Eternal Flame Falls

Sunday  10 July 2011 10am and John and I are on the road again.  It’s about a 25 mile drive – maybe 45 minutes or so – this time out to Eternal Flame Falls in Chestnut Ridge Park. 

For years now, I’ve been hearing about this place.  It’s a natural gas flame that sits behind a small waterfall somewhere in the park.  To this point, I, of course, had never been able to find it, and after a while simply gave up trying to figure it out.  When I’d ask, people would say, “it’s in the park”, but nobody could ever do any better than that.  Yeah.  Over 12 hundred acres and the best they could come up with is “in the park.”  OK, fine.

Well, this Sunday, John presented me with two options:

A:  Skinny Dip Falls – Westfield, NY, approximately 60 miles away and over an hour and a half driving.

B:  Eternal Flame Falls in Chestnut Ridge Park.

Did I mention that I was hung over?  Oh, yeah.  The night before…crimony…I can’t remember, for the life of me, what it was that I had done the night before.  I don’t remember going out, but I know that I don’t generally drink at home….ohhh…I remember now.  Dinner and drinks with a friend and her husband.  Right…so there’s that.  Moving right along.  So, I was good any hung over and the thought of spending more than an hour and a half on the bike, followed by a tromp through the woods, followed by another hour and half back…not real palatable.

Off to Eternal Flame Falls, I go.

John, displaying remarkable forethought, packed a couple bottles of water in a cooler, a flashlight and some bug repellant.  I’d have kissed him…if I didn’t think it was a little gross.  I swapped out my helmet for his; he wired his with mics so that we could chat while we ride, and off we went.

It was not at all an unpleasant ride.  The day hadn’t yet started to get too very hot but it wasn’t cold enough to ride without a jacket.  We chatted about this or that and we pulled up to park the bikes at the southern end of the park.  OK…this is where I’d been going wrong all this time.  Problem solved, as just as we parked the bike, there was a large sign with a trail map of the way straight down to the falls…naturally.

Also, worthy of a “naturally”, John decided that we weren’t going to be taking the main trail down, as he knew a “better” way to get there.  My heart sighed in resignation, and we set off after LIBERALLY coating ourselves (and subsequently everything within a five foot radius) with bug repellant. 

We plunged into the underbrush and started down a hill.  The first thing that I came across was this:

LEAF

After I'd gotten past the heart attack that came with the premonition of fall, we moved on.

Approximately 15 minutes down, I came across this little guy:

And, about the minute I stopped to take the picture with the Nikon (which I’d FINALLY remembered to bring), I realized that I had left my cell phone sitting on my gloves on the tank of the Harley parked on the side of the road.  Fabulous. 

Crashing back up the hill we go.

Turns out it was rather a happy accident, as John realized that there was a better route we could be taking, which, I think, was his way of saying he’d taken a wrong turn right out of the gate
We soon found ourselves on a walked down path that just as quickly lead to a shallow stream.  As we walked, picking our way from rock to rock, we’d stop to take our pictures and try to avoid breaking our necks.

There's not a whole lot that I need to be saying, but I'll walk you down a bit of the path with John and I:

OK...We didn't get as far as I thought we would before I got hung up on the next narrative.  We walked for not too very long before we encountered our first "down":

So down we went.  As most of the walls along the path were slate/shale, we picked our way carefully until we reached the bottom not too very far below:

Ok....so what say, we just walk for a few minutes....?

And then, the second 'shroom of the day:



And a little closer look at his majesty:

And, on we went.  We came to our next down a fwe minutes on...This was the big one.

Not a great shot, but...did I happen to mention shale, slate, loose rock.  Yeah.  I wasn't looking for a quick trip down.  Needless to say, we had to find an alternative...

And there you have it.  The way down.  John led the way, stopping to take a couple shots before he started down:

And, the picture he was taking?  Well...have a look...

OK...kinda glad I didn't see that before I decided that I was "in for a pound".  I sidled over to him and took my own look:

Ah geez. 

With the exception of the camera bag wanting to slide around to the front of me every time I reached for another root, the descent was fairly easy and before I had time to freak out and ask myself what the hell I was doing, we reached the first landing:

Beautiful.

The next level down was a tiny bit more tricky.  It was down the loose rock sides (of which there are no pictures, as it took everything I had not to break my neck) the rest of the way to the bottom...to the eternal flame:

OK....as you might have noticed, this wasn't exactly the most...engaging post I've dropped on you to this point. 

I'm distracted.  Big.  My brain is full and I need to get what's in, out before I can post something like this again...I'll keep you posted........................................