When It Rains in the Finger Lakes

When it rains in the hills around the Finger Lakes, water hits the ground.

When water hits the ground, it runs mainly along the rocky surface of the steep hills surrounding the lakes until it finds one of the many pretty little ravines that feed the lakes every few hundred feet.

Then it splashes in lovely little cascades down from the hills, and into the lake.  

Tempting to sip if not for the agriculture going on above.

Most of the time.

Every once in a while, an especially strong storm dumps its load of rain directly into the watershed of a few of these streams, but even then, all is well since the water is contained in streambeds more than adequate to handle the volume of water.

Unless, of course, the highway that passes above the places of merriment below has a culvert that gets plugged with sticks and stones and even broken bones (bones not so often, but they could certainly plug the culvert).

The opening to the culvert is supposed to be just to the right of the puddle.
The stream is still flowing, so this small volume of water is getting through.
I hope there is no rain coming before the people we pay with our taxes
get back here to fully expose the opening.

When the culvert plugs, water no longer runs downhill for awhile.  It backs up and then flows over the highway and finds new unconventional paths of least resistance.

A rather disorienting view of the downhill side of the highway.
I'm surprised there was not more damage to the roadway.

I got a note from our neighbors.  "You're not going to like what happened to your beach."  So I had to investigate.

You may be thinking that dealing with damage on vacation property is a nice problem to have, and you'd be right, but such things are problems, nonetheless.

This is where we prefer the water to flow.
The log is new, so you can tell how much water was flowing even here.

I missed the beginning of the cleanup.
Here, some of the gravel washed down from above has been bulldozed
out of the road into a currently unusable parking spot.

You might ask, "Where did the gravel come from?"
Let's just say I would not park here now.

This back yard was never "lawn beautiful,"
but it was never a rock wash before.
Note that Hillbillies must have snuck in after the storm 
and placed that other stuff.
 

Water moves some pretty good size rocks.

I'm very happy that the water did not enter or undermine the building.

Like it did the driveway.

I commend David and Chaz for the work they did on these steps.
While much of the backfilled gravel has moved on,
the step-defining 4-by-4s did not budge.

While the steps did well, I can't say the same for the driveway down to the lake.
From the newly established ravine, it looks like a river ran through it.

Ferocious guard dog surveys the new rock garden that used to be a lawn.

It's great to have a new set of stepping stones to the boathouse.

Boats all still in place, but the post-storm water is full of debris.

We'll be happy if the stream stays in this channel in the future.

I took advantage of this new vantage point
on the newly formed point to make the following point.
A week ago, I'd have been standing here in water at least knee deep.

There were more leaf bags here before the storm.
Also, the raging water has provided me with a new opportunity for improving this parking spot.
Or perhaps I'll just leave the big hole beyond the cones
as a secret passage to the beach.

The beach has receded a bit, but that generally comes and goes.
The next storm may push some of it back up.
Do you like our "Man on Cellphone" statue near the back?

That little point out beyond the willow tree is new.
Perhaps it will stay, and the place will have more land!
And then I'm sure the taxes will go up accordingly.

Not great, but could have been much worse.  But I do wish I'd been there to see it happen.  There would have been great pictures, if I didn't get washed away.

AND NOW, 

A BONUS PHOTO WITH NO LINK TO THE NARRATIVE!

A really lovely stone house on a back road somewhere between Branchport and Canandaigua.
(OK, maybe the stones are a link.)