After I had slept in a quiet motel and my check engine light had gone off [here], I drove on to the famous town of Ithaca. Which is just around the corner from Rome, Syracuse, and Etna by the way. I just love the way U.S. Americans have named their towns. Ithaca itself would probably be the most boring little town in the middle of nowhere if it weren’t for the famous Ivy League Cornell University, which was established there in 1865. Now, I didn’t want to take a closer look at the university itself because one of my former students in Istanbul has been accepted there. Since she is going to move there in a few weeks, I will go to visit her and properly explore the campus then. Instead, I went to see the huge Cornell University Botanic Gardens.
I actually only knew about them because there had been a special on the Fingure Lakes Region in the travel section of the New York Times recently [here]. Tearing that page from my Saturday newspaper had basically been my whole preparation for the trip. But the journalist was absolutely right: The Cornell Botanic Gardens are amazing and worth a visit.
I arrived early, at around 9.30 a.m. when most parking spaces were still empty. I paid to park there for three hours, which was the maximum, then picked up a map of the botanic gardens, and then looked for coffee. Fortunately, there is a little shop at the entrance also selling freshly brewed coffee. After the first few sips I felt ready to explore the 71 ha big gardens. Well, I didn’t
© janavar