Don't Overlook the View

I spent this last weekend with our gorgeous brother and sister mountains in the North Country; the Adirondacks. We stayed with a friend at her granddaddy’s cabin (accessible only by boat) on Saranac Lake. It was gorgeous. Every day there was fishing in crystal lakes, hiking in cool, monumental forests, napping in a hammock as the loons called to the sun. The mist on the water provided an eerie morning scene while blue herons seamlessly scooped up fish and young eagles hovered over our canoe. Needless to say, it was a rich landscape and I was hard-pressed to leave it.

On the return trip, as we slowly made our way south and got into Berkshire territory, I felt a vague sense of disappointment at the landscape. There was no cabin, no mist, no craggy mountains (not by Adirondack standards anyway) and no bite in the air.

Home was not where my heart was.

On Monday morning, I peeled myself out of bed to cover a story in Richmond. On the ride through West Stockbridge the fields shone golden in the morning sun and as I approached Richmond the farms became increasingly evident (and the farm smells increasingly potent). My disappointment was fast turning to awe as the road curved this way and that.

It was shaping up to be a perfect day except that I am stubborn and had not had the luxury of casting a line that morning.

I stopped at the store at Bartlett’s Orchard and shamelessly devoured a cider doughnut while chugging fresh coffee (don’t worry I paid for them first). Continuing on my way I decided to take a detour up Lenox Branch Road, that’s when I stumbled upon Olivia’s Overlook.

Situated between West Stockbridge Mountain and Lenox Mountain, the overlook which is owned by the Berkshire Natural Resources Council, is located on Yokun Ridge. The sight is essentially a circular parking lot surrounded first by a stone wall and then densely foliated land and then woods (there is also a path that I will be exploring most likely during the hurricane!). On a clear day, which it was, the blue oasis of the Stockbridge Bowl and its surrounding hills and mountains, can be seen through an opening (which was cleared to make room for a pipeline years ago) in the trees and landscape. Perched on the stone wall with my locally grown apple and my camera, I felt the residual disappointment of the morning wash away.

This is a beautiful place, with beautiful sights and sounds and smells, and damn good coffee and cider doughnuts. We can always learn to appreciate the view if we just change our position. So far I’ve returned to the overlook twice and I cannot wait to see the view when it is ablaze with autumn foliage.