In a One Horse Open Sleigh

I had always planned to clean up this cute little cutter and put it in the parlor in front of the windows. However, we could never get the second big door open and it languished up in the building.

It doesn't look like I am ever going to get around to that job, so the boss took it over to the auction to sell this Saturday. If you are interested, get there early....

It belonged to his dad...he is said to have bought it for ten dollars from some people he did grounds keeping for.

We kept the bells, and if I can get somebody to ring them while I take video, you will soon get to hear them. They are the mellowest, most sweet-sounding sleigh bells I have ever heard. I have them in the kitchen right now and I jingle them several times a day just for the sheer enjoyment of it. 

I can just see it spanking down a snowy road with a little bay horse in front....and those bells making merry for all who could hear as it passed by.

Scho-Mo Confluence

A necklace of gulls hunts where the waters merge

 A mighty tree the flood washed up at the boat launch

 Mappy for size reference
You can see part of the aqueduct behind him

The Auriesville Shrine from the boat launch

The innocent corn fields looked much the same...

you would never know that they had been inundated with feet of swirling water. When we were little the then owners let my dad and his friends and us kids walk these river flats after the rain, searching for chips of flint, arrow heads, pot shards and other evidence of those who lived here before us.

On the way home from the hospital Sunday my brother and sis-in-law were kind enough to stop at the boat launch where the Schoharie "creek" (a word used loosely for a sometimes-raging monster river) and the Mohawk River (which did some raging of its own last year.)


All the way home, things had looked the same and yet different from the last time I had been this way....before the flood...houses still sat where they always had been, but now they were wrapped in Tyvek, surrounded by dumpsters full of sheet rock and sofas, or sported condemned stickers and waited for their fate. 


It was a little like moving away, growing old, and finding your town somehow different when you came home to visit....you knew where the streets were, but life had gone on without you. Kind of misty and confusing.


Except that it goes on for miles and miles all over the state and a lot of places are much worse than here.


Much the same at the boat launch...the hard things of concrete and stone were still where they used to be but water channels had changed, roads had washed out and been replaced with lesser roads, debris was piled everywhere in windrows and mini-mountains. 


I was really pleased to see that much of the aqueduct still stands...I thought it might have all fallen. Imagine the kind of construction that has kept that much of it upright since 1841.


The place was thronged with people, much busier than it is in the summer when the state holds its hand out for money every time you drive down the access road. People hunted lures, played with eager doggies, or just looked out where the gulls whirled in the current, hunting herring. It was wild and eerie and.....well...I can't come up with a better word than different.


For more on problems with flood debris, go here.

Soldiers, Saddles and Sabers

The folks will be at the afternoon portion of this event on Saturday. Sounds like a lot of fun. Stop by and see them if you go.

Soap and Muskets

A couple of assorted pairs of kids and the BF went to the Revolutionary War Re-enactment and Market Fair at Johnson Hall this weekend. Despite the rain they all had a nice time.

And this lovely lady was there again after a long hiatus. Beck bought me a couple of bars of her terrific soap. We met her some years ago at the market fair and bought some and have hoarded bits and stubs of it ever since. I still have a tiny bit of the gritty brown stuff she makes so the "Indians" at the re-enactment can produce the skin tone they want to go with their outfits. However she hasn't been at the fair the last few times I managed to get there, and the fair hasn't even been held for a couple of years so my supply has dwindled.

The Market Fair is always a lot of fun and except for the foot I probably would have gone too. The period costumes, camp with tents, suttlers, and assorted Revolution era entertainment are a terrific way to spend an afternoon. Great music, lots of cool people who really know how to have a good time and a lot of carefully researched and well-presented history. Mom and dad used to put on their Clan Montgomery Scottish dress and attend and they always looked spectacular. (Hey mom, got a good photo for me?)

The magnificent house itself is worth a good bit of time, as it is an amazing preservation of the life-styles of the rich and famous of that time. Used to be pretty much every class of school kids that came along got to make the tour and learn a lot about our area history and I can remember my first trip with my class (There were still a couple of dinosaurs roaming the woods nearby). Sir William and his son Sir John were big players here in upstate NY back in the day.

I am really tickled to have a couple of bars of freshly-made Scottish lye soap. Beck suggested I cut it into little bitty bars while it is still soft so it will last longer, so that is just what I did. You can't imagine how nice your skin feels after a wash with it......

Sanford Stud Farm Kitchen

I loved these kitchen items and the rooms themselves. They reminded me so much of camps owned by relatives when I was a kid...the same style of wainscoting and dishes and all.

More Sanford Stud Farm Photos

Mare and foal barn

Medicine Cabinet in Jumping Barn

Kalamazoo track rake

Down the aisle of the mare barn

Sanford Stud Farm

Also known as Hurricana Farm. Today we were fortunate enough to be given a personal tour of the restored barns that are now under the care of the Friends of Sanford Stud Farm .

What an incredible place. At one time it covered a thousand acres, or so I have read. It was one of the largest stud farms of its day, housing as many as 150 breeding horses, sending one winner to the Kentucky Derby as well as an American horse to win the Grand National. Native Dancer, northern Dancer and Big Brown spring from horses bred there.

Mare and foal barns, not included in reconstruction area...alas....

The farm barn, which housed teams of pure white mules and dairy and beef cattle
Also unrestored

Saddle racks

Hand made stall hinges, made on site by the farm blacksmith

Saddling area

Jumping horse barn

Today much of the land is under Walmart and many of the buildings are gone. Those that remain are simply amazing. In the jumping barn the stall walls are inch-thick solid cherry. In the mare barn you can still see the marks where the race horses kicked the walls, and the edges of the doors (which are nearly as high as my head) that were chewed by generations of thoroughbreds. The atmosphere in the stables and rooms speaks of a time when life was much different, long before supermarkets and highways. (In the early days of the farm the race horses were walked to the track at Saratoga.) We were most grateful for a chance to glimpse the glory days of racing through our visit to this historic spot.

A medicine cabinet in the jumping barn

Solid Cherry Stalls

Gibson Oat Grinder, the only one in the US

"Suicide Ladder"which goes to the oat bin