’re glad we made the journey!

Good Places to Hike, With Easy-On/Easy-Off — Part III

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So – been to Watkins Glen lately?

*Earlier in this space we’ve looked at several easy-on/easy-off trails, where you can get in a satisfying hike without spending half your time just getting to the trail. In ascending order of difficulty we looked at Sperr Park and the Big Flats Trail; Keuka Outlet Trail between Penn Yan and Dresden; and the trails at Mossy Bank Park overlooking Bath.

*If anything, the Gorge Trail at Watkins Glen State Park is even easier to reach – just pull off the village street into the parking lot and you’re there.

*Mossy Bank has a spectacular overlook. Watkins Glen is spectacular every step of the way.

*Thinkers and pontificators from Lao-Tzu to Chairman Mao have remarked on the quiet but terrifying power of water… that while it may be the softest and most yielding of substances, given time it will bore right through the hardest rock. That’s what’s happened here.

*If you start at the lower entrance, on Franklin Street, you pass along the stream, make your way through a short tunnel in the rock, and then pass over the stream on a stone bridge. That short tunnel, and that short bridge, form your portal into a world of mist, stone, water, sharp shadows contrasting with startling sunlight, and noise — for the water roars as it races through the narrow gorge.

*The trail tracks alongside Glen Creek, occasionally tunneling or crossing over, with a low wall between you and the river. You make your way under rock overhangs. You pick your way through muddy underfoot. You push through spray, and you hike to the roar of the falls and the rapids, echoing off the cliffs of stone through which you follow the Creek. (Even where the Creek is quiet, you can still hear it roaring just a few steps away.)

*You also make your way uphill, swimming against the current, so to speak. Near the upper entrance there’s a flight of 180 stone steps. I’ve done it both ways, but it may be good thinking to start at the LOWER entrance, so that your return trip, when you’re tired, is DOWNhill.

*You’re walking through a cleft in the rock… a glen… with rocky cliffs that tower high above you. In many places the stone is covered with moss. Ferns spring forth, and so do precarious hemlocks. Flowers grow here and there, and butterflies make themselves at home. High above you, squirrels scramble in the trees. Check out the juncos, who love cliff spaces like this, a little higher than the surrounding countryside, for their summer homes.

It’s an oft-told tale, but worthwhile all the same. While hiking one day I stopped to help a couple of visitors puzzle out their map and get themselves situated as to which trail they were on, and which way they were headed. “You people should advertise this more,” the woman said. “I’ve been to Hawaii, and I’ve been in their gorges. Their gorges are nothing like this.”

WHAT’S NEARBY: You’re actually in the Village of Watkins Glen, with its famous marina at the head of Seneca Lake. Watkins Glen International is not far off, and the Watkins Glen Motor Racing Research Center (adjoining the public library) always has a classic car on view.

*WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: (a) The Gorge Trail is also part of the main Finger Lakes Tail, and the North Country National Scenic Trail. (b) The park as a whole has 19 waterfalls and 832 stone steps. (c) The visitors center at the lower entrance sells my historic photo books, “Watkins Glen Racing” and “Around Watkins Glen!”

Good Hikes With Easy-On/Easy-Off — Part II

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Two weeks ago in this space, we looked at Sperr Park and the Keuka Outlet Trail – two easy-on/easy off hikes where you don’t have to send half the day just getting to the trail. We observed that Sperr Park and the Big Flats Trail made a very easy hike, with Keuka Outlet Trail not much harder.

*Going up a little bit on scale of difficulty… and going up a LOT on spectacularity… are the trails at Mossy Bank Park, overlooking Bath.

*Those who’ve visited Bath have surely noticed the cliffs across the river on the south side of the village. Up at the top is Mossy Bank, a site that had that name at least as far back as 1851, when diarist Hannah Seeley noted that it had become a fad for people in Bath to go up to Mossy Bank to have picnics and to walk around.

*And they’re still doing it, 167 years later! But the hill is steep, so today’s walkers and hikers find getting there an easier trip than the trips that Hannah’s friends had.

*Once you get to the park the simplest walk is a double loop. You can park on the outer loop, near the pavilions and the Ted Markham Nature Center, or you can park down by the Lookout. The dirt road forms a figure eight, with the loop that includes the Lookout encircling forested land, while the other loop encircles lovely green picnic, playground, and rest room space. There’s also fitness equipment you can indulge in, if you’re inclined in that way.

*Doing the double loop twice will take you close to a half-hour, depending on your speed and what you stop to admire along the way. Lady’s slippers bloom in their brief beautiful season. Juncos desert the flats to summer up at Mossy Bank, and butterflies flit mindlessly by. Pileated woodpeckers laugh in the trees, while squirrels and chipmunks crash around so frantically that they probably forget where they’re going, or where they’ve been.

*Mossy Bank visitors sometimes get to see bald eagles. For eight years running they nested successfully down on the flat, but this year they didn’t, despite some indifferent gestures in that direction. It’s going too far to say that they’re commonplace, but they do come along in every season of the year. Ospreys also nested nearby until recently, and still turn up at times.

*There are several trails inside the wooded loop that includes the Lookout. There are also mapped and blazed trails throughout the park. For the most part they’re pretty well beaten underfoot, but there are spots where it’s a bit of a climb up or down.

*On top of that, despite the mapping and blazing some Mossy Bank trails have minds of their own – they’ll disappear right in the midst of the woods. When that happens, just turn around and cheerfully follow the blazed trail back. I’ve been exploring Mossy Bank for twenty years, and even I can get “a mite bewildered” if I get off the trail.

*(Part of the problem is property lines. Hitting a line can bring a trail to an end, but it’s also easy to mistake property blazes for trail blazes.)

*If you’re facing out on the lookout, a trail to the west has a somewhat steep drop (you stay upright, but worry about it) for twenty feet or so, but then a more gentle downward grade that takes you through the woods and over a couple of streams until you reach the property line near an abandoned road. Of course, then you have a long (though gentle) climb back up.

*Unlike Sperr Park, most trails in Mossy Bank are wooded, and it’s isolated enough that (unlike Keuka Outlet) you don’t encounter any active roads. You CAN, however, hear (and in spots see) Interstate 86 far below. Walking into the woods at Mossy Bank, I often feel weights of troubles lifting instantly off my shoulders.

*Of course, no trip to Mossy Bank is complete without enjoying the Lookout. Bath village, Lake Salubria, and the Conhocton River are spread out below you. You can see a good distance toward Hammondsport, Mitchellsville, and Kanona. On a good day, you can see wind turbines in Prattsburgh and Howard. And the Lookout pavilion is a great place to watch the rain progress across the scene, and listen to it drum away on the roof.

WHAT’S NEARBY: Bath, county offices, Steuben County Fairgrounds, the Bath V.A. and National Cemetery. Hammondsport’s not too far, either.

*WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: (a) The best way to get there is to cross the Conhocton River at Cameron Street (becomes County Road 10) from Bath, veer left onto Windfall Road, then go left again onto Mossy Bank Road. (b) There used to be bobolinks on the road in, but I haven’t seen them in years. (c) Markham Nature Center schedules interesting programs from time to time. (d) The Bath Christmas star is installed (in season) onto the Lookout pavilion. (e) During the winter months Mossy Bank is open to walkers, BUT cars are not permitted AND hunting is.