Came across this barn structure on the way home from Pennsylvania this weekend.

RICKETTS GLEN STATE PARK -- LAKE JEAN beach
After hiking the trails at Ricketts Glen State Park, we decided to go down to the beach and try and catch the sunset on the water.  Weather was beautiful after threatening to rain but it held off.  We were able to get some nice pictures as the sun was setting.

RICKETTS GLEN STATE PARK, PA

 

This Memorial Day weekend, we spent 2 days at Ricketts Glen State Park in PA.  It is about a 3 hour drive away in Benton, Pennsylvania.  The park contains 26 miles of hiking trails and 22 waterfalls.  The trails are moderate to strenuous.  In a 3 hour period, we were only able to visit 4 waterfalls due to the strenuous hike and threatening weather...it started to thunder and lightening so we go out of there!   Here's a few shots of the waterfalls.  We were also able to do some mountain biking on some of the easier trails but we later found out that the trails aren't really for biking -- the park ranger saw us but when we asked for directions (not knowing we shouldn't be on the trails with bikes), she informed us that bikes aren't really permitted but they don't enforce it which was nice for us.

STONE CHURCH, DOVER
Stone Church is located in Dover Plains about 3/4 of a mile off Route 22. The cave dates back to the 1600s when it is said that the Indian tribe of Pequots came here to escape from the New Englanders.  In the 1830s, NYC folk came here to see Stone Church and stay at the Stone Church Hotel.  Some people have even gotten married there.  The cave is about 2 miles from my house so when we have an hour to kill and the weather is nice, we will often go there.  No matter how many times I go there, I can't seem to get good pictures that show how beautiful it is there.  Here's the best I got recently...

This waterfall is in the back of the cave.

Inside the cave...

There are 3 pools of water in a meadow on the pathway that leads up to the cave.

Newest addition to the family...

BENNETT SCHOOL FOR GIRLS (also known as HALCYON HALL) - MILLBROOK, NY 

This school was originally constructed in 1890 as Halcyon Hall - a luxury hotel. The building is designed in the elaborate Victorian Queen Anne style and consisted of 200 rooms in 5 stories, plus a basement and sub-basement. The hotel never really caught on and was only open for about 11 years.  It was vacant until another a buyer was found eight years later. The Bennett School for Girls, originally founded in Irvington N.Y. by Miss May Bennett, found Halcyon Hall quite suitable as a new home in 1907. Bennett College struggled in the 1970s to stay open and entered bankruptcy in 1977. The school was closed for good one year later.  Several attempt to redevelop the property failed in the 1980s, and the title was acquired by a savings bank subsidiary. When the bank went out of business in 1991, its assets including Bennett College were seized by the FDIC. An agreement was reached to place Halcyon Hall on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993 but the town of Millbrook is trying to have the place demolished so they can put up condos...here's some photos taken there last weekend.  It was too scary to go into the main structure (and it was posted) but we did manage to get into the dorm areas.  You could see that this was a very nice place at one time but the passage of time has not been kind to it...