Travel dates: July, 2021
There were two things we wanted to make sure to see while we were in New York’s Finger Lakes region last summer, one of them a little more…obvious than the other. We knew we wanted to go to Watkins Glen State Park, for this was the summer of hiking through gorges. And then, of course, we wanted to visit the It’s a Wonderful Life Museum in Seneca Falls (Seneca Falls is said to be the town that the fictional Bedford Falls is based on).
The older kids were already big fans of the movie, and we prepped Abe for our visit early on in the trip with a summer viewing in the trailer. More on that in a bit.
Watkins Glen State Park
If you read my earlier post about Flume Gorge in New Hampshire, you already know that we all ranked the Gorge Trail in Watkins Glen higher. It was our favorite hike-in-a-gorge of the trip, and not just because it was WAY cheaper (just a $10/car entrance fee).
Like with Flume Gorge, we ended up here on a very rainy day, which made all the waterfalls and rushing water more impressive, but also made for some slippery trail and for a very wet family. In fact, we weren’t able to complete the entire trail because it was washed out at one point and they had just closed it down.
The Gorge Trail is 1.5 miles each way, but you can easily turn around partway through and still see most of the big sites along the trail. We ended up parking at the South Entrance and walking over to Couch’s Staircase to start our hike, but I think that was mostly because we got a little turned around and didn’t find our way to the main entrance. But either of those is a fine way to get started.
We walked to Mile Point Bridge, which was where the trail was shut down when we were there, and then made a loop along the South Rim Trail to return to our parking lot.
The whole trail is stunning, with amazing features everywhere you look. And, if you go on the day after torrential storms in the area, there’s SO MUCH WATER.
I’m afraid most of my Watkins Glen pictures are more “wow! so much water!” instead of “wow! so pretty!” But both things were true! It was a little tricky to take amazing pictures because of how it kept raining and I had to keep putting my camera away.
Here: a pretty waterfall!
But one time there was a fat toad!
Anyway, highly recommend the Gorge trail! If you can go on a day when it’s not so rainy, that’s probably best. But if a rainy day is your only option, at least you get to see a crazy amount of water!
Seneca Falls
We spent our other full day in the Finger Lakes at Seneca Falls. Our campground, Sned-Acres, was about 20 minutes from Seneca Falls and 35 minutes from Watkins Glen, so great for checking out both places.
The aforementioned It’s a Wonderful Life Museum was our first stop. This small museum is filled with memorabilia from the film and definitely worth a stop if you’re at all a fan (and why wouldn’t you be?!)
We spent some time just walking downtown in Seneca Falls, too; it’s a cute little town with some fun gift shops. Dave bought a t-shirt with a logo from alternate reality Pottersville bar, Nick’s, that reads “hard drinks for men who want to get drunk fast.” Sadly, he can’t really wear it to school when he’s teaching, but that’s okay.
You can see the bridge that looks like the one from the movie; umm–I think it’s the one in this picture? We didn’t walk all the way down there:
The Seneca Falls Heritage and Tourism Center was a nice surprise; we were expecting a standard visitors’ center type place, but found a pretty extensive museum all about the history of the town and area.
Finally, we checked out the Women’s Rights National Historical Park. Because aside from inspiring the town in It’s a Wonderful Life, Seneca Falls is famous as the site of the first women’s rights convention, held in 1848.
Some of the buildings were still closed due to covid restrictions, but it was great to be back at an NPS site, complete with junior ranger badges and ranger talks. Abe did his junior ranger book and we listened to a talk about the convention and how it came to be in Seneca Falls. And then we toured the museum.
We got here fairly close to closing time so only had maybe an hour and a half to tour, and that was a good about of time. You’d likely want more time if the historic buildings are open, though.
And that was it for our quick Finger Lakes stop! There is, of course, much more to do in the area and one could easily spend a week or more here.
Next up: Niagara Falls!
maybe you would like to pin this?
Now I know why the Watkin’s Glen subdivision in my area is called that. It’s pretty steep. It has no waterfalls. It must have been named by someone who had seen the real Watkin’s Glen.
Is Abe holding on to his brother’s jacket to keep him from falling in the water? “cause I would so be doing that too!
I don’t remember, but that seems like something he would do! He’s a very cautious kid!