Day 10 - Seneca Lake and Keuka Outlet Trail

 

Waterloo NY to Keuka Outlet Trail to Keuka / Penn Yan

28 miles  (20 rowing, 8 walking)

 

Today was a sample plate at the all-you-can-eat buffet of life on the water. Up at 5, on the canal by 5:40 to see a fog-enrobed sunrise, out on the wide open waters of Seneca Lake by 7:30, across 2 miles of open water in a rising breeze … then 17 miles of upwind/crosswind rowing to Dresden.

Seneca’s clear waters are colder because this is a very deep lake. The clarity, sadly, reveals a lot of milfoil/vegetation that crowds out everything in the shallow water, a shame because the water itself seems so pure, so healthy. Aquatic weeds are fun sponges.

Seneca conveys a sense of size because it offers such a broad horizon, its gently rising farmland and plateaus offering long distance vistas, not close-in mountain ranges. It’s really grand and sweeping and the cloud formations today masqueraded as mountains in the sky. I once heard a western skier describe Stowe as ‘claustrophobic’ because of the nearby adjacent peaks, and could imagine a Seneca Laker applying that term to Lake George’s mountain-ringed shores. Me?  I love ‘em both.

I reached Dresden at noon and met my crack logistical team - Keith and Phillip in the lead, with additional good-hearted muscle whose names I’ve lost. They took my boat and gear to Steve’s house, here on the very northern shore of Keuka, and it will be an easy launch to Hammondsport, 22 miles south, tomorrow morning.

Phillip is president of Friends of the Outlet and a prince among men. His passion for environmental stewardship and his humble yet assertive and tremendously knowledgeable leadership show in his recounting of history, accomplishments, and challenges. We walked the 8 mile trail together, from the shore of Seneca Lake to Penn Yan, and I soon found myself wishing we had the likes of Phillip at all levels of leadership and administration in government. When I asked him, at about mile 4, what he thought of when he walked this trail, he said, with a pause, ‘People …the people that worked these locks and factories that lined it, and now my fellow volunteers who give everything to preserve and protect it.’

Gentle readers, their website is at www.keukaoutlettrail.org. What a cool group, what a model for volunteerism! Thanks, Phillip, for the ‘insider tour’ of the trail, a walk I now know you’d do for anyone because of who you are. You’ve given me another model, another fabulous example of environmental advocacy at its best.

So now I’m at Steve’s house on the very north end of Keuka Lake. I’ve had a long, refreshing swim, and I await a vanilla malt from the stand down the street. Ryder, Steve’s enterprising grandson, is on a mission.

Early this morning I rowed past a big fake bird on a post, the kind of thing that people buy to scare away other birds or pests. The thing was so overdone, so gaudy in its exaggeration of what a real bald eagle looks like, I did an eye-roll at the cheesy extent to which industry caricatures the bald eagle and people get swept in and nail the damn plastic likeness to a pole.    

Then, as I rowed on by, it flew away.

Later, I found a swim spot along the west shore of Seneca. I rowed in close, hopped out in my Crocs into knee deep water, and came face to face with a lamprey eel. They’re harmless to humans, they say, but they say a lot of things. I rowed on.

Phillip took me to a pub after my 20 mile row and our 8 mile uphill walk. I drank 7 Cokes and ate a Beyond Burger.

Tomorrow is a 22 mile sprint to the finish line on Keuka Lake. Alan, who bought mom’s ‘Princess’ pontoon boat, plans to find me and feed me during the row, and I’ll plan to drink all the chocolate milk the Princess can carry.

With only one day to go, I’m already getting misty about finishing – Steve, Phillip, Keith, Mark, Mitch, Lindsey, Tom … lovely people along the way, giving unconditional support just because they can.

It’s really heartening to see this side of America so clearly, so personally. We’re better than we present ourselves to be, I think.

xxoo