Mohonk Preserve & Mohonk Mountain House

Our 1 year wedding anniversary was yesterday & to celebrate we took the day off & went to the Mohonk Preserve in New Paltz New York to go hiking. The landscape there was unlike any other we had hiked in before. The Shawangunk Ridge is a very popular place for rock climbers & the cliffs were impressive.

The trail started with 100's of steps made of granite - it was a quick "welcome to hiking"

Once we got to the top of the stairs we turned onto the undercliff trail - it was a smooth path, to our left were the cliffs rising 100's of feet into the air, and to the right were beautiful views of the valley below.

This was a VERY heavy rock

After the first couple of miles we transitioned from Mohonk Preserve Land to the Mohonk Mountain House property

After a short while we emerged from the woods & were met with beautiful views across the lake of the Mohonk Mountain House, a Victorian Castle that now serves as a luxory hotel, and the adjacent cliffs. It was magnificant.

We then arrived at the famed "Labyrinth" trail, and were met with the following sign

It quickly became clear where the trail got its name it was a winding path through, under, over & around gigantic boulders

Once we got to the top we were met with little bungalows for two and the summit tower

We descended from the tower by way of a wandering trail that took us along the cliffs

We hiked down a set of trails over, under & through rocks, through arching rocks overhead & into caves

Mount Monadnock

On Sunday October 5th Craig & I joined Mom, Dad & Feng to New Hampshire to climb Mount Monadnock. The hike started with a nice leasurely woods trail:

The foliage was beautiful and the views got better as we peeked out of the trees.

Although the summit looked like it was VERY far away...

but we were there before we knew it

What a great day!

Yay! Wood floors

So the floors were installed today as scheduled, we put some of the furniture back in the living room, here are a couple of pictures.

Soon we'll get all the furniture put back into the dining room:

Preparing for Wood Floors

We started by taking up the carpet & pad in the dining room. There were years of dirt under the pad, here's Craig vacuuming it up.

After the floor was cleaned up it was time to remove all the staples & trim around the room.

Once the dining room was complete, we moved on to the living room & then our house looked like it was under construction.

Yesterday the wood was delievered. Now it's aclimatizing to our house before it is installed at the begining of next week!