Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Upstate NY: Ithaca and Trumansburg

Yesterday we had the best day--we headed to Trumansburg which is about 10 minutes north of Ithaca on Cayuga Lake (one of the Finger Lakes). It's a sleepy and sweet little town, with a great coffee shop (Ithaca-based Gimme Coffee, which also had perfect muffins and scones from a local baker), a couple of cool antique stores, a destination restaurant that serves up organic fare from local farms (Hazelnut Kitchen), and a couple of other cool stores. One of the best parts was this little play area right in the center of town that had three wooden play structures--a library, a school house, and a firehouse. It totally inspired imaginative play, but also physical (ladders, a pole to slide down in the fire house), and we could have spent the whole morning there.
After Trumansburg we headed to the Taughannock Falls in the State Park--we wimped out on walking to their base (20 minutes each way), and opted to check them out from the top of the falls, but it was still super impressive. Afterwards, Clara went swimming in Cayuga Lake (a chilly 70 degrees) in the Taughannock State Park, right across  the street from where you walk the path to the falls. 
We headed in to Ithaca for lunch, thinking we'd go to Moosewood Restaurant , which I've been dying to go to...but we didn't want to leave our dog in the car too long, so we just ate at the Ithaca Farmer's Market which is in DeWitt Park on Tuesdays.  
We finished off the day in the very idyllic Ithaca Children's Garden. A fine example of what could and should be done with unused land in many cities.

2 comments:

  1. any recommendations on where to stay??

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  2. this place looks really good--a rare b+b that welcomes families, has a cool wood-fired hot tub, nice amenities, and the breakfasts look great!
    http://www.gothiceves.com/

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