East Coast Epic: Happy Accidents

Flexible. I hadn't had any intention of ending up in New York a week prior to finding myself in the state. My sister and I had planned a summer west coast trip, complete with glaciers, tide pools, and volcanoes. Life got in the way, however, and four days before I was supposed to fly to Montana we cancelled the trip. Being me, I was still itching to go somewhere, so I sat down at my computer and started looking, finally coming up with a list of places I wanted to see but no defined route or timeline to see them. I basically just started driving. Okay, there was a little bit more to it than that, but that planning process if for another post. Somehow, some way, instead of ending up in Montana I ended up on the exact opposite side of the country, meandering my way through the state of New York along the Great Lakes.

When I made tentative plans to hit up New York, crossing off another state on my list, I reached out to a friend living in Toronto, figuring if I were that close it'd be worth a shot to see if she could meet up. She could during the evening toward the beginning of my East Coast Epic, so I needed to find something to occupy myself until she was available. We made plans to meet in Niagara Falls on the US side of the border because I don't have a passport (yet!) and I set out from my campsite in Pennsylvania with no plan in mind but to see where the road might take me.

That ended up being a pretty great plan, because otherwise I never would have stumbled into a beautiful state park along the New York/Pennsylvania border. Allegany State Park boasts multiple fishing lakes nestled among the rolling wooded hills typical of the northeastern part of the United States, bisected by a couple of paved roads and an awesome dirt road. Waterfalls splash just down little hiking trails from the side of the road, and hundreds of butterflies flutter in open meadows full of wildflowers. I spent the better part of a day in the park, driving its roads and exploring the woods and meadows. I even drove that dirt road twice because it was so much fun. Happy accidents can happen, and it totally pays to not have a complete plan in place when you're exploring a new place. If you're ever in the area I would definitely check out this little park!