Dave went fishing

My family is spending a week at Allegany State Park starting tomorrow afternoon. During our preparation my mom dug out her journals she keeps whenever we go there. We have been going there since I was a little kid, but she started keeping journals in 1984, and we spent some time reading them just now. They are really interesting, but I thought I'd mention a frequent phrase that was in the journal at least once or twice every day. "Dave went fishing" or "Dave and I went fishing" or "Dave came back from fishing with 6 trout - we had fried trout for supper" etc. etc... Allegany is an anglers dream. 2 big lakes full of crappies, panfish, trout, bass, and northerns. Both lakes drain into Kinzua reservoir which has excellent fishing, and there are streams full of trout all over the place. Happy GRIZZ. :D

Here is one of the lakes - Quaker Lake

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...egany-pano.jpg

Congrats Dave... nevermind, Dave went fishing!

Sounds like an awesome place. Where is it? Is it in NYS?

Pretty spot there! I have never been to NY other than the airport, LOL! However I would love to see some of it that is away from and city as I am not a big city boy and don't like them at all.

Skip - you really ought to come to upstate NY if you ever get a chance - absolutely nothing like NYC. GRIZZ is in Western NY, lots of beautiful countryside out there. I'm in Central NY, lots of beautiful countryside around here. Then there are the Adirondacks (just watch out for bear and moose).

Once you get an hour or two away from New York City, we're mostly rural, with 5 major cities (Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Binghamton, and the home of dysfunctional state government - Albany). just for kicks, check out Cato NY on google maps - notice that most everything is either woods or fields - or lakes :) and all of them have crappie!

Hey all, had to come back for a night because I have a little job to do in the morning. I'll go back tomorrow night and ignore all the calls for the rest of the week.

Skip, mom and I were discussing the what most people that have never been to NY think of the state, and we know that most have no idea what a beautiful, forested, mountainous place it is. They think its all sidewalks and building and when I take them for a look around they just say "Holy smokes this place is nearly wilderness", and it is. We came to the conclusion that even with NYC, Albany, Buffalo, Binghamton, and Syracuse, and all the population out east that 98 - 99% of NY State is forested, and very very rural. You should have seen the roads I was driving around on today. Just gorgeous. Well, I need to get to bed, so I can get up early and get that job done so I can get back out there in the woods.

Have a great week all - I know I will. :D

Here are some pics.

These 2 are the view off our cabin at allegany.

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http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...ongrm/pano.jpg

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http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...m/DSCN0251.jpg

That bird flying in this one is a bald eagle.

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Originally Posted by joejv4

Congrats Dave... nevermind, Dave went fishing!

Sounds like an awesome place. Where is it? Is it in NYS?

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Its in SW upstate NY, about 30 minutes east of Chautauqua lake. Its 65,000 acres, and the largest park in NYS.

http://nysparks.state.ny.us/parks/info.asp?parkID=91

Cool - Maybe I'll have to take the family camping there for a long weekend this summer - looks fantastic!

I'm surprised I never heard of it before - having grown up right down Rt 17 in Corning (during the school year anyhow - stayed at my grandparents place on Keuka Lake all summer every year). Another park in your neck of the woods I love to go to is Letchworth, I wish I had some photos to share from there - would help change the picture of NY that many folks have in their head. I live "in town" our little village with a population under 300, and my back yard borders a field that alternates between corn and soybeans year to year. We get turkeys and deer in the back yard regularly. Not exactly the "concrete jungle" that folks think of when someone says New York.

Yeah we have a lot of wildlife as well. The road that leads to my house is kind of dicey at night there are so many deer. The other night in a one mile stretch I saw deer in 4 different places when I was coming home. One had a nice start to a rack in velvet. At Allegany there are signs to not feed the bears all over the place and they are always changing the way the park handles garbage to keep the local bears from traipsing down the cabin trails inspecting the dumpsters for treats. We haven't seen any this week so far, but we usually do before the week is over, but they centralized the garbage facilities this last year behind an 8ft fenced in compound, so maybe there aren't as many bears around the cabins this year since there are no dumpsters anymore. We used to feed the raccoons by hand there were so many of them. One night we had 14 of them on the cabin porch, but that was about 20 yrs ago and there are fewer of them around now with the new garbage systems. Saw a bobcat last year and there are cougars too. Yeah NY - who figured.

Watch your thumb!! I am prpbably making the treck up to 'the city' in July sometime, my stepdaughters oldest friend is moving to london, is all the pretty stuff way far away? For a day trip, anyway. I have another friend wo bought a house in WRencelerville. Not at all sure how to spell it, but from what he tells me very pretty.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...m/DSCN0197.jpg[/QUOTE]

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Originally Posted by Buffy

Watch your thumb!! I am prpbably making the treck up to 'the city' in July sometime, my stepdaughters oldest friend is moving to london, is all the pretty stuff way far away? For a day trip, anyway. I have another friend wo bought a house in WRencelerville. Not at all sure how to spell it, but from what he tells me very pretty.

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I'd head for Otsego County and stop by Otsego Lake or Canadarego Lake. Shouldn't be more than an hour or two out of NYC.

Rensselaer county has some nice countryside too, but Otsego is more in the foothills of the Catskills and would seem to me to be a bit more scenic.

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Originally Posted by Buffy

Watch your thumb!!

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I suppose I should explain before you all think I'm an idiot for chopping wood with my hand on the wood. What I'm doing there is slicing off thin pieces of wood for a cooking fine for later. I pop the axe lightly into a thin section of wood then I lift up the whole mess and whack it on a rock and snap off a thin piece piece that burns to coal quickly for cooking steaks or chicken or fish or sausage or biscuits or whatever else yummy we are cooking over the open fire that night. I've been swingin an axe all my life and I'm pretty deft with one.

As far as visiting NYC, if you haven't been there before I'd suggest staying in the city and checking it out, or going to long island which is really interesting. If you really want to hit the woods I'd suggest norther NJ. The northern counties of NJ are gorgeous and very wild. If you don't mind going a little further there is the Catskill mountains or the Delaware water gap.

Try this - http://www.trails.com/findarea.asp?state=NY

sounds and looks like a wonderful place. being a hick from the southern sticks, when you say NY I think of the BIG CITY. I know NY has wildlife and Farming but I think Times Square.
That picture of the Eagle is nice. I am blessed to know where several nesting areas here. I always watch in awe as those magnificent birds fly by me on the river.

Doris & I made a trip to Malone, NY a couple of years back..Saw the home of Almonzo Wilder of "Little House on The Prairie" series. In fact, we have been to all the Ingles & Wilder home places...Doris taught 4th grade and read this series to here classes...It was a fun experience and took us about 5 years to get to all of them..

Malone was a beautiful place...We might make another trip up that way....