Labrador Hollow Unique Area

One of the problems with my husband's and my busy lives is that we do not get to spend nearly enough time with my Dad.  So we took advantage of having an extra day in our Labor Day Weekend and went on a little adventure/photography trip with him.  Dad picked a great destination - he always does.  We loaded up the dogs and cameras and binoculars and headed over to Labrador Hollow Unique Area, which is a sweet little spot that is maintained by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation.

Labrador Hollow is really a hollow left by some glaciers long ago.  It is a total of 1,474 acres, and is located in the towns of Fabius and Truxton on the borders of Onondaga and Cortland Counties.  There is a lovely boardwalk, which is what we spent our time on, but there is a pond that is open for canoeing and fishing as well.

I still haven't mastered taking landscape shots when the sky is bright.  I always, with 100% consistency, underexpose them.  Badly.  I clearly need to go back and take some lessons from my camera genius Lydia at Johnson Camera.  It irritates me no end that I keep getting better and better at using this camera, but I'm wildly missing the mark when it comes to landscape photos on bright days.

The upshot is that I did not really capture any really good shots of the lake itself, or the way it is cradled in the surrounding glacial hills.  I did, however, manage to get some nice photos in the course of the day.

This my Dad identified as Turtle Head.  I don't know that I have ever seen it before:

Some Jewel Weed, which was all over the place:

Some friends we met along the way:

Some friends we brought along.  This is just classic - Simon has gone splat, and Phoebe is still bursting with puppy enthusiasm.

Here is a little mystery.  Anyone know what this is?  I'm not sure whether it's fuzzy lichen, or a colony of furry bugs, or what?  We couldn't get close enough to do any kind of real examination, since we were confined to the board walk.

I love the way the wild cucumbers are catching hold with their telephone cord curlicues:

And just some random photos that capture a little of the atmosphere of the area.  Things have all of a sudden turned gold and autumnal, which doesn't make me particularly happy.  I am not ready for fall.  Nor winter.  For me there are only two seasons: summer, and Raynaud's, and it's already the latter again.  But at least all the fall colors are delightfully photogenic.

The goldenrod fields were just decadently lovely.

It's such a nice spot to have found. (Thanks, Dad!)  Next time perhaps we shall bring a canoe and explore the boundaries of the lake a little more thoroughly.