Climate change

There are expressions that one encounters when one is very young, which mean little more than the words themselves. They lack the emotional resonance that they slowly accrete as one gets older. I am sure my father and my grandfather, ur-pendants and lovers of the English language, familiarized me to the expression "Nero fiddled while Rome burned". But what did that expression mean to me when I was young? Perhaps it evoked an image of fat, elderly men in togas playing violins as angry flames leapt towards the sky in the background. But did it mean anything more than that image? I lacked the experience to understand the monumental scale of human capacity for denial, for not facing facts, for looking away from ugly reality as it stands right in front of them. I had not gone through medical school, not encountered patients whose entire arms were consumed by basal cell carcinomas – tumors that are so slow growing that it must have taken 20 years to get to that size. Why did the patient not have it looked at when it was a millimeter or so across, when it could have been safely and painlessly removed? Why did he wait until he had to have his entire arm amputated? Or that woman patient, from a family well known to our hospital for their generosity and philanthropy, whose breast cancer had ulcerated through her skin, giving rise to an oozing, bloody mess – why had she not reported earlier to the very breast cancer center that her family had donated so much to establish? I did not realize then that the expression about Nero and fiddling and Rome was merely a cautionary tale about the human ability to look away from catastrophe and distract ourselves with frivolity.

These days I am daily reminded of the much-maligned Emperor’s musical proclivities  as we go about our daily activities, unmindful of the growing evidence that we are facing a calamity of epic proportions. There was a time, about 10-15 years ago, when I felt that the effects of climate change would take place in my grandchildren's time and while it was a matter of concern, it was not a problem of great immediacy. But the events of 2015, coupled with two recent papers alarm me and cause me to realize that the changes are taking place much more rapidly than I had thought.

2014 was the warmest year in recorded history; 2015 is already on track to surpass that. July 2015 has been the warmest month on record. Horrible, disastrous heatwaves have struck India, Pakistan, Europe, and much of the United States. Western United States is experiencing some of the worst wildfires in history and California suffering the worst draught in modern times.

Bill McGibben, the environmentalist, begins his piece in Rolling Stones with the following sentences:

"If the pictures of those towering wildfires in Colorado haven't convinced you, or the size of your AC bill this summer, here are some hard numbers about climate change: June broke or tied 3,215 high-temperature records across the United States. That followed the warmest May on record for the Northern Hemisphere – the 327th consecutive month in which the temperature of the entire globe exceeded the 20th-century average, the odds of which occurring by simple chance were 3.7 x 10-99, a number considerably larger than the number of stars in the universe."

James Hansen, one of my heroes in science for his long record of being correct about environmental predictions and his fierce, unwavering commitment to his cause (even though many have criticized for being overly dramatic and pessimistic) has published, along with several notable colleagues, a paper in the Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions. The paper make the following truly alarming predictions:

“We conclude that continued high emissions will make multi-meter sea level rise practically unavoidable and likely to occur this century. Social disruption and economic consequences of such large sea level rise could be devastating. It is not difficult to imagine that conflicts arising from forced migrations and economic collapse might make the planet ungovernable, threatening the fabric of civilization.”

Just this morning, NASA released its assessment of sea level rise due to climate change and believes that a 3-foot rise in ocean levels is already locked in in our future, even if we reduce global CO2 emissions to zero right now (an eventuality that is completely unlikely to happen!). While they are unable to predict when this 3 foot rise may take place, their scenario is apocalyptic:

"New satellite research from NASA shows that not only are global sea levels rising quickly, but they could rise even more drastically than previous reports estimated. According to the US space agency, seas around the world have risen an average of three inches (7.6 cm) since 1992, and as much as nine inches (23 cm) in certain places."

Amidst all of this scary news, New England is behaving like a truly blessed oasis. We are experiencing a balmy summer. Historical records show that we usually have thirteen 90°F plus days in each summer. Thus far, we have had 7! As we approach September, temperatures will begin their slow, inexorable slide towards the brutal cold of winter. It seems unlikely that we will have even as many warm days this year as we usually do. Far from hitting new records for heat, we are experiencing a magical summer, warm but not humid or unpleasant. This is cool summer, following one of the colder winters in my recollection, will probably make the New England's 2015 cooler than the normal, unlike the rest of the world.

My own vision of the future gets progressively more bleak with each passing day. I fear that great parts of the world are going to become uninhabitable in our own lifetime. If the drought persists long enough and the temperatures keep going up, can people survive in Australia? What about great swatches of the Middle East, wherein temperatures are increasingly creeping up to the 120, 130°F levels? Will central and northern India be habitable in another 20 years? The migrations that we are reading about from Northern Africa into Europe are harbingers of things to come, I fear. I envision the kind of mass migrations that took place 80,000 years ago, when our species moved out of Africa due to increasing global temperatures. The globe was almost empty of people then and there was plenty of room for the migrants.  Where will 7 billion people crowd themselves? In the Maritime Canadian provinces and New England? I can see the kind of global unrest that Hansen and his colleagues are predicting.

Despite the inevitable changes that seem to be in our immediate future, we go about our merry ways without a care in the world. Perhaps we should all start ordering our togas.

Corning/Ithaca

July 28/29.

Corning/Watkins Glen/Ithaca

We decided that we would stop on the way back to New York State at Niagara Falls, to take one last look at the Falls. We decided the best place to stop would be at the Botanical Gardens, near where the butterfly Conservatory was. We also had the thought that once we stopped, we would eat the felafels that we had picked up in Toronto for lunch, and then take the People Mover to get us down to the Falls, get off the bus to take a walk near the Falls, and then catch another People Mover to bring us back to the butterfly Conservatory. However, once we stopped at the butterfly Conservatory and ate our felafels for lunch, we realized that we had just missed a people mover and it would be a 30 minute wait before the next one arrived. So, we decided that instead of using the people mover to get us around, we would simply drive down to the Falls to take a look at the Falls from the car. The disadvantage was that we would not have a chance to park the car and walk close to the river, but it was clear that we did not have the time to wait for the People Mover. So, we drove south on the Niagara Falls Pkwy. to the Falls and swung around to take a last look before heading across the border.

After we got on to the New York State Thruway, I had a choice of either taking Route 390 to Corning, or stay on the Thruway to exit 42, and then take Route 14 down to Watkins Glen. I decided that there was a small chance that the Corning glass factory and Museum might be open and took Route 390. It turned out to be a fortuitous decision, since we did not get to Corning till about 7 o'clock. We thought that it was extremely unlikely that the museum would be open, but as luck would have it, it turned out that through the summer the museum was open to 8! As we walked into the museum, we came across an open air exhibition of glass blowing. We rushed to join the audience and were absolutely transfixed! A very talented young man was walking the audience through the steps of making a platter. The end product was an absolutely spectacular piece of art. The added benefit was that they were handing out raffle tickets for an end of the show raffle, during which they would give out some of the pieces that they were making during the demonstration. We were hoping that we would get one of the pieces, because they were all very lovely. We did not, but we did enjoy the show very much. We were very glad that I had made the decision to come to Corning, and decided we should come back the next morning.

We drove to Watkins Glen. The B&B was not very impressive. I took an instantaneous and perhaps unjustified dislike to the couple who ran the B&B. The town of Watkins Glen seemed terribly rundown and unprepossessing to me. After checking into the B&B, we walked around to see the local sites. There were a couple of boarded-up stores, a Burger King across the street, and a camping site leading to the local gorge. We tried to walk to the gorge, but it was getting very dark and we decided not to walk along the street which did not have a sidewalk. We were fearful that if it got any darker, the trucks and SUVs that seem to be the majority of the traffic on the street might hit us (deliberately or inadvertently!) There is no restaurant nearby, so we decided to walk into the Burger King and by ourselves a couple of veggie burgers and an order of onion rings. We were impressed by the extreme level of obesity of all of the clientele in the store. All in all, it was a very dispiriting environment.

The next morning, we had a fairly mediocre breakfast. There were three other couples at the B&B, and we overheard two of the other couples in conversation before sitting down at the breakfast table. They sounded rabidly right-wing, and fiercely anti-Obama. Sandy and I looked at each other and I whispered to her to not pick a fight with them in case we ended up sitting at the same table with either of those two couples. Luckily for us, there were two tables for four people each, and the two couples decided to go sit together. This left us with the other table for four. The couple that joined us a few moments later turned out to be far more liberal than the other two. They were from Vermont, and one of them was a state legislator. I mentioned to him that I loved Bernie Sanders, and he told me that he did to and the reason he got into politics was because of Bernie. This made it clear to us that they were at least as left-wing as we were, since Bernie Sanders is the only self-declared socialist in the U.S. Senate. We had a fairly pleasant conversation with them.

After breakfast, we headed back to Corning. We got tickets to the museum at a substantially reduced rate, since the museum honored both our AAA membership and our senior citizenship. Unfortunately, it started raining quite hard so that the outdoor glassblowing demonstrations had to be canceled. We were looking forward to them, with the somewhat unrealistic hope that we would win one of the raffles. Even without the glass blowing demonstrations, however, our visit to the museum was an unqualified success. We took a tour of the museum with a docent, a woman who was somewhat obnoxious, officious and pretentious. Nonetheless, she was pretty knowledgeable and showed us some interesting exhibits and explained that provenance in a way that made them even more fascinating. I was simply blown away with the quality of the art in the collection. Particularly fascinating was a temporary exhibit of glass-art collection from a Chicago couple. The exhibit occupied two whole rooms of the museum, but the couple lived in an apartment in Chicago! One had to wonder where they found the room to house all of the art that they bought. I am really not that much into museums, but I found many of the pieces in this particular museum entirely captivating.

After the docent's guided tour, we went to a in-door glassblowing demonstration. The artist, just as impressive as the young man the day before, made a lovely glass bowl. Unfortunately, there were no raffles!

Sandy had bought tickets for one of the do-it-yourself shows, where they let you make a piece of glass with your own hands. So in the pouring rain we went across to another building where the studio is located. They handed Sandy a plain glass vase, on which she was asked to make a pattern using stickers. They then helped her sand the glass so that it turned opaque, basically turning into ground glass. When she took the stickers off, there were patterns of transparent glass surrounded by opaque, ground glass. I think that she did a very nice job making a very pretty vase.

We wanted to stay longer. There were sections of the museum that they had not even had a chance to see including some of the more technical aspects of glass making including fiberglass and so on. But it was getting near noon, and we wanted to have lunch at the famed Moosewood Café in Ithaca, New York. Sandy has been using their cook book for a very long time, and wanted to have lunch at the source. It poured the whole way. When we got to Ithaca, it was just after three o'clock, and the Moosewood Café was closed in preparation for dinner. Sandy tried to bully and/or cajole them into seating us, but they adamantly refused. We decided that this was one of the few disappointments we have had during this vacation. We walked around a little bit, and I picked up a slice of pizza and Sandy picked up a sandwich. We ate them for our lunch instead of the much anticipated lunch at the Moosewood Café. We headed home.

The drive home, through Route 17 (which is scheduled to be converted into Interstate 86 in the future) was one of the more harrowing experiences of the trip. Route 17 goes through the Catskills, with many steep inclines and declines, and many sharp turns. Throughout this 100-odd mile trip, it poured like it was going out of business. It rained so hard that I could not even see the front end of the car! I could barely see the road, and sometimes it was difficult to know whether I was making the right turns. At some points, especially at the bottom of steep downgrades, water was pouring in rivulets over the road, and I wondered whether I should pull off and wait. Unfortunately, my compulsive nature won out, and I kept driving on. Luckily, when we descended from the Catskills on to more level ground near Newburgh, New York, the rain subsided somewhat. We made it home late in the evening on Wednesday, 29 July.

Toronto

July 25-27, 2009.

Toronto, Ontario.

We made our way to Toronto in the pouring rain. For the next three days that we stayed in Toronto, it would rain pretty much the whole time, with the rare breaks. We checked into the Delta Chelsea Hotel, the only regular hotel that we stayed at doing this particular vacation. It is located pretty much at the center of downtown Toronto, making it quite easy to get around. We had a little difficulty parking a car in the hotel's parking lot -- we later found out that there was a wedding reception in progress and therefore a large, temporary crush on parking. After searching through all the levels, we were finally able to find one in the deepest level of the underground parking.

Soon after we checked in, however, the weather improved dramatically and the sun came out! We cased around the local neighborhood, looking for places where we might be able to get some breakfast and dinner, since we pretty much decided that we would be having lunch at different places in the city. For breakfast, it looked as though the best place would be a small "marketplace" in the main level of the hotel. This had a variety of breakfast items available pretty much throughout the entire day, and the prices were not so exorbitant as they are in most hotels. For the three days that we stayed there, I would get up in the morning and go downstairs and get Sandy a cup of coffee. Later, we would go back down there again for breakfast for myself. This arrangement suited us well, since the marketplace was also a good WiFi spot and we were able to check our e-mail and stock account.

Not far from our hotel was a large square at the intersection of a Queen and Yonge streets, the major east-west and north-south thoroughfares. There was a small outdoor market in progress in the square, which we checked out. There are also multiple television displays showing all kinds of things, and a discount-rate ticket counter for many local theatrical productions. I was tempted to buy tickets for a program known as Second City Troupe, the alumna of which have been many prominent comedians. After much dithering, we decided to hold off getting tickets. This might have been one of the few bad decisions we made during this vacation.

We also found a booth at which tickets were being sold for city tours. Much to our surprise, we found that the tickets permitted us to board the tour buses for an entire week! They were not too expensive (about $35 apiece). We decided we would get tickets for one of the course the next day, since it was already too late in the day to start a tour that day.

The next morning, it was raining pretty hard. Our hotel is located at the corner of Gerrard and Yonge streets. It was easy to walk out the Yonge Street, where we ran into a young woman selling tickets for a slightly different city tour company than the one we had found the first day. The tickets that she was selling were a little cheaper ($32 apiece), and in addition included a boat ride. We decided that that sounded really good, and bought ourselves tickets.

We decided we would go around the town the first time to get an initial look at what stops we might want to stop that. The tour lasted about two hours and included most of the major landmarks in town. Nancy Ryan, the woman who runs the histology core facility at the health center, is from Toronto and had told me that I should certainly visit Cass Loma, St. Lawrence and Kensington markets, the boardwalk along the pier, the CN Tower, the University of Toronto, and the city islands, which lie in Lake Ontario close to Toronto. The tour bus included most of these sites. In a sense it was good that we were in the bus, since it permitted us to see all the sights without getting hopelessly wet.

By the time we made a full circle around the city and got back to the starting point on the pier, it had cleared slightly for another break in the rain. Looking around, we found a Middle Eastern restaurant where we bought a falafel sandwich for myself and a baba ganoush sandwich for Sandy. They were both very good, but both Sandy and I thought that the falafel sandwich was about the best we had outside of Israel.

We decided to finish off with the boat ride, because we had no idea how rainy it might be the next day. The boat ride was off the pier, and on the way we walked past a rock concert and another open-air market. Apparently, this was an "international market" and we decided we'd stop at it after the boat ride.

The boat ride lasted about half an hour. It took us around the harbor area showing us all the highlights, and then among the city islands that Nancy had asked us to visit. Many of them have been converted into aquatic bird preserves. We saw a whole bunch of interesting birds that we did not quite identify, not being birders ourselves. But it was overall an interesting, restful trip. Sometime during the boat ride, the sun emerged briefly and Sandy was happy to be able to "get some color" as she says.

We wandered among the international market stalls after our boat ride. There were tents run by vendors from India, the Middle East, and the Far East. There was a tent selling fruits and fruit juices, and we bought a small order of cut papaya and mango. It was delicious, and we were tempted to buy another order. However, the woman running the stall would not give us any benefit for the fact that we are using US currency which was worth about 10% more than Canadian currency. We decided that that was not fair, and we did not buy a second order even to our mouths were really watering!

We went back to the tour bus stop and took a ride to an area of the city called the distillery. Apparently early in the history of Toronto, there had been a distillery in this area, but it had long ceased to operate and fallen into disrepair. Over the past few decades, this area has been converted into an upscale shopping center, full of the typical arts and crafts stores and galleries that such downtown rejuvenation projects have. It started raining again rather hard, and it was difficult for us to make our way around. Nonetheless we persisted and visited a number of galleries and a terrific chocolate place, where I could not resist buying myself a cup of hot chocolate. Given the fact that it was cold and rainy, it seemed to make good sense. Sandy and I shared the chocolate while waiting for the rain to abate, which it did not. So, we wandered among the art galleries and upscale stores, just looking around but not buying anything specific. Sandy was still questing for maple extract, and asked many of the stores whether they carried it and no one did. Several people felt the some of the stores at the St. Lawrence market might, but unfortunately that market was closed till Tuesday. So, it would only be open on the day that we were landing to leave.

We had been told that the last bus out of the pier was at 6 o'clock, and that it would be at the distillery around 6:10 or so. So, I planned to be out at the bus stop around 6:05 or so. When we got to the bus stop, I was a little nervous because no one else was waiting there. I wondered whether we had missed the bus. After another 10 to 15 minutes of waiting, I called the tour bus company, and the guy the phone told me that the last bus out of the peer was actually at 5:40 and that it had been at the distillery at about 5:45 or 5:50 or so! So we had missed the last bus on the tour bus schedule. Sandy got incensed by this, and took the phone from me and yelled and screamed at the guy telling him that he was abandoning us and that he should do something to bring us back to our hotel. But the man was recalcitrant, told her that I was nothing he could do. Sandy was so furious that she was almost close to tears by the time the conversation ended.

We ended up taking a cab back to our hotel. This set us back about $10, but there was really no option because the distillery was quite a ways from our hotel.

While we were on the tour, we had driven by the CN Tower. Nancy had told us that it is well worth the visit, especially on a clear day, and we thought maybe we should go in. But, we were told that there was a charge to get up to the observation tower, which is about 800 feet above ground. However, if you had a reservation at the restaurant which is a couple of levels above the observation tower, then there was no charge for the elevator ride. We thought that this sounded like a good deal and we talked to the concierge at the hotel to see if there will was anything on the menu that I could eat. Luckily for us, there were numerous vegetarian options and we decided that we would reserve a table for us for lunch the next day.

The next day started just about as rainy as the previous days, but cleared progressively as the day progressed. We got into the tour bus and got a slightly different take on the city, since the guide was not the same person as the one on the bus the previous day. We got to CN tower a little before lunchtime, but got off the bus anyway and walked around a bit before heading out to the restaurant. This turned out to be a heady and gratifying experience. There was an enormous line waiting to get on to the elevators taking the plebes to the observation deck. However, the elevator to the restaurant was completely separate, and we were whisked off separately from the waiting crowds to our elevator! We felt like one of the chosen few!

The elevator to the restaurant takes about 58 seconds to climb about 800 feet. I understand that it is one of the most speedy elevators anywhere in the world. The elevator door opens directly into the restaurant. The service was quite exceptionally solicitous. We were shown to a table and sat down to see extraordinary vistas all around. The platform on which the tables are located spins around to make a complete revolution in 72 minutes. Sandy and I decided that we should spend at least that much time so that we can get a good view of every part of the city.

We decided that we would have price fixed lunches, at about $48 apiece. This included an appetizer, a main course and dessert. The dishes that came with each course were beautifully presented and we took pictures of all of them, because they look so pretty. We also took many many pictures as our table swung around. Altogether, it was quite a lovely experience.

The next morning was Tuesday, the day that we were so supposed to depart Toronto. We had initially planned to take the tour bus to the St. Lawrence market (which was finally supposed to be open). However, it turns out that the tour bus goes counter-clockwise around the whole town, and if we got into the bus at the stop closest to us, we would have to go through the entire town before getting to the market. This really meant that we would spend two hours to get to some place where you could easily drive within a few minutes. So we decided that we would check out, get into our car and drive to the St. Lawrence market, see if we could buy the maple extract there and then head out to Watkins Glen, New York, as scheduled.

The St. Lawrence market was really quite nice. It reminded us very much of the Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia, except that it was a little less crowded and a lot more organized. We wandered around the market admiring the produce and miscellaneous merchandise on display. We asked at several stores whether they had maple extract, but they all had maple syrup and maple candy but not maple extract. There was, they all told us, a store on the lower level which might have it. So we repaired to the lower level and went around seeking the store. We finally did find it, a store catering to gourmet cooks or so it seemed. Unfortunately, they did not have maple extract either. However, they did have an extraordinary variety of licorice candy, and Sandy purchased some.

During one of our trips around the city, we had been told that there was a section called the Annex which was the intellectual center of the town, and people like Michael Ondaatje and Margaret Atwood lived there. Sandy thought it might be a hoot to wander around a little bit there and perhaps run into one of them. So we decided we would get there and see if there was anything going on. We drove up to the Annex, but found it almost impossible to park the car. So we decided that it was not worth the trouble, and headed out of Toronto.

All in all, we had a very nice time in Toronto despite the incessant rain. We likeed the people we met, we liked the town and we liked everything we did, particularly the CN Tower. Because of the rain we couldn't do a lot of outdoorsy things like wander around the gardens and the University of Toronto, take a long stroll along the boardwalk at the eastern beaches along Lake Ontario etc. I would also like to have attended a performance by the Second City Troupe. However, both Sandy and I liked Toronto enough that we might come back one day.

Niagara Falls

July 23-July 25, 2009.

Niagara Falls.

The drive from Canada Hari to Niagara was uneventful, other than the sporadic rain. We filled up our gas tank in Buffalo, before crossing the river because I remembered that gas was at least 4 1/2 dollars a gallon in Canada and about half that much in the US. Luckily, there was a BJ's right off the highway in Buffalo and I was able to get gas there. I almost got hit by a woman backing up her car as they pulled into the gas station. This is the closest we came to an accident during our vacation trip.

We had booked a room in a bed-and-breakfast in Niagara Falls, Ontario. I was not terribly impressed by the place, but Sandy was somewhat more forgiving. It was rather nicely said, with a grape vine vineyard right behind, and a winery and bakery just beyond. The house itself was not prepossessing, which is why I was a little cautious at first. The woman running the bed-and-breakfast, however, was extremely helpful in giving us tips about how to get around Niagara Falls, where to park so as to avoid exorbitant parking fees, what to see and what not to see, etc.

On the first night, all we did was to drive around on the Niagara Falls Pkwy, which runs about 12 miles along the Niagara River on the Canadian side. I caught my first glimpse of the Niagara Falls that evening (the evening of July 23), and I must say it was more breathtaking than any picture or movie I have seen of it. We did not, however, get to see it close up until the next day.

Breakfast the next morning was plentiful. The woman made some really good bread and much else. I thought there was nothing to complain about in terms of food, either in quantity or quality. The woman who ran the B&B had told us to park at the butterfly Conservatory, which was located at the closest part of the Niagara Falls Parkway. Parking there was free and then we could take a shuttle bus (called the "people mover") all day, for a fee of $7.50. As it turned out, we had purchased a Niagara Falls passbook from Triple-A before we left. One of the coupons in the passbook was for two days of rides on the people mover. This meant that you could pretty much move around without paying anything more than what we already had back in Connecticut.

So we started the morning at the butterfly Conservatory. Sandy wanted to see the butterflies, and we were able to get tickets half-price because of the coupon book from AAA. I'm not sure however that it is worth the price of admission. The butterfly Conservatory was not very different from the butterfly Museum that we had visited earlier in Deerfield, Massachusetts. But what was absolutely wonderful was the large botanical Garden surrounding the butterfly Conservatory. Sandy and I have both come to appreciate the extraordinary gardens in Canada and this was no exception. We spent an hour or two just wandering around the gardens, admiring the variety and profusion of flowers tastefully displayed.

We got to the people mover to the first touristy the attraction on the Niagara Falls Pkwy. this was set a few miles downstream of the Falls (I should probably point out that the Niagara River runs south to north from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario. The place where we were staying was at the northern end of the Parkway. So, we joined the Parkway at the northern end and were traveling south, two words the Falls from the butterfly Conservatory. The first stop was therefore several miles downstream of the Falls). The attraction here was a boardwalk that ran on the Western (Canadian) bank of the Niagara River, at a place where the water was rushing at the highest speed. The Rapids were truly impressive. I know that several people have tried to swim across the Rapids at that very spot, and I cannot help but wonder at their bravery or stupidity. Needless to say most people never made it across to the US side. We took many pictures, but I don't think any picture can do justice to the shooter with volume of water that was rushing at enormous be over rocky terrain, creating whirlpools and Whitewater that is nothing short of awe-inspiring.

We went back to the Parkway, and waited for for a bus to take us to the next attraction, which was the maid of the mist. The maid of the mist is basically a boat that travels they are close to the Falls. We were all given a flimsy plastic raincoats to wear. Sandy and I had, in addition, brought our own raincoats. We wore the plastic raincoats on top of our more robust ones.

What can I say other than the maid of the mist is something that every human being must experience firsthand. As you approach the foot of the Falls, I look up and see the falls cascading down from great height and force, generating the most extraordinary row or and throwing up amidst that rises hundreds of feet into the air, it is simply breathtaking. You cannot help but feel humbled by the power and awesome majesty of nature. It is probably the most singular experience of our vacation.

It was May Day by then, and we stopped to get some lunch from the many fast food outlets along the Niagara Falls Pkwy. Sandy bought herself some inari sushi, which she thought was some of the freshest she had had since the time that we were in Japan. I bought myself some pizza which tasted a lot like the pizza that Costco or BJ's sells.

After lunch we visited two other tourist attractions, neither of which overwhelmed us all that much. The first was a cave that had been bored into the rock behind the false, with some portals that lead directly into the face of the rock over which the Falls cascade. The water is a few feet away from the rock face, so that it is not possible to actually put one's hand out and feel the water. This probably lucky that it were so, because I am sure the power of the water would simply take one's hand off. There were also railings to make sure the worker to jump into the water. This is okay, but won't really did not get to see much other than the curtain of water in front of one size, which is impressive but not anywhere near the kind of awestruck feeling one gets from being at the foot of the Falls in the maid of the mist boat. We also visited something called the fury of the Niagara falls, a sort of Disney-esque multimedia event. Technically this is quite nice. We were on some kind of a movable platform and they made a very good attempt at making it seem as though we were on the boat that was cruising upstream of the Niagara River towards the Falls. By using projection screens that surrounded the entire platform and moving the platform along several axes, they were able to make it seem as though you were actually on the boat. In addition, whenever the "boat" was neither the falls are a Rapids, they sprayed water on you to subjects built into the roof to make it seem that you are actually in the water. It is high-level technical cheesiness. It is worth one visit, but I doubt I would be tempted to go back there again if we went there a second time.

We went back to the better bet breakfast for a brief respite, and then on the advice of the woman who ran the bed and breakfast, we spent the evening in the old, historic part of that peninsula, called Niagara on the Lake. It was a bit like walking on Main and cottage streets of Bar Harbor, Maine, except somewhat more upscale and less crowded. One additional feature, which you never see in Bar Harbor, with the flowers. Every street corner and the central island were veritable botanical Gardens. The Canadians seem to specialize in horticulture and it is astonishing given the very short growing season that they must have. There is a confusion of flowers many of which I have never seen before, but I am sure Sandy knows. Personally, I was impressed by the amount of sweet potato greenery. I have loved sweet potato foliage ever since I saw it first at the Yankee Candle factory in Deerfield Massachusetts.

We had dinner at a restaurant located inside a hotel called the Prince of Wales. We sat at a table on the sidewalk, watching the world go by. Sandy had lobster dish which she thought was terrific, and I had pizza which was very good. We thought the whole ambulance of the restaurant and the rest of the hotel was so good that we decided to price out the rooms. We later found the least expensive room was about $240 a night, which seemed a little steep. However, it was a high-class establishment!

The next morning, breakfast was just as spectacular as the day before. The woman made a multigrain bread, but Sandy absolutely adored. She was, however, not able to pry off the recipe from the woman.

What enlivened breakfast was the conversation. We sat with two Canadian couples, one perhaps a few years older than us and the other a few years younger. Everyone was somewhat left of center like ourselves, which made the conversation pleasant and bereft of friction. The younger man (who is of course, not all that young, I guess about 56 or so) at the table reminded both Sandra and myself very strongly of Eric Kronstadt. He looked like Eric, he talked like Eric (except somewhat more than I ever does) and seem to be quite smart, just like Eric. He also turned out to be an oenophile, and was able to recommend some wineries to visit on our way to Toronto. I guess I have not mentioned that of the most extraordinary features of that whole area seems to be the profusion of wineries. I could not help get the oppression that every other house was a small winery.

In any case, we talked about all kinds of interesting things at breakfast, many many political issues but most importantly their impressions of the health care system in Canada. As with most other Canadians we spoke to during our visit, they were basically happy with what they had and were quite astonished that there were so many Americans who did not have health coverage and the numbers of Americans who go bankrupt if they fall ill.

Before leaving the better breakfast, we walked through the vineyard behind to the bakery. It was a very nice bakery, and be realized that they could have picked up some really good for lunch the previous day had been known that it existed, instead of the rather mediocre fast food we actually had. Sandy had come to Canada hoping that you would be able to pick up some maple extract better recipe for maple oat nut scones called for. This seemed to be just the kind of high-end bakery that might have that ingredient. As it turned out, they did not order a book to recommend some places to try.

We decided to drive through the Niagara Falls Parkway one last time before we left. We wanted to take another good long look at the Falls because it was quite likely we would never come back again. But initial thought was to park the car at the butterfly conservatory, and take the people mover but in the end we decided that this would take too much time. So we simply drove the car through the entire length of the Parkway, and headed towards Toronto. As our pseudo-Eric had recommended, we decided not to take the highway to Toronto, but drive through some of the back roads through the wineries that dotted the landscape. Pseudo-Eric had suggested that we stop at a specific winery whose name I have now forgotten. It is housed in a lovely old stone house. Because of my Plavix and aspirin, I'm not able to drink, but Sandy tested many of their wines and wine tasting. The guy who poured the wine was an older man who seemed patient, knowledgeable but not supercilious and informative. Both Sandy and I found an excellent guide to the winds at the winery. We had heard that one of the specialties of the entire Niagara Falls region was ice wine, a wine made from grapes after the ground is frozen. Sandy made a point of testing that ice wines, but found them unbearably sweet. We ended up buying a few bottles of wine at the winery.

Soon after we finish of the winery, it started raining. We stopped at a small Greek restaurant and bought a Greek salad to eat on the way. Unfortunately, I seem to have left the umbrella we took with us (the one that we have both last year in Nova Scotia) at that restaurant.

By the time we hit the highway to Toronto, it was pouring very very hard. There were times that I could barely see the road (this would happen again on the last leg of our journey, between Ithaca and Farmington). There were times when we wondered whether we should just pull off the road and wait out the rain fall. However, we also realize that he did not seem like it was going to stop raining at any time. So we just pressed on and got to Toronto on the evening of July 25.

Saratoga Springs/Amsterdam

July 22, 2009.

Saratoga Springs/Amsterdam, NY.

Many years ago (1970, if I remember correctly), my classmate Raja Rao and I drove across the country. It was the year after we had arrived from India and we believed, at that time, that we would go back after we finished our residencies here. So, we felt that we had to see the country before we went back and decided the best way to do it would be to drive. Raja was in Cleveland at that time. I drove from New York to Cleveland to meet up with him. We then drove west on Route 90, and after stopping at Badlands in South Dakota and Mount Rushmore, we ended up in some small dinky little town that had sulfur springs. Many years later, I went to another sulfur springs during a visit to Israel, at the Ein Gedi Kibbutz on the shores of the Dead Sea. Both these experiences were so enjoyable, that I have an unfulfilled desire to immerse myself in another hot, sulfurous soaking at least one more time before I die. Hence the presence of Saratoga Springs in the itinerary.

After leaving Hyde Park, we drove to Saratoga Springs. On the way, we stopped at Rhinebeck, New York to pick up a sandwich at a place called Bread Alone (another suggestion from Eric, the chef at Le Petite Château). We got ourselves a grilled Portobello sandwich which was absolutely scrumptious. We got to Saratoga Springs relatively late in the evening and found ourselves in a town that was absolutely jam packed because of a rock concert. It took us an unconscionable amount of time to locate the springs. Much to my disappointment, the springs were neither hot nor sulfurous. They were merely tepid mineral waters, that people were collecting in plastic jars to take home with them, presumably to cook with! Sandy reminded me that we have had precisely this experience once before, several years ago when we had driven past that way on our way to Montréal.

Disappointed, we left Saratoga Springs to drive on the Amsterdam, New York, which is where I had booked a room for us at a B&B called the Amsterdam Castle. It seemed interesting on the web page (see picture). What we read about it on the webpage was that it had once been an Armory, and this young couple had bought it and refurbished it as a bed and breakfast. We arrived at Amsterdam when it was still dusk. The town was not prepossessing. It was (or so I imagine) a typical Small Town, USA. There were numerous abandoned factories with broken windowpanes galore, looking sad and bereft. The parts of the town that we drove through were full of minority young men hanging about on stoops. I could imagine that they had no jobs and no hopes for one either.

I got lost. We did have directions to get to the castle, but it was from a different direction and I had difficulty reorienting myself. We finally saw a police cruiser, and I began to follow him, waving frantically. Finally, he must have noticed me in his rear view mirror and pulled over. Before I had a chance to open my door and come out, he began to approach our car, looking somewhat menacing. I rolled my window down and as I did so, he asked (both Sandy and I sensed, somewhat belligerently), what can I do for you sir or what do you need sir? I told him quite politely that we were looking for directions to a place called Ford Street (I knew that the Amsterdam Armory was located on Ford St.). He gave me fairly explicit directions and I felt that I could find my way. He went back to his car and started driving away and I realized he was making the first turn that I was supposed to as well. So I followed him. Much to my surprise, he began to make all the turns that would lead me to Ford Street! Finally, he pulled over just in front of the castle. Sandy and I were both surprised and touched that he had taken the trouble of leading us to our destination. We pulled by his side, lowered our windows, and thanked him. He waved and left.

The castle was charming. Our "room" was really an enormous suite. We had an ante-chamber, with a little breakfast/dinner alcove. This led to an enormous bedroom with a four post bed. The bathroom had an old-fashioned bath on four legs and an additional walk-in shower. Outside our suite was a wide corridor that led to an enormous gym. A pool room was next door to our suite. The next morning, we had breakfast in an enormous dining room on the level above.

The family, the Phemisters, that ran the bed & breakfast were a German man married to a half American-half French woman. The latter was more interesting, chatty and outgoing. The man was somewhat reserved and did not say very much. They were holding an annual picnic for the local soccer coaches and invited us to join them. One of the "local" soccer coaches was a young man from London who had been coaching in the US for the summer on some kind of a work-study program. We had a very pleasant time chatting with him.

For dinner, we walked over to an Italian restaurant around the corner from the castle. We ordered an egg plant Parmesan sandwich to go that we planned to share. Instead of waiting at the restaurant, we decided we would take a short walk. The walk took us past a boccie ball tournament, apparently of the local women's club or something because all of the players were women. We watch them play for a while and by the time we got tired of watching, it was time to go pick up our dinner. We brought in the back to our suite a very enjoyable dinner in the little breakfast/dinner nook. We then decided to get really wild and have a bath in the nice antique tub. Which we did.

The next morning we headed out to Niagara Falls. There is a little town on the New York State Thruway not far from Amsterdam called Canajoharie. Mrs. Phemister had suggested that we should stop in the town because it had an outstanding library and museum, housing the art collection of a Mr. Arkel whose family had started the Beechnut baby-food factory there. So we decided to do that. The museum was quite astonishing in its collection of lovely paintings. Mr. Arkel was clearly not only very rich, but also seems to have had excellent taste. The guard at the museum seemed to know an astonishing amount of detail about the paintings, and explained the provenance of several items to us.

We also wandered through the library, which was holding an exhibition of local painters. Both Sandy and I fell in love with a painting entitled "On the moor" by a local artist by the name of Karen Rosasco. We decided we should purchase it and after we got back to Farmington, we called the library and ask them to ship it to us.

We hit the road to Niagara Falls by midday on July 22.

Hyde Park

July 21, 2009.

Hyde Park.

Sandy and I leave for our long anticipated Niagara Falls vacation on July 21, 2009. As always, small crises loom in the horizon! It is Tuesday and therefore garbage pickup day, and we anguish about whether we should stay long enough to bring the recycling bin back home before leaving. They usually pick up the recycling material relatively early in the day, but when we check around 10 AM, it still hasn't been emptied out. We are in a dither and fervently hope that it gets done soon. The intensity of our concern is out of proportion to the reality of the stimulus. Luckily for our mental health, it does get emptied by 11, and thankfully we bring the container back up to our garage and head out by noon as we had hoped.

It is, of course, raining. This is been the story of the summer of 2009. We are not to know this yet for another week or so, but it turns out that the combined rainfall in June and July of 2009 is about 18 inches, making them the most rainy June/July on record. I don't particularly enjoy driving in the pouring rain, but compulsive as I always am, I have set myself the task of getting to Hyde Park by 2 or so and this is not a task that I'm willing to forgo.

We do in fact reach Hyde Park by 2 and check in to our Bed and Breakfast. We have decided to split our lodgings half-and-half between traditional hotels and B&B's. By the time we get to Le Petite Château in Hyde Park it is pouring so hard that we have no clear inkling of the setting. The next day, just before we check out, it would clear just enough for us to see that it is beautifully set on a man-made lake.

We are greeted by Eric, the resident chef who is a recent graduate of the Culinary Institute of America. Philistine that I am, I had never before heard of the Culinary Institute of America and did not realize that this is an institution of considerable renown. Just before we leave, Judge Evelyn Daley, the probate judge in Farmington, had told us that we needed to reserve seating at one of the restaurants at the Institute a month or so ahead if we had any hope of dining there. As it turns out, the Institute is closed for renovations through the month of July and we would not have had a chance to eat there in any case. But we do get a taste of its potential, since Eric turns out to be a spectacular cook. When we arrive, we have some homemade cookies and cheese crackers that are absolutely delicious. The next day, for breakfast, he makes the best grits (with black pepper and cheese) we have ever had. The main course for breakfast is a breakfast burrito. Now, I have had breakfast burritos in many Mexican restaurants. Maybe this is an unfair thing to say, but I've come to the conclusion that Mexican food is not the most sophisticated in the world. At least the version that is available in the United States is almost unbearably heavy on the melted cheese that sits like a slab of lard on almost all the dishes, threatening to clog the coronary and carotid arteries of anyone who dares to consume it. Add to that the tomato sauce the drenches and overpowers most dishes, I for one am left with a heart-felt desire for antacids after a meal in a Mexican restaurant. Eric's breakfast burrito was to be standard Tex- Mex restaurant's version is as Itzak Perlman to a four year old learning to play the violin. It was delicate, almost fluffy, with just a hint of sun-dried tomatoes and none of the slabs of congealed melted cheese that alarm me so much. It was the best breakfast we were to have through our vacation.

We headed out after checking in to our first destination in Hyde Park, Franklin Delano Roosevelt's home. The first thing we did was to buy something called the Interagency Pass for Senior Citizens. This is a one-time ticket costing $10 that allows us free access to all historic properties owned by the National Parks Service. Sandy and I are delighted by this, because nothing makes us more happy than the sense that we are getting something for nothing!

We go on a guided tour through the mansion. It pours relentlessly and my rain-slicker that barely reaches my knee acts as a conduit for the water pouring down on the rest of my body onto my pants at mid-thigh. I am soaked through and through by the time we finish. We decided to go back to the B&B to dry off a little bit before going elsewhere. Eric is extremely helpful and allows me to use the dryer in the kitchen.

We head off to the Eleanor Roosevelt cottage. Thanks to our Interagency Pass, we have free admission. Now, I have some vague knowledge of Eleanor Roosevelt, some awareness that she is a liberal icon. But to be honest, this knowledge is more received wisdom than any first-hand awareness of what she actually accomplished. This visit to her cottage leaves me stunned at the range of her activities, the consistency of her progressive views at a time when women were probably meant more to be seen than heard, and her unflinching bravery. I am deeply impressed and humbled. I cannot help but feel that more people, at least more Americans, should be forced to come here and confront what is possible for a human being to accomplish in one's life, in a noble and disinterested fashion. More than anything else, I am touched by the simplicity of her dwelling -- here is a woman who could have afforded something much larger and more ostentatious but chose to spend most of her widowhood in a small relatively modest residence. I am intrigued that her best friends through this part of her life were a couple women who appear to have been lesbians, even though this goes unstated through all of the material that is presented at the cottage.

We have to scrounge around for dinner. The Culinary Institute of America is out of the question because it is closed. We ask Eric for some suggestions, and he tells us that there is a restaurant called Twist in a neighboring village also run by a graduate of the Institute. We drive over and find a very crowded, tiny place that looks quite unpretentious. The food that we get is delicious and sophisticated. We are getting an interesting impression of the Institute.

After that delicious breakfast that I mentioned before, we had off to our final planned destination at Hyde Park -- the Vanderbilt mansion. We are impressed even before we see the building. The grounds are extensive, lush, beautifully maintained. The acres and acres of rolling beautifully manicured lawns are broken up tastefully by clumps of strategically positioned trees. When we drive through the seemingly interminable approach and finally catch a glimpse of the mansion, is a breathtaking experience. It is set on a hilltop that overlooks the Hudson River, and across the river from the Palisades. The view is stunning. As with the Eleanor Roosevelt house, admission to the Vanderbilt mansion is free thanks to the Interagency Pass. Everything about the house inside is emblematic of the roaring 20s. This seems to be a case of opulence for the sake of opulence, rooms and rooms and rooms over decorated, overstuffed, almost stultifyingly so. The contrast between ostentation of the Vanderbilt mansion and the spare, understated simplicity of Eleanor Roosevelt's house is poignant. The main entrance alone has enough floor space to house a modest apartment. There are marble staircases sweeping grandly to the first floor, from which one can look down, over marble balustrades, on to the foyer. There are sculptures and paintings galore and antique furniture to fill many shops. The basement level has a spectacular, spacious kitchen and myriad rooms for servants. After the tour of the house, we wander around the acres and acres of gardens around the house. Apparently, there were eight greenhouses during the heyday. None of them is now operational, and most have been torn down. There is, however, still a large flower garden maintained by volunteers from the local community. It is about the size of many public gardens in medium-sized cities.

The entire experience is a little overwhelming. Someone once said, behind every great fortune lies a great crime. I don't know enough about the Vanderbilt's to know what great crime lay behind that great fortune, but I am torn between envy for someone who could generate so much wealth that he could build and maintain something as lavish and grand as this and at the same time the sense that this is all really, in the ultimate analysis, needless.

It is mid-day and we head off for Saratoga Springs, the next stop on our vacation.