Confessions a 20th century ne'er do well: Drinking, fighting, stealing and other things one generally ought not do

Sunday, June 01, 2008

I finally made it to the location from my dreams. And saw a porcupine.

A little over a year ago, I mentioned that I had discovered the location of a mountain escarpment that had appeared in my dreams for years - I had gone camping there as a child and once as a teenager, but when I dreamed about it, I didn't realize it was a real place. I finally went back. It's the escarpment at North-South Lake campground in Haines Falls New York. I'm glad I remembered this place because it is a fantastic camping location. Great hiking - dig the pictures at Katterskill Falls, where the clouds encompass the mountains. There are countless other trails, including ruins of hotels that have been long abandoned. The site itself obviously has a lake for lazy canoeing and kayaking, plus fishing. The sites are each individual enough to keep the site itself interesting. I'm pretty sure I randomly picked a site from my childhood, because I rememeber being in love with a gigantic rock that was behind this one. The next year, my parents assured me that we had gotten the same site, but I was disappointed to discover that (as was my parents habit) they were just kind of making that up. After this weekend, I think they meant that were on the same loop, because I remember my disappointment at not having the rock being replaced with a facination with the lake (further on down the loop), where our site was that year.
I saw a baby bear in someone's yard on the way up, and at night, when we were hiking up to the escarpment, we saw a porcupine.
I used my superior sense of direction to find the top of Katerskill Falls from a random location in the woods, since I didn't remember where to park to find it, which makes for a good vibe.
To top it all off, I finally got to play my banjo by the fireside.



North Souuth lake trip