Winter in New York

This weekend I went to went to a young single adult (YSA) conference* in Ithaca, New York. I had a good time. I didn't take many pictures though. (Others I know did, maybe I'll get them to send me some. Though they are on Facebook; if you're on Facebook, you can see the ones I was tagged in.)

Saturday afternoon we went on a hike. I should say "hike." :) It's more like walking a flat stretch of trail (I hear it's paved, but it was covered with snow and ice, so it was hard to tell). Anyway, this trail wound it's way next to a river, in a gorge, until it finally came to Taughannock Falls. (We were told that it is the highest waterfall east of the Rockies. However, a bit of interenet research this morning showed me that several other places claim that title. So, I'll just say that it was a really awesomely tall waterfall.)

Here are some pictures.

First we drove above to the lookout point. This was our first view.

Then we went down and hiked into the gorge. This is the river. It's frozen! FROZEN! This totally blows my mind.

(This one is the river, NOT the trail.)

Here I am, with the frozen river in the background. This is such beautiful country!

We arrived at the falls. It's mostly frozen, though because the temperature had warmed up to about 40 that day (HEAT WAVE!!), part of the falls were flowing.

Flowing into an icy river below...

This is me again.

And this is me with my friend Reija. She is in med school at Rochester, and showed up to the conference too.





* In a nutshell, these conferences are held to give single Mormons between the ages of 18 and 31 a chance to meet other young, single Mormons. (Especially since the population density of Mormons is so low in these parts.) People drive a couple hours, stay a couple days, and are treated to a variety of activites including a dance, religious speakers, workshops on a variety of topics (both religious and not), service projects, some kind of fun activity, and lots of socializing.