Beautiful Fall Hike in the Finger Lakes

Every year we go away for a long weekend with another couple on a trip that inadvertently (…or maybe deliberately) becomes a beer-centric trip. This year we went to the Finger Lakes in New York, which admittedly is primarily known as being wine country.    

Three of the four of us drink wine, so we were keen to add in a few wineries, but we also hit up a couple microbreweries and Ithaca Beer Company. All around, the beer wasn’t terribly memorable, but we figured that’d be the case given the region’s focus on wine, particularly white wines. The wines were delicious, but many of the dry white wines (my preference) tasted the same from winery to winery. But it's always fun to sample nonetheless.

From top to bottom: fields outside Ithaca Beer Company, view of Seneca Lake from Grist brewery, and a flight from Ithaca Beer Company.  

We usually incorporate some sort of physical activity and we love being outdoors (we’ve hiked near Niagara Falls, biked between breweries in Burlington, VT, etc.), so this year we hiked the Gorge and Rim Trails at Robert H. Treman National Park outside of Ithaca.    

It was a gorgeous hike and I think we were all surprised with just how striking it really was. The 4+ mile loop is well kept and much of the elevation gained on the Gorge Trail is via manmade steps built into the mountain with wood borders and a stretch of stone steps that were spectacularly beautiful in their own right. 

The main draw for this trail loop is that you pass 12 waterfalls, some more impressive than others, but none were a standout. We also passed a number of bridges and the views all around were incredible. The only thing that could have made it better is if more leaves had changed color to the characteristic reds, oranges, and yellows of fall. Below are just a few of my favorite photos from the hike (and I seriously edited down) – enjoy!