Sept. 1, 2025 - THE ADIRONDACK PARK
The area of the Adirondack park is in blue and as you can see several of the great named national parks can actually fit inside of the Adirondack park
Breathtaking views at every turn.
We took several hikes around the lake, well they hiked and I scooted!
www.bernunzio.com
I couldn’t help stopping to take a picture of this little shop in Old Forge, NY. I remember seeing it over fifty years ago and it planted the seeds for a business in my home. Note the banjo in the front window!
Night time stroll around the town….
Lake Placid, NY home of the Winter Olympics 1932, 1980
Sometime customers stop by the store in search of things other than instruments…sometimes they’re just looking for dog food!
THE ADIRONDACK PARK
September 1st, 2025
The Adirondack Park lies entirely within in New York State. It is larger than most of the other national parks that are much more famous. In fact, the illustration shows exactly the size of the Adirondack Park compared to many of the famous national parks. It is not a national park because a good portion of the 6,000,000 acres and 2,800 lakes within the park are privately owned.. so it’s a mixture of government and private ownership. The park was created in 1892 as a method of preserving water rights and timber for future generations. So a good part of it is government run but a good part of it is also in the private sector.
I’ve been coming to the Adirondack Park since the late 1950s first as a Boy Scout and then later bringing friends and family here on canoe trips, camping adventures and just plain site seeing. It is always been a sacred place and as a young kid, I contemplated living here. I wanted to live near a small lake with crystal clear water and tall Pines and Hemlock that gave out their wonderful aroma and the deer and the bear and the moose and the beaver all wandering within the park. Of course it was not to be, but I do visit is often as I can. It is been a few years since I have made the trek. It is about a five hour drive from our home in Penn Yan. This past weekend we were invited by my daughter, Rose and her husband Jose and their new addition Talia Rose to spend some time in Lake Placid with them. It was cool and exhilarating but mostly just humbling to spend time with a six month old, developing human being once again. She is everything I could imagine in a granddaughter and I love her immensely.
Today is Labor Day and the store is closed. Labor Day marks the unofficial end of summer. Fall activities, such as school and sports, are now under way. There are lots of "back to school" activities and, with the Eastman School students back in town, our store has been a very busy place. Let us not forget that this Federal Holiday has been celebrated for nearly 150 years. It was established to celebrate the importance of the folks who perform the hardest work in the land, often for the least compensation. So tip your server, yard maintenance folks, AND musicians with a bit of extra zest, to honor their labor.
With peace,
John Bernunzio
Adirondack vista
Mirror Lake Inn
From our balcony