Honestly, we’ve been getting a little bit of cabin fever with our lack of traveling to entirely new places!! We love traveling and seeing new places, and we spent a lot of the summer discovering parks on Long Island that we’ve never been to. While Long Island is amazing, we needed a bit of a change – so we headed upstate to Ithaca this past September. We actually went to the Ithaca area on three separate short trips, and this was the second one! 

We were literally in Ithaca for about 24 hours, so we wasted no time!! We got there in the early evening and went straight to Taughannock Falls. It is located within a state park right on a lake, so there are a lot of different views to see, but Taughannock Falls is the main attraction for visitors! We didn’t stop here, but you can stop at the Taughannock Visitor’s Center, and there is a great view of the falls from there, right near a parking lot. The view is perfect for getting another vantage point, or if you aren’t able to walk to the base of the falls itself. There are a few different trails, and we took the Gorge trail along the creek to the base of the falls. It was a very easy walk along the gorge, and the path was really wide. It wasn’t crowded at all when we were there, but it was nice that the trail had so much space so we didn’t have to worry about passing by others. The creek bed was completely dry and a lot of people were walking on the rocks.

We walked to the waterfall on the trail, which didn’t take long at all, then reached the waterfall.. Which was pretty dry as well!! It was literally a trickle!! We knew the waterfall wasn’t going to be wild because of the time of year that we visited and the lack of recent rainfall, but also because we saw photos online taken just a few days before. We giggled at the view and told ourselves we would be back when the waterfall was flowing!! It was still a really cool sight to see, and we spent some time exploring near the base of the falls.

We walked back in the creek bed, jumping across rocks and enjoying the freedom of being able to walk there. When we got back to the car, it was time for dinner! We originally planned on going to Ithaca Beer Co, but when we got there it was pretty crowded and the line for food was extremely long! We were hungry, so we left and headed to downtown Ithaca. We ended up eating at Ithaca Ale House which was a nice compromise because hey, we still had beer!

We started our next morning at Buttermilk Falls! Because of COVID, the trails were one way only. We parked in the main parking lot . There is a large waterfall right near the parking lot, but there wasn’t much going on waterfall-wise when we were there. The beginning of the hike had a bit of a steep climb. Once we reached the top, the trail brought us around the rim of the gorge. We couldn’t see much below, but it was a nice walk through the woods. Halfway through, the trail ends in a way and comes to a road. Across the street, there was another parking lot, which is the Upper Buttermilk Falls parking lot. We ended up following the people in front of us and wandered over to that side of the park, but it was the wrong way for the gorge!! When you get to the road, do not cross the street. Turn right, and then you will see a fence and a trail to continue to the gorge. If you start at this parking lot, you will start by walking through the gorge right away, but then you will end with a lot of uphill climbing. We would definitely recommend parking in the main parking lot, because you will forget about that uphill climbing once you get to the gorge!!

While the water levels weren’t extremely high, we were happy that there was water there, so we were able to see little falls and everything in action. We kept stopping along the way to admire how picturesque the place was!

We were lucky that there weren’t too many people there since it was a weekday, but we encountered the most amount of people near the gorge because everyone was so excited so they were stopping. Still, it was less than a handful of people and not bad at all. We followed the gorge back to the parking lot after spending about two hours there, had a snack, and went on our way to our next stop!

Our next stop was just 5 minutes away to … you guessed it.. Another gorge trail!! We went to Robert H. Treman State Park, which has SO many waterfalls throughout it! This park was more developed, but we definitely enjoyed it. It was a nice mix between walking through the woods, hills and stairs, and just enjoying nature!

This park was a little more crowded, but not really crowded by any regular means!! While the waterfalls weren’t crazy because of the rainfall, it was still cool to see the water cascading slowly off the rocks!  We spent two and a half hours meandering through the park. We probably could have spent a little more time there, but with the hills and the stairs, we wanted to finish as fast as possible because our legs were getting tired from the day! We took our time near the gorge, and walked faster through the woods. 

We stopped for lunch, then headed to Ithaca Falls. You literally park, walk for a minute or two, and you are at this giant waterfall!! We were happy because there was some water flowing, and we imagined what it would be like with decent rainfall! It was the perfect easy stop to end the day, because our legs were tired after all the up and down on the trails we spent the earlier part of the day on! We spent about half an hour here. It would be a nice place to bring your lunch and just sit down and enjoy the views. 

Every time we go to Ithaca, we know we will be back again because there are so many awesome and scenic hikes in the area. We are grateful for all of our opportunities to go upstate, but usually it’s just for a night or two. We definitely made the most out of this trip!!!