Ace of Diamonds, Fort Klock, and the Sea Angel

Our first adventure today was to visit the Ace of Diamonds mine. We’d learned about Herkimer Diamonds on the Travel Channel and just yesterday realized how close we were to the source. As we walked between the car and the shop we watched the people out among the rocks with safety glasses, gloves, and sledge hammers but rather than spending time and energy on trying to mine for our own finds we just visited with Ted Smith in his shop and purchased a few delightful examples of these double terminated quartz crystals before we continued east. From the AAA Tour Book we knew there were some historic sites we could visit along our route. We stopped at Fort Klock. It was built as a family home by Johannes Klock in 1750 right along the King’s Road but it was built like a fortress with firing ports located all around the house to resist raids by British and their allies during the French & Indian and the Revolutionary Wars. We spent hours here with our extremely knowledgeable guide who is married to one of the Klock descendants. It was a fascinating step back in time. Then as we left there we happened upon another of the Erie Canal locks, We parked the car and walked up just as the Sea Angel was entering the lock. We chatted briefly with the couple aboard. They are from Minneapolis and have recently sold everything and are sailing the Sea Angel to the Florida Keys for Christmas and then on to the Caribbean. They have no definite plans for now, just a desire to start a new life somewhere warm. From there we headed into the Adirondacks and got a camping site at Sacandaga Campground, Site 75 which the ranger called the Honeymoon Suite. How appropriate since we are beginning our 40th Anniversary celebration. It’s a wonderful site with enough privacy and a view of the river. We had no power and knowing that we’ll be in the Adirondack Park through the long weekend we started trying to eat up the cold foods so dinner was leftover steak cooked up with the last of the eggs and some other leftovers. Yum!