The Southern Tier, New York

           As long as we're extolling the virtues of all things north of the 42nd parallel, here are some more photos of New York State's Southern Tier.  This is an abandoned farmhouse on NY 394 in Cattaraugus County.  In fact, I saw this house from I-86 en route to Allegany State Park from the Chautauqua Institution; it's at the "Schoolhouse Road" exit just west of the village of Randolph.  If I could have found an inconspicuous spot to park my car, I would have been in that place!

          Locally, some people talk about the "Twin Tiers."  That's to say, the Southern Tier of New York and the Northern Tier of Pennsylvania.  Ironically, it means that the "Southern Tier" is to the north of the "Northern Tier."  But that's not the only confusing thing about using the expression "Twin Tiers."   The most confusing and misleading thing is that there's very little similarity between them.  This is the Hotel Lenway on the shores of Lake Chautauqua.  It's very much like the old wooden hotels you'll find in the Finger Lakes.  Down here, south of the border, I'm pretty sure that all the clapboard hotels disappeared long ago.  They were consumed in grease fires and drunken mishaps with kerosene lamps. Down here, big wooden structures don't last more than seventy or eighty years because, after a long shift at the factory or coal mine, people collapse into bed with lit cigarettes in their mouths.  And nobody bothers to paint real wooden clapboards.  Unless Home Depot is having a real cheap sale on vinyl siding, that place is toast.

           The gulls--or terns--on the docks at Lake Chautauqua, Bemus Point.  Come early because seating atop the poles appears to be limited.

          This is the venerable old Athenaeum Hotel on the grounds of the Chautauqua Institution.  In some ways, Chautauqua is a pretentious place.  It's what would happen if National Public Radio hosted an old fashioned church camp: costly, intellectual, with first rate speakers and plush--if faded--accommodations.