Goin' Mobile-A Dance Gypsy's tour of the country

    Spent a quiet night at the state park last night. Read some more of my book, I'm now done with the whole Aubry/Matruin series by Patrick O'Brian, (21 books), and am now back to finish up the last couple of chapters of Saga of a Wayward Sailor by Tristan Jones. A really pleasant evening with warm temps and fireflies over along the creek. Stayed up long enough to watch the moon rise up above the trees in the park and hear the coyotes up on the hill behind camp.

    Up way to early this morning for some reason. I'm thinking it must be because it is summer and the sun starts to stream in by 5:00 in the morning. I seem to be able to resist until a more civilized time around 7-8:00, but I don't seem to be able to stay in bed any longer than that right at the moment.

    Anyway; fixed a bit of breakfast and took a quick shower before heading out on the road. Headed over to the town of Crawford and Fort Robinson just beyond. Had a real pleasant hike this morning up into the Soldier Creek Wilderness Area. Saw a couple of deer, a few turkeys and lots of other birds of all kinds. Hiked into a couple ponds I have fished before with my nephew and just checked them out. They were full of water weeds already, but still looked like there were some nice trout in them. We have both caught some nice 12"-18" natives and rainbows out of them before, as well as a few nice brook trout down in the creek. No fishing today, but still fun to be out looking at everything.

   Spent a couple of hours wandering around the grounds of Fort Rob afterwards, rereading all of the signs and going to the natural history museum here on the grounds. It is an interesting place to explore and you can either camp in one of several campgrounds, rent a cabin that once housed U.S. Cavalry Soldiers or a room in one of the old multi-story barracks buildings. You can go horseback riding, take a hay ride, do a bar-b-que, hike, swim, play a little tennis or go to a play. That of course is what I intend to do tonight. The selection for this evening is 'Annie Get Your Gun', one of my all time favorites. Looking forward to seeing some great entertainment this evening.

   Right now though I'm sitting in a rocking chair on the porch of one of the barracks buildings. I had a nice lunch here earlier on, a nice buffalo burger, fries and ice tea. The buffalo they use here is from part of the herd they have at the park. They evidently cull a few animals every year so the herd doesn't get to big for the amount of pasture they have. It was very tasty for sure, not dry like it can be as I asked them to cook it medium rare so it hadn't dried it all out.

    They have WiFi here for the guests so it wasn't hard to latch on to their signal. Not real fast, but good enough for what I want to do today. Will read some more this afternoon and then take another hike this afternoon. Will find some dinner somewhere in Crawford later on and then head back here for the play.

    A few more photo's from my trip to Boldt Castle a couple of weeks ago. One more batch to go after this group. Enjoy!

Boldt Castle on Heart Island near Alexandria New York

June 3, 2013

What would of been George's bedroom. At that time it was customary for husband and wives to have separate bedrooms.

This would of been Louise's bedroom/sitting room.

Looking in the other direction at the sitting area and the fireplace. A very inviting place to have tea and read a book.

The bathroom off of the two master suites. The whole house had been plumbed for modern running water and sewer systems as well as that new fangled electricity.

The daughter, Clovis's bedroom. I really love how the TIBA has decorated the various rooms they have finished rehabbing. I particularly like the color pallet they have picked for each room.

Looking at the sitting area in Clovis's room.

A separate sitting area on the second floor. Used to entertain guests that were staying over perhaps.

On the third floor you can start to see what the TIBA had to start with. In most cases there was even less than what you can see here. One of the first things to do was to install new, temporary windows and a new roof just to keep the elements at bay.

Another room and another view of what they had to start with. In most cases all of the plaster had fallen off because of the elements, and the walls exposed down to the original bricks that faced the inside of the exterior walls as well as most of the ceilings. The bricks were all made on site by some of the workmen. All of the hard wood floors were gone and only the sub floors remained, though sometimes even they were missing big sections. So you can begin to see what a large project this is, considering there are 120 rooms in this building alone.

Looking out from one of the upstairs balconies you can see the light house on 'Sunken Rock'. This is located in the channel between Heart Island and the mainland at Alexandria Bay.